The Easy GIT Crash Course For Beginners

I put off learning GIT for 17 years. Don’t be like me. Get started today.

Photo by Isaac Smith on Unsplash

Many aspiring data engineers and developers put off learning GIT because it seems complex and scary.

Well, I have some bad news for you. GIT is complex and scary. But there’s a silver lining: 90% of the time, the basics work every time. And that lingering 10% is handled by your senior and principal engineers.

When you finish reading this article, you will have a firm grasp of the all-important basics mentioned above. Let’s look at the essential GIT terminology first, then cover a few examples of getting things done with GIT commands.

Essential GIT Terminology

Repository: A repository (repo for short) is where your code lives, including its version history. GIT is a tool for version control, and a repository is the main component of its ecosystem.

Example: You’re building a simple website with a single homepage HTML file. Your project repository will include every homepage version you add.

Repositories can be local or remote. A local repository is stored on your computer, and a remote repository is hosted on a platform like GitHub, Bitbucket, or GitLab.