Git can feel like dark magic sometimes, but understanding its core tenets radically simplifies using it!
Fundamentals are critical
With a tool as rich as Git, it’s easy to get lost in the details or to stop looking beyond symptoms.
The risk is even greater when you come from a self-styled version management tool (say, Subversion) that actually only offers a tiny set of features: not only can you get confused with unfortunate same-name commands, but you have no idea what becomes possible, so it’s hard to understand why Git behaves the way it does.
The best way to learn more easily about its numerous commands and capabilities is to start by exploring its core concepts. Why do we have 5 zones instead of 2? What is the index/stage anyway? What even is HEAD and why does it show up all over the place? Why do we talk about a history graph? How is branch management different?
Thanks to a solid understanding of Git’s core tenets, you’ll find that mechanisms such as branches, resets, cherry-picks, merges and rebases suddenly make a lot more sense…
(Ce cours est également disponible en français.)
The risk is even greater when you come from a self-styled version management tool (say, Subversion) that actually only offers a tiny set of features: not only can you get confused with unfortunate same-name commands, but you have no idea what becomes possible, so it’s hard to understand why Git behaves the way it does.
The best way to learn more easily about its numerous commands and capabilities is to start by exploring its core concepts. Why do we have 5 zones instead of 2? What is the index/stage anyway? What even is HEAD and why does it show up all over the place? Why do we talk about a history graph? How is branch management different?
Thanks to a solid understanding of Git’s core tenets, you’ll find that mechanisms such as branches, resets, cherry-picks, merges and rebases suddenly make a lot more sense…
(Ce cours est également disponible en français.)
Animated diagrams galore
There’s no better way to drive these points home than to take you through step-by-step, visual animations of what each concept is about and what goes on under the hood. And Maxime spared no effort making these for you. You'll see: plenty of “aha!” moments coming up!
So what’s in this course?
The outline goes like this:
Version management
Version management
- Why manage versions?
- Version management ≠ backups
- Evolution of version control systems
- Benefits of a decentralized approach
Understanding Git
- Git’s origins
- A words about the wealth of commands
- Zones, states, and file lifecycles
Demystifying Git by looking under the hood
- The Git repo: a filesystem
- Content-addressable entities
- Blobs, Trees, Commits and Tags; also, commit-ish and tree-ish
- The index / stage
- References and history buildup
7 videos
1 file
1 text file
So what’s in this course?
Best of all, IT’S FREE! 😍💰
This knowledge is sort of a pre-requisite for all our upcoming Git video courses. In fact, this mini-course is so necessary to so many people we decided to make it free. Forever.
So just grab it already, and enjoy!
So just grab it already, and enjoy!
FAQs
😎 Should I already know Git?
Not at all! This is a no-pre-requisite course, that acts as a foundation for all our upcoming courses. You don't need to know or use Git yet… but if you do, this will undoubtedly clarify a lot of things for you! 😉
😎 Do I need prior version control experience?
Nope! If you somehow escaped Subversion, CVS, TFS, Perforce, ClearCase etc. it’s actually better: you won’t need to ”unlearn“ the dodgy concepts or implicit limitations of your former tool. It often makes it easier to learn Git, kinda like how never having used MS Office makes it easier to get into LibreOffice or the Apple productivity suite.
📥 Can I download the videos for offline viewing?
Yes! Every section opening contains a link to a Zip file with all the MP4 video files for that section, that you can download to view or review when you’re offline. Note that a low bandwidth is enough to watch them online, though, and that gets you extras like transcripts and related contents.
🆓 Do you offer other free Git-related content?
Do we ever! Our tech articles on Git are many and in-depth; you'll also find a number of videos from our conference talks or meetups about Git and how to streamline your workflows with it. Some examples:
🎓 Do you do in-room trainings?
We sure do! We probably offer one of the world’s best Git trainings: 360° Git. 3 days to explore Git in-depth, from scratch, unlocking all its power and with tons of hands-on practical exercises.
A course by Maxime
Maxime Bréhin has been using Git daily since 2008, and has been a professional trainer on it since 2015. An expert on Git and on the productivity and workflow boosts it enables, Maxime lays here rock-solid foundational understanding that makes it much easier to learn Git commands and features.