
If you already have a GitHub account, continue to the next section ( GitHub Desktop).

To use GitHub and GitHub Desktop, you will need a GitHub account. There are other services to host Git repositories, but GitHub is a trusted, free service used by organizations across the world, big and small. In short, GitHub is a tool for working with Git. With GitHub, you can back up your personal files, share your code, and collaborate with others. GitHub allows you to store your local Git repositories in the cloud. GitHub is a popular hosting service for Git repositories. Git and GitHub are the same thing…right? Not exactly. The interface we will be working with is called GitHub Desktop.

Using such interfaces helps simplify your development workflow and allows you to focus on your coding instead of spending your time figuring out all of the intricacies of Git. However, today there are ease-of-use interfaces that make it easy to interact with Git without using the command line.

Many people get intimidated by Git at first because they imagine interacting with it might look something like this: You can read more about this change here. Note: In the past GitHub used the term master, but decided to rename the default branch to main. When you make a commit in Git you will see “commit to main.” This is referring to the default branch, which can be thought of as the production-ready version of your project. A commit tells Git that you made some changes which you want to record.
#Update github desktop series#
The file history is a series of snapshots in time, known as commits. It also includes the revision history of each file. A project managed with Git is called a repository.Ī repository contains all of the files and folders associated with your project.
#Update github desktop code#
Git allows you to save drafts of your code so that you can look back at previous versions and potentially undo complicated errors. Nearly 70% of developers use Git, according to a Stack Overflow survey. Git is a widely-used version control system used to manage code.

Version control also makes it easy to rewind to a previous version of your project if, for example, you discover a bug in your code and want to revert to a past version. In simple terms, you can think of it as a Google Doc – for coders.Ī version control system makes it clear which changes to the project are made, who made those changes, and when those changes occurred. A version control system (VCS) can help prevent this issue.Ī version control system helps manage your files and track the history of changes in your projects.
#Update github desktop how to#
