Source Control (4-8), Git - Get A Specific Version Or Commit in Practice

A - Introduction

In the previous article, Source Control (4.7), Git --- Get Specific Version or Commit, we discussed the way for TFS to get the latest version and specific version for a Branch, we discussed the similarity and difference between Git and TFS, while Git is for similar concept to get a Branch and a specific Commit in a Branch.

Besides the concepts, in practice, we found out that by making a New Branch from the commit in View History might be the best way to get a Specific Version in Git. I will demonstrate this in this article.

The contents of this article:

A - Introduction
B - Make a New Branch from a Commit in a View History
C - Use Reset to Get the New Branch from a Commit in a View History

B - Make a New Branch from a Commit in a View History

In one project, I found out there is a long lasting bug. It is difficult to figure out the reason, then I tried to trace back and see where and when the bug started. At this point, I need to trace back the code history.

For the specific file, Right Click => Git => View History:

We got the History for this file:

In fact, I have worked on this file for a while, and have created several new Branches for my analyses, such as master_text1_1, master_text1_2, ....... For demo purpose, I will create a new Branch master_text1_12 that has not existed yet.

Right Click the commit, 4e88e754, => New Branch:

In the Create a new branch window, type in a name, I made it as master_test1_12:

Create the new Branch, master_test1_12, it will be checking out automatically:

The new created branch, master_test1_12, will be shown in the file chosen history:

View the history of the new Branch, master_test1_12, its HEAD will point to the Commit: 4e88e754

Use this way, we can create the new Branches, as many as we need, against each commit that we need to test:

Note:

Because Git branches will occupy very small spaces, we can do that as we need (I remember I read this, but cannot find out the source right now),

C - Use Reset to Get the New Branch from a Commit in a View History

We tried a different way, using Reset, we will get the same result.

From the base Branch, say, master,

Make a new Branch, master_test2:

The new branch is created:

Make a Hard Reset for the Commit: 4e88e754

View the history of the new Branch, master_test2, its HEAD will point to the Commit: 4e88e754, which is the same as we have in Branch master_test1_12

At this point, using Reset command, we can get exactly the same result as using New Branch, but with an extra step to create a New Branch from HEAD, instead of from the specific Commit, then Reset from the Commit. So, we should use the New Branch approach.

Reference