Dinesh Pandiyan

Posted on Apr 30, 2018

What is your favourite git merge tool/strategy?

#discuss #git

VSCode is my favourite editor. But while rebasing and resolving merge conflicts, I switch to Atom as their git integration is too damn good for resolving conflicts IMO. Just wondering what other tools/strategies devs use in general for resolving merge conflicts.

This is my usual flow

Go to terminal and git rebase master
When conflict occurs, I open Atom, resolve conflict and stage the file
I come back to terminal and git rebase --continue

Top comments (35)

Darryl Norris • Apr 30 '18 • Edited

This is the best way to merge in Git.

#### FYI: DO NOT RUN THESE COMMANDS. This will not merge instead it will force a pushed commit.

git add -f . && \ 
git commit -m "`curl -s http://whatthecommit.com/index.txt`" && \
git push -f

FYI: DO NOT RUN THESE COMMANDS. This will not merge instead it will force a pushed commit.

Mihail Malo • Oct 1 '18

This is pretty bad, maybe copy the warning to above the code as well.

And into the code as a comment, for good measure.

Darryl Norris • Oct 1 '18

Done

Dinesh Pandiyan • May 1 '18

I see what you did there 🔥

Darryl Norris • May 1 '18

hahahah

Stephanie Handsteiner • Apr 30 '18 • Edited

I do my git stuff via command line, idk I learnt git on the CLI, never used a GUI for it and I just sticked to that, I guess. :D

Sometimes I'll use Atom too, for repos being hosted on GitHub anyway.

Dinesh Pandiyan • May 1 '18

I'm still the terminal guy. You don't need anything when you got oh-my-zosh right?

But how do resolve conflicts when you rebase?

I usually,

Go to terminal and git rebase master
When conflict occurs, I open atom, resolve conflict and stage the file
I come back to terminal and git rebase --continue

Alexandru Bucur • May 1 '18

Are you using gitlens in VSCode ? It helps a lot on the normal git flow (including merges)

Al Romano • Feb 21 '19

+1 for GitLens.

As Doruk says below it does have a bit of a learning curve but it's totally worth it.

I've uninstalled GitKraken now because of it.

Between the side-bar additions and the command palette items you should be able to git ninja your way out of most situations.

There is always Git in termial if you need to go full hacker mode. :)

Doruk Kutlu • Aug 28 '18 • Edited

+1 for gitlens

It has a learning curve, but once you invest the time, it's worth the savings.

Joe Clay • Apr 30 '18

My current Git workflow is:

VS Code's built-in Git support for check-ins and simple diffs
Sourcetree for the more complex bits (managing merges, rebasing, squashing commits)
P4Merge for resolving merge conflicts
- I used to used Meld - the UI is a little nicer, but it's really slow to start up :(

Dinesh Pandiyan • May 1 '18

VSCode's built in git isn't that great if you ask me. I like selective staging where I can stage/unstage particular line(s), which isn't supported by VSCode. Also, you cannot use keyboard in their staging area, which is very much bad experience for me.

Maybe we all should pool in and port the Atom's git integration to VSCode so we'll have the perfect editor of all time.

Mahlon Gumbs • May 22 '18

You can stage/unstage particular lines with VSCode. I do it all the time. Only rule is that the lines must be consecutive.

Adam Crockett 🌀 • Sep 17 '18

Vs codes conflict resolver is also good, no need for another tool. Source tree to Vs code.

Adarsh • Apr 30 '18 • Edited

Check out Gitkraken it's a good GUI tool build for git. They support most of the git features and also make the merging and rebasing process very easy.

Dinesh Pandiyan • May 1 '18 • Edited

GitKraken is good as long as you only do reads (checkout and diff) and not writes (commits and rebase) 'coz they don't support local config or multiple config in their community edition which is kind of a bummer.

John Costanzo • Apr 30 '18

Some time ago I used that tool. But when they switched their TOC to having to pay for it for non open source stuff, I left it

Anthony Bouvier • Apr 30 '18

Same, and it started requiring an account be set up. For the desktop app. No thanks.

Chad Smith • Jul 5 '18

I used to be a big fan of GitKraken, though on larger repositories it seem to just slow down to a crawl for me. It would just take forever for them to open. Sometimes spin forever.

I also tried to use with git LFS enabled and kept having issues with it sadly.

EkaterinaS • Jul 26 '19

My favorite git merge tool is Code Compare
Code Compare can be integrated into a variety of version control systems that support external comparators. Code Compare extends VCS native comparison functionality with its advanced approach to file comparison and merging.

Yoandy Rodriguez Martinez • May 4 '18

Emacs + Magit, It's a really great tool even if you're and experienced git user

Maria Zaitseva • Aug 25 '18

Same here. Especially magit's interactive rebase makes rebasing so painless it always went flawlessly for me.

Anthony Bouvier • Apr 30 '18

All from the command line. Close eyes. Try merge. Pray. :D

I'll have to check out some of the tools mentioned in rest of comments though. I think it is important to know how to do it from the CLI, but if you do know how to do that, I don't mind a tool as well.

Dinesh Pandiyan • May 1 '18

I've been working on a feature branch for three weeks now that has around 50 new commits and rebase them every single day with master. So I totally relate with closing eyes and praying part :D

Jonathan Boudreau • Apr 30 '18

If its a fairly complex merge conflict, I use the builtin three way merge in fugitive (vim plugin). I don't normally run into major merge conflicts though.