like Git way better than all the alternatives. I learn more things about it all the time. Even today, I wondered if there was an easier way to create nicely named patches automatically; and there is. Here's a run down of the more common tips and tricks I've learned.

• git init .

  Create a git repo.

• git add .

  (Adds all files recursively into git.

• git add -u

  (only adds or "stages" removed/changed files.

• git commit -m "Commit message"

  I tend to use double quotes so I'm able to use contractions in the commit message.

• git commit --amend

  Adds more changes to the most recent commit. Use if you haven't pushed yet and missed a couple files or changes in the last commit.

• git rebase

  Stages all the changes at the tip of HEAD.

• git rebase -i

  Interactive rebase to allow for picking and choosing what to pull to the HEAD and re-arrange into multiple commits that make more sense.

• git apply --index

  Applys a patch and stages all newly created files to the index so you don’t “miss” committing a file.

• .gitignore

  All files and paths mentioned in here are ignored by git.

• gitk

  UI on Linux/Mac for viewing and searching the tree.

Common git aliases (from ~/.gitconfig):

[alias]
        diff = diff --word-diff
        a = apply --index
        st = status
        ci = commit
        branch-name = !git for-each-ref --format='%(refname:short)' `git symbolic-ref HEAD`
        cd-root = rev-parse --show-cdup
        branch-diff = !git format-patch --stdout $1 > `git cd-root``git branch-name`.patch

The last three lines in my aliases creates a patch named after the branch. This is particularly useful because I tend to name my branches after the Drupal project and issue description and number. So the patches names are cleanly built as so: htmlpurifier-fixFormError-123456.patch. To use it from the branch, simply call git branch-diff 8.x

Another thing I like to do is remove old branches from time to time. Here's a one liner I use: git branch -D $(git branch | awk '{ if ($0 !~ /7.x|8.x|7.x-1.x|7.x-2.x|8.x-1.x|8.x-2.x/) printf "%s", $0 }')