about.md

What is staging and why would I care?

If you just started with git, you probably have no concept of the stage (or as some people confusingly call it index). In other version control systems, the only thing you can select is which files you want to commit. However, git not only allows you to do that but also which parts of a file you want to select.

Unfortunately, the built-in command line tooling for that (provided via git add -p) is pretty hard to use and takes way too long.

Demo

Full a quick demo, check out my video on YouTube:

What git istage does

When you run git istage inside your repo, it shows you the set of current changes, i.e. the output of git diff. But in contrast to git diff, you can select individual lines and add them to the stage by hitting S. You can also permanently remove changes from your working copy by hitting R (be careful: there is no undo for that operation).

At any point you can view the staged changes (i.e. the output of git diff --cached). If you decided that there are certain portions you don't want to commit, you simply unstage the selected lines by hitting U.

All three shortcuts can be modified using Shift. In that case it will apply to all consecutive changes, called a block.

In order to quickly navigated you can use ← and →, which will jump between files, and [ and ], which will jump from block to block.

You can also customize the way the changes are presented. By using + and - to increase or decrease the number of contextual lines being displayed. Alternatively, you can use \ to toggle between viewing entire files or changes only.

When you are done, simply return to the command line by hitting Esc or Q. Once there, I recommend you run git stash -u -k, which will stash all changes you didn't stage so you can test the code you're about to commit. Or, you can stash right from inside of git istage by hitting Alt S. Once satisfied, run git commit and unstash via git stash pop.

More keyboard shortcuts listed below. A shortcut may be preceded by a number, N. Notes in parentheses indicate the behavior if N is given.

Keyboard shortcuts

Shortcut	Description
Esc	Return to command line.
Q	Return to command line.
C	Author commit
Alt C	Authors commit with --amend option
Alt S	Stashes changes from the working copy, but leaves the stage as-is.
T	Toggle between working copy changes and staged changes.
R	When viewing the working copy, removes the selected line from the working copy.
S	When viewing the working copy, stages the selected line.
U	When viewing the stage, unstages the selected line.
Shift R	When viewing the working copy, removes the selected block from the working copy.
Shift S	When viewing the working copy, stages the selected block.
Shift U	When viewing the stage, unstages the selected block.
+	Increases the number of contextual lines.
-	Decreases the number of contextual lines.
\	Toggles between viewing entire files and changes only.
W	Toggles between showing and hiding whitespace.
↑	Selects the previous line.
K	Selects the previous line.
↓	Selects the next line.
J	Selects the next line.
←	Go to the previous file.
→	Go to the next file.
[	Go to previous change block.
]	Go to next change block.
PgUp	Selects the line one screen above.
PgDown	Selects the line one screen below.
Space	Selects the line one screen below.
Home	Selects the first line.
G	Selects the first line (or Line N).
End	Selects the last line.
Shift G	Selects the last line (or Line N).
Ctrl PgUp	Scrolls up by one screen.
Ctrl PgDown	Scrolls down by one screen.
Ctrl ←	Scrolls left by one character,
Ctrl →	Scrolls right by one character,
Ctrl ↑	Scrolls up by one line.
Ctrl ↓	Scrolls down by one line.