Missing Documentation on how to apply changes from one file to another in Github

[vanessaavviles]

Overview

We need to add a description of how to apply changes from one GitHub file to another, so that developers can synchronize changes and keep files up-to-date.

Action Items

• Add content in the What's missing? section below to a new numbered item and linked page here: https://hackforla.github.io/peopledepot/contributing/howto/, editing or revising if necessary

Resources/Instructions/Tags

• 1.01 git, diff, patch, moved content

Documentation Addition Notes

What's missing?

Here's how to apply changes from one GitHub file to another:

1. Rebase/Merge your feature branch to main.

2. Undo changes to the file you changed (replacing CONTRIBUTING.md with the relevant filename):

git reset upstream/main -- CONTRIBUTING.md

3. Now switch to the unmerged branch with the changes (replacing our-branch-original with the relevant branch name):

git switch our-branch-original

4. Create a patch of the changes (replacing with relevant filename):

git format-patch hackforla/main CONTRIBUTING.md
# only changes to CONTRIBUTING.md
# include changes since we branched off from hackforla/main
# may need to create a temporary branch where hackforla/main used to be for this command

# output:
# 0001-add-to-dev-environment.patch

5. Switch to the rebased branch without the changes to the file (in this example CONTRIBUTING.md):

git switch our-branch-rebased

6. Apply the patch to the other file (in this example, docs/contributing/dev_environment.md:

patch -p1 docs/contributing/dev_environment.md 0001-add-to-dev-environment.patch

Where should it go?

When would this information have been useful?

• This information would be useful in situations where complex changes have been made - for example::

1. You made a change to CONTRIBUTING.md, unmerged.
2. Another dev split CONTRIBUTING.md into several files and it's merged into main.
   • The place you made the change in CONTRIBUTING.md is now in a file called contributing/dev_environment.md
   • git can't merge your change automatically. (git tracks renames, but not splits)
3. By using the patch described above to apply the change semi-automatically, you can avoid having to type (copy/paste) the change manually into contributing/dev_environment.md

Which roles will benefit most from this information?

• Backend/ Dev