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Questions about Git-Flow Release

khalilm

Hi,

I am using SourceTree and Git-Flow and am wondering if someone could educate me on a few things.

1. The purpose of the Track option in the Push dialog

As per the Git-Flow recommendation, I have two branches, Master and Develop. Whenever I am on the Develop branch and use Git-Flow to Finish a release it prompts this dialog.

The default choice for this tri-state button is always "mixed". And if I just Push it works fine.

However, if I were to choose to push to the master at the same time the track option changes to a checkmark as below.

From another post I found this information.

Checked = Set the remote branch to be the one the local branch should track

Unchecked = Stop the local branch tracking anything

Mixed (-) = Don't change any tracking on this branch, leave it as-is

My question is why does it check it on the master? And how do I correctly push to both branches when finalizing a release? Right now I have to push to the develop. Switch to the master and then push to the master. Would setting the option to "mixed" do the same thing? It seems logical but honestly this whole git thing can be confusing as hell so I don't want to mess up my repository by doing something I shouldn't.

2. Generating a release with new (added) files

My second question is about generating a release with new files in the Develop branch. I dont know if this is right but whenever I do this, the release fails. I then have to go to the master and add the files and then issue the release.

I am not sure why I need to do this extra step since I need files added anyway. And quite honestly from the Git_Flow branching model (https://nvie.com/posts/a-successful-git-branching-model/) it looks like the master just holds all the latest files once the develop branch has been properly vetted. Shouldnt the files just be pushed to master branch automatically? What am I missing?

I apologize in advance if these questions seem basic but git can get very confusing at times for the uninitiated.

TIA

Accepted answers

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Mike Corsaro

Hello!

1. The purpose of the Track option in the Push dialog

Q: "Why does it check it on the master branch"

A: When you check the box to push to the not-current-branch we assume you'd like to associate the tracking branch as well. For the current branch we already know if it's tracked, so we don't explicitly change the setting

Q: "And how do I correctly push to both branches when finalizing a release?"

A: You're on the right track -- just check the box for each branch you'd like to push. You can have it mixed if you know the branch already exists on the remote and is tracked locally but we check the box just in case.

2. Generating a release with new (added) files

Q: "I am not sure why I need to do this extra step since I need files added anyways"

A: I'll need some more info about this -- are you getting a specific error?

khalilm

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the response. Just to follow up on question #1.

"You can have it mixed if you know the branch already exists on the remote and is tracked locally but we check the box just in case."

So since I am using GitFlow which created both branches remotely and I am assuming is also tracked locally, does leaving it mixed or checked do the same thing in this case? Just want to be sure.

I guess in my mind I am confused as to is why this is even an option given the Gitflow process of releases being pushed from the develop branch to the master branch. Again sorry if this seems like a dumb question.

As for #2,

I seem to be having some weird issues with SourceTree. When I try and issue a release it sometimes but not always fails. When it does fail, it switches to the master branch and (randomly?) marks some files from my repository in the unstaged file area as deleted. Unfortunately I didnt get a screen capture of it as I was in a rush to do a release for a customer. But what I had to do is discard the deleted files form the unstaged area which luckily restores the local repository and then I have to manually finish the commit to the master. Then do the release again to close the process.

I think this happens when I do a start and end release too quickly. It appears that the delay in updating the remote seems to affect this. If I wait a few minutes between the start and end of a release then I havent seen this issue (yet). But it has happen a number of times.

I will experiment on a non-critical project and see if I can reproduce what is happening. Or if this happens again on my work project I will post the message here.

Thanks again for the response.

Mike Corsaro

So since I am using GitFlow which created both branches remotely and I am assuming is also tracked locally, does leaving it mixed or checked do the same thing in this case? Just want to be sure.

If you're using GitFlow you probably don't have to worry about it. The mixed checkbox setting I believe will create the remote branch if it doesn't exist and track it (this is a git behavior BTW, we just run the default git push command). Checking the box does an explicit track command after the push. I pretty much never check that box and I've never had any issues.

I guess in my mind I am confused as to is why this is even an option given the Gitflow process of releases being pushed from the develop branch to the master branch. Again sorry if this seems like a dumb question.

Hey, no worries! Git is confusing, and that's the exact reason why we continue to work on Sourcetree 🙂.

That option is there because not everyone uses flow, and the push dialog isn't aware of flow either. Additionally, some users might want to push one branch to another branch that isn't set as the remote tracked branch, or they'd like to push to more than one remote. When making decisions about features we often lean on the side of more options than less due to the number of unique workflows we've seen.

I will experiment on a non-critical project and see if I can reproduce what is happening. Or if this happens again on my work project I will post the message here.

Excellent, thanks!

khalilm

I am still having issues creating a release with new files added. Once ST tries to switch to the master it always gives some sort of error along with, randomly it seems, marking file(s) as deleted. I really am not sure what is going on here.

On running a GitFlow release this is the error I got. Please note that the file in question is ALREADY in the repository and has existed for months. I did however, make a change to it for this release.

At this point, ST has switched from Release to Master and shows the following:

Now in order for me to get this to work correctly, I have to DISCARD the changes to auth.js. Then I have to manually commit the changes. Then switch to Release. Complete the release. Then Push the changes on both branches.

As I noted previously I thought this might be related to completing a release too quickly but I waited a good half hour before completing the release.

So I am not sure why this this happening and what I can do about it. Any ideas why? Am I missing something in the procedure?

Thanks,

Khalil

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