CS 105 Update Log

Git does a lot of stuff. Fortunately, we don’t care about most of it. Here are some tips to make git work for you (and not the other way around).

If you have a flash drive, and would like to use it for the class, git can make that work for you!

Simply insert the flash drive into the computer, and take note as to which letter it gets assigned. In this example, my flash drive was assigned the letter “D.”

First step, open up git-bash. You can do this however you wish, I’m doing it by navigating the start menu -> all programs -> git -> git-bash

Now I need to get to the flash drive. I “cd /d” and now git-bash is open on the flash drive. After we set everything up, you’ll be able to just open your flash drive and right click on the cs105 directory and select “Git-Bash Here,” and not have to do all of these steps. Right now we can’t do that though.

Once you have git-bash open and have it looking in your flash drive (do an “ls” and see if the files are familiar), you can check out the git repository. You do this by typing “git clone git://github.com/michaelee/cs105.git cs105″

You should now have a folder “cs105″ on your flash drive (do an “ls” and make sure). That’s your project directory, you’ll want to change to it (cd cs105). Inside the directory are folders for each lab. Whenever you want to work on a new lab, type “git pull” to get it. You will not need to do any fancy git clone hullabaloo after you’ve done it once. Once you do a “git pull” you should have all of the new files and folders. If you get any error messages, ask your professor, or the TAs, for help. Usually, all that should display is the downloading of files, or “Already up-to-date.”

So, recap:

Setting it up:

1. Insert flash drive

2. Check which letter the flash drive is.

3. Open up git-bash and “cd /<lower-case-drive-letter>”

4. git clone git://github.com/michaelee/cs105.git cs105

5. cd cs105

6. git to work! (ha ha, get it? I so punny)

Using it afterwards:

1. Open flash drive

2. Right click on cs105 folder and select “open git-bash here”

3. git pull

4. work!

Now, you can take your work home with you and use it there, or pull out your flash drive and use it in any of the lab computers (the instructions won’t change), and you don’t have to memorize all the arcane git commands. Fun, eh? If you are interested in what happens behind the scenes, e-mail me and I can explain it in more detail. However this post is designed to help you use git more easily, without necessarily understanding the nitty gritty details (after all, not all of you are mechanics, but you can drive a car; same principle).

-Evan Larkin