10 Essential Git Tricks to Supercharge Your Workflow

1. Git Auto‑Completion

If you use the command line for Git, typing commands manually can be tedious; enable auto‑completion by running the following script on Unix:

cd ~
curl https://raw.github.com/git/git/master/contrib/completion/git-completion.bash -o ~/.git-completion.bash

Then add these lines to your ~/.bash_profile:

if [ -f ~/.git-completion.bash ]; then
    . ~/.git-completion.bash
fi

2. Ignoring Files in Git

Create a .gitignore file and list patterns for files or directories you don’t want Git to track, using ! to negate patterns when needed.

*.pyc
*.exe
my_db_config/

!main.pyc

3. Who Broke My Code?

When something goes wrong, use git blame [file_name] to see the author, commit hash, and timestamp for each line.

4. Viewing Repository History

Beyond git log, three useful options are: --oneline – shows a compact hash and message per commit. --graph – draws a text‑based graph of the history (ineffective for a single branch). --all – displays history of all branches.

Combining them yields concise visual output.

5. Never Lose Track of Commits

If you accidentally reset and lose commits, git reflog lists all HEAD positions on your local machine, allowing you to recover lost work that isn’t part of the remote repository.

6. Staging Partial Changes

Use git add -p [file_name] to interactively select hunks to stage, choosing y to stage, n to skip, e to edit, d to skip to next file, or s to split a hunk.

7. Squashing Multiple Commits

Run git rebase -i HEAD~[number_of_commits] (e.g., git rebase -i HEAD~2) to open an interactive list where you can mark older commits for squashing into a single one.

8. Stashing Uncommitted Changes

When you need to switch context, run git stash to save your work. List stashes with git stash list and restore with git stash apply (optionally specifying a stash identifier).

9. Finding Lost Commits

Besides git reflog, use git fsck --lost-found to locate dangling commits in large repositories, then inspect or merge them with git show [commit_hash] or git merge [commit_hash].

10. Cherry‑Pick

Use git cherry-pick [commit_hash] to apply a single commit from another branch onto your current branch, useful for fixing bugs across multiple branches without merging entire histories.

These ten tips can elevate your Git proficiency, helping you work faster, recover lost work, and maintain a clean project history.