I needed a place to put all of my notes on how to get started and use GitHub. I am not a GitHub master by any means, I am writing this to solidify the few things that I know and to learn a lot more. I want to provide the commands to run but also explain why you are running them. The object is to do 90% from the command line.

Create a GitHub account and log in. Make sure you use a strong password and enable 2FA. Also, add your SSH pub key so that we can make pull/push/clone/etc requests using SSH not HTTPS.

First step it to actually install git on your machine. For this writeup I will be using Debian/Ubuntu. Run the following command in your terminal.

$ sudo apt-get install git

You can verify that it's installed by running the following;

$ which git <- shows the location of the git command

Output: /usr/bin/git

or

$ git --version <- shows the version of git installed

Output: git version 2.7.4

Now you need to set the user and the email in the config file. You can do this with these two commands.

$ git config --global user.name "Your Name" <- Sets your name in the config

$ git config --global user.email "youremail@example.com" <- Sets your default email in the config

Navigate to your home directory and create a directory to house all of your repos.

cd <- Move to your home dir

mkdir repos <- Create a dir in your home

cd repos <- Move to the new dir

mkdir test <- Create a dir for your first repo

cd test <- Move to the new dir

Now that you have a home for your repository it's time to log in to GitHub and add one. Technically you could do this using the API but for simplicity we will create it from your profile in GitHub. Create a public repository named test. On the next screen you should see a "Quick setup" section, save the SSH link to this new repo. It will look something like this: git@github.com:username/test.git. Now lets set it up from the command line, you should be in your test dir.

$ git init <- Creates an empty Git repository

We need to add a new remote so we can make pull/push requests. We will use the git remote add command and pass two arguments with it, the remote name (typically origin) and the SSH link you saved from when you made the repo. The command should look like this:

$ git remote add origin git@github.com:username/test.git

You can see if it worked by running:

$ git remote -v <- Verbose output showing the remote url after name

Output Should look like this:

origin	git@github.com:username/test.git (fetch)

origin	git@github.com:username/test.git (push)

Now we need content to push to the repo. We will start with a simple README.md file. Use your favorite text editor to create the file (vim, vi, nano, etc)

$ nano README.md

Now that you made the file lets add some content, you can add anything you want or just copy and paste the following:

# Hello World

Testing my first repository

## GitHub uses markdown to format text.

You can create a new line by adding a blank line after blocks of text.

Like this.

You can also add `code` with back ticks and blocks with triple back ticks.

Save your changes to README.md and exit your editor. Next lets check the status of the repo.

$git status

Output:

On branch master

No commits yet

Untracked files:
  (use "git add <file>..." to include in what will be committed)

	README.md

nothing added to commit but untracked files present (use "git add" to track)

We can see the README.md file is not being tracked so we need to add it now. We can add everything thats in this dir by running:

$ git add . <- Adds everything in the current editor

or

git add README.md <- Adds just this file.

Now running the status command should look like this:

$ git status

On branch master

No commits yet

Changes to be committed:
  (use "git rm --cached <file>..." to unstage)

	new file:   README.md

Now we have a file that is being tracked and we have made changes to it. Lets commit these changes and get ready to push them.

$ git commit -a <- Commit all changes, you will be prompted to make a brief note of the changes.

$ git push origin master <- Pushes commits made locally to the remote repo. Uses git push REMOTENAME BRANCHNAME syntax.

Refresh your GitHub page and you should see the readme in all its glory.

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