On Tue, Feb 4, 2025 at 1:08 PM D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > On Mon, Feb 3, 2025 at 7:28 PM Bram van Oosterhout > <adriaanbram0712@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > > > Ahhhh, this thread explains my confusion when, even though git locally > > tells me my branch is "up to date", a fetch demonstrates the branch is > > not up to date. > > > > Which begs the question: Why does git say: "Your branch is up to date > > ..." if at best it can say: "Your > > branch MIGHT BE up to date with ..."? > > > Well, the branch _is_ up to date with your remote-tracking branch [1] > origin/main; that doesn't mean the tracking branch is up-to-date with > the repository origin's branch main! > > I find it helpful to break the notion for newcomers early on that > origin/main somehow is "equal to" the repository named by origin's > main branch. Git (mostly) only communicates with remote repos when you > fetch, push, or, pull—in other words (and this bit may be more for > Manuel), try to reinforce that things Git knows locally are only local > and not inherently tied to other repositories. Learning this > distributed lesson proves hard in my experience but explains a lot > about the reality of how Git operates. > > Exceptions to the "remote communication" rule I can think of that > probably don't need to clutter things for beginners: > - git-maintenance has pre-fetching as a default task > - git ls-remote lists remote refs by communicating with the remote > > > I have learned not to rely on the message and come to expect > > (sometimes nasty) surprises when I return to a project after a few > > months, > > > > Bram > > And thus `git fetch [--all]` because a part of your typical workflow, > or something like `git pull --rebase [origin [main]]` before pushing. Thanks all for the education. I have always read the message "Your branch is up to date with 'origin/main'." as "Your branch is up to date with _main_ at _origin_", with _origin_ being the remote repo. I now understand it says: Your branch is up to date _according to_ the information available at .git/refs/remotes/origin/main. Since that is a local file , I can reasonably expect the info to be stale when I return to my repo after 6 months and I should do a git fetch to assess the situation Thanks again. Bram > > [1]: https://git-scm.com/docs/gitglossary#Documentation/gitglossary.txt-aiddefremotetrackingbrancharemote-trackingbranch > > -- > D. Ben Knoble
