Default behavior of “git push” without a branch specified

Question

I use the following command to push to my remote branch:

git push origin sandbox

If I say

git push origin

Answer 1

You can control the default behavior by setting push.default in your git config. From the git-config(1) documentation:

push.default

Defines the action git push should take if no refspec is given on the command line, no refspec is configured in the remote, and no refspec is implied by any of the options given on the command line. Possible values are:

• nothing: do not push anything

• matching: push all matching branches

  All branches having the same name in both ends are considered to be matching.

  This used to be the default, but not since Git 2.0 (simple is the new default).

• upstream: push the current branch to its upstream branch (tracking is a deprecated synonym for upstream)

• current: push the current branch to a branch of the same name

• simple: (new in Git 1.7.11) like upstream, but refuses to push if the upstream branch's name is different from the local one

  This is the safest option and is well-suited for beginners.

  This mode has become the default in Git 2.0.

The simple, current and upstream modes are for those who want to push out a single branch after finishing work, even when the other branches are not yet ready to be pushed out

Command line examples:

To view the current configuration:

git config --global push.default

To set a new configuration:

git config --global push.default current

Answer 2

You can push current branch with command

git push origin HEAD

(took from here)

Answer 3

Rather than using aliases, I prefer creating git-XXX scripts so I can source control them more easily (our devs all have a certain source controlled dir on their path for this type of thing).

This script (called git-setpush) will set the config value for remote.origin.push value to something that will only push the current branch:

#!/bin/bash -eu

CURRENT_BRANCH=$(git branch | grep '^\*' | cut -d" " -f2)
NEW_PUSH_REF=HEAD:refs/for/$CURRENT_BRANCH

echo "setting remote.origin.push to $NEW_PUSH_REF"
git config remote.origin.push $NEW_PUSH_REF

note, as we're using Gerrit, it sets the target to refs/for/XXX to push into a review branch. It also assumes origin is your remote name.

Invoke it after checking out a branch with

git checkout your-branch
git setpush

It could obviously be adapted to also do the checkout, but I like scripts to do one thing and do it well

Answer 4

I have added the following functions into my .bashrc file to automate these tasks. It does git push/git pull + name of current branch.

function gpush()
{
  if [[ "x$1" == "x-h" ]]; then
    cat <<EOF
Usage: gpush
git: for current branch: push changes to remote branch;
EOF
  else
    set -x
    local bname=`git rev-parse --abbrev-ref --symbolic-full-name @{u} | sed -e "s#/# #"`
    git push ${bname}
    set +x
  fi
}

function gpull()
{
  if [[ "x$1" == "x-h" ]]; then
    cat <<EOF
Usage: gpull
git: for current branch: pull changes from
EOF
  else
    set -x
    local bname=`git rev-parse --abbrev-ref --symbolic-full-name @{u} | sed -e "s#/# #"`
    git pull ${bname}
    set +x
  fi
}

Answer 5

git push origin will push all changes on the local branches that have matching remote branches at origin As for git push

Works like git push <remote>, where <remote> is the current branch's remote (or origin, if no remote is configured for the current branch).

From the Examples section of the git-push man page

Answer 6

I just put this in my .gitconfig aliases section and love how it works:

pub = "!f() { git push -u ${1:-origin} `git symbolic-ref HEAD`; }; f"

Will push the current branch to origin with git pub or another repo with git pub repo-name. Tasty.