Getting existing git branches to track remote branches

Question

My usual workflow when working with git, is something like this:

1. create a local repository
2. do some work in that repository, add/change files etc.

Answer 1

Use this command:

git clone [<options>] [--] <repo> [<dir>]

Answer 2

Use the set-upstream arg:

git branch --set-upstream local-branch-name origin/remote-branch-name

Running the above command updates your .git/config file correctly and even verifies with this output:

"Branch local-branch-name set up to track remote branch remote-branch-name from origin."

EDIT: As martijn said: "In version Git v1.8.0, --set-upstream is deprecated. Use --set-upstream-to instead."

git branch --set-upstream-to local-branch-name origin/remote-branch-name

See this for more information.

Answer 3

git help remote should show you what you need to know. I think what you want is

git remote add [remote-name] [remote-url]

# Set a local branch to follow the remote
git config branch.[branch-name].remote [remote-name]

# Set it to automatically merge with a specific remote branch when you pull
git config branch.[branch-name].merge [remote-master]

You can also manually edit .git/config to set these up.

Answer 4

On newer versions of git you can use

git branch --track origin/branch_name

Answer 5

The --set-upstream flag is deprecated and will be removed.

git branch master --set-upstream-to myupstream/master

Answer 6

Fast forward three years (see what I did there :-) ), I tried to pull an untracked branch using Git Bash and received

If you wish to set tracking information for this branch you can do so with:

git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/<branch> develop

The following achieved what I needed:

$ git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/develop develop Branch 'develop' set up to track remote branch 'develop' from 'origin'.