GitHub Commit - Shell/Bash

As a programmer, you may be familiar with Git, a widely used version control system for software development. And GitHub, a web-based platform built on Git, provides a collaborative environment for teams or individuals to manage their code projects.

One of the important steps in software development is to commit changes to the codebase, which tracks the history of a project's files and helps to detect and fix bugs or conflicts. And the command-line interface (CLI) is a common tool used by developers to interact with Git and GitHub.

In this article, we will introduce you to how to make a commit on GitHub using Shell or Bash commands.

Step 1: Configure Git on Your Computer

Before starting, you need to ensure Git is installed on your computer and configured correctly. You may need to run the following commands to set your name and email address for the commit:

$ git config --global user.name "Your Name"
$ git config --global user.email "your_email@example.com"

Step 2: Create or Modify Your Code Files

Next, you can use your preferred text editor, such as vim or nano, to create or modify files in your local repository. For example, you can create a new file called hello.py.

$ nano hello.py

And you can add some Python code to it, such as:

print("Hello, GitHub!")

Step 3: Add Your Changes to the Staging Area

After you have modified your files, you need to stage your changes, which means adding your changes to the staging area that is ready to be committed. You can use the git add command, followed by the file name or a wild card (*) to add all changes in the current directory, recursively.

$ git add hello.py

Step 4: Commit Your Changes with a Meaningful Message

Once you have staged your changes, it's time to commit them. A good rule of thumb is to write a meaningful commit message that describes the changes you made in a concise and readable way. For example:

$ git commit -m "Add a Python script that prints a greeting message"

You can also use a more elaborate message with a body section to explain the details of your changes. In that case, you can use the -m option to specify only the summary and let your text editor open to enter the body.

$ git commit -m "Add a Python script that prints a greeting message" -e

Step 5: Push Your Changes to GitHub

Finally, after you have committed your changes, you need to push them to GitHub so that others can see and collaborate with your code. You can use the git push command, followed by the remote name and the branch name that you want to push to, such as origin and master.

$ git push origin master

And voila! You have successfully committed your changes to GitHub using Shell or Bash commands. Keep coding and happy sharing!

Note: For a more advanced use case, you may want to learn how to use Git branches and merges, pull requests, and other GitHub features. Also, you may want to automate your commit process using Git hooks, such as pre-commit or post-commit hooks that run scripts before or after committing. Feel free to explore and experiment with these Git/GitHub features to improve your development workflow.