📝 GitHub Workflow: Cherry-Pick & Merge to a Specific Branch

📌 Purpose

This guide provides a detailed workflow for cherry-picking individual commits and merging entire branches into a specific target branch using Git and GitHub. Useful when:

• You need to bring selected commits from one branch into another.
• You want to fully merge the contents of a feature branch into a base branch.
• You're collaborating via GitHub and want to manage changes efficiently.

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🧰 Prerequisites

• Git installed on your machine
• GitHub repository access
• Branches already created
• Familiarity with terminal or Git client

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🔀 What is Cherry-picking?

Cherry-picking means taking one or more individual commits from one branch and applying them onto another branch.

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🔄 What is Merging?

Merging combines the entire history of one branch into another.

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✅ Step-by-Step: Cherry-pick a Commit into Another Branch

1. Clone or fetch the latest repository

git clone https://github.com/your-username/your-repo.git
cd your-repo
git fetch origin

2. Identify the commit you want to cherry-pick

You can get the commit hash using:

git log origin/feature-branch

Or use GitHub:

• Go to the feature-branch on GitHub
• Navigate to Commits
• Copy the hash (first 7 characters is usually enough)

3. Checkout the target branch

git checkout main
git pull origin main

4. Cherry-pick the commit

git cherry-pick <commit-hash>

✅ If successful:

git push origin main

⚠️ If there are conflicts:

• Git will stop and highlight the conflict files.
• Manually edit the conflicting files to resolve issues.
• Then run:

  git add .
  git cherry-pick --continue
  git push origin main

🛑 To abort:

git cherry-pick --abort

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✅ Step-by-Step: Cherry-pick a Range of Commits

git checkout main
git cherry-pick <commitA>^..<commitC>
git push origin main

• This will pick commits between A (excluded) and C (included).

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✅ Step-by-Step: Merge a Branch into Another

1. Checkout the target branch

git checkout main
git pull origin main

2. Merge the feature branch

git merge feature-branch

3. Push changes

git push origin main

⚠️ Conflict Resolution

If there are conflicts:

# After fixing conflicts manually:
git add .
git merge --continue
git push origin main

🛑 To cancel:

git merge --abort

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✅ Merge via GitHub Pull Request (PR)

1. Push your local feature branch to GitHub:

git push origin feature-branch

2. Go to the repository on GitHub

3. Click Compare & pull request

4. Make sure:

   • Base branch is the target (e.g., main)
   • Compare branch is your feature branch

5. Add title, description, and click Create pull request

6. After review, click Merge pull request

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💡 Best Practices

Practice	Description
Use descriptive commit messages	Helps in identifying cherry-picked commits
Keep branches up to date	Always pull before cherry-picking or merging
Test after merge/cherry-pick	Ensure no broken functionality
Avoid cherry-picking merge commits	Can cause complex conflicts

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📘 Useful Commands Summary

Command	Purpose
git cherry-pick <hash>	Pick one commit
git cherry-pick A^..C	Pick range of commits
git cherry-pick --abort	Abort cherry-pick
git merge <branch>	Merge full branch
git merge --abort	Abort merge
git cherry-pick --continue	After conflict resolution
git merge --continue	Continue merge after resolving conflicts