Skip to main content

Version control

Runesmith works with Git repositories through the built-in Git plugin. This page walks through the everyday tasks: committing, branching, updating and pushing, reading the history and undoing changes. Git must be installed and on the PATH.

Start with a repository​

Open a folder that is in a Git repository, and Runesmith finds the repository by itself. The branch widget appears in the toolbar, the Commit window on the left stripe and the Git window under it. Outside a repository they stay hidden.

To make the open folder a repository, choose Git › Initialize Repository.

Commit your changes​

  1. Press CtrlAltK, or choose Git › Commit.... The Commit window opens with the message box focused; its stripe button shows how many files changed.
  2. Check the files, folders or groups to commit. Checked files move to Staged; uncheck them to unstage. Space does the same for the selected files.
  3. Double-click a file, or press Enter, to see its diff before you commit it.
  4. Type the message. Keep the first line short: past 72 characters, the box shows its length.
  5. Press CtrlEnter or select Commit. To push right after, press CtrlShiftEnter or select Commit and Push.

To change the last commit, turn on Amend: the box loads that commit's message, and Amend Commit replaces the commit with the staged changes and the message. Turning Amend off brings back what you had typed.

Create and switch branches​

  1. Click the branch widget in the toolbar, or choose Git › Branches....
  2. To create a branch, choose New Branch..., type its name and select Create. The new branch is checked out unless you clear Check out the new branch.
  3. To switch, type part of a branch's name in the search field, select the branch and choose Checkout. A remote branch becomes a local branch that tracks it.

When local changes are in the way of a checkout, choose Smart Checkout to take them along to the other branch, or Force Checkout to throw them away.

Update and push​

  • Pull... (CtrlT), or Update Project... in the branch popup, brings in the commits of the current branch's upstream. Your local changes are kept.
  • Push... (CtrlAltShiftK) shows the commits that go and where they go. Select Push. A new branch gets its upstream on its first push.
  • Fetch brings in every remote's branches without changing yours. The branch widget then shows the commits to pull (↓) and to push (↑).

Pulls, pushes and fetches run in the background with Cancel in the status bar, and end with a toast. When a push is rejected because the remote has commits you do not, select Update and Push in the toast.

Read the history​

Choose Git › Show History to open the Git window in the bottom area. Each row is a commit, with the branch graph, its labels, the author and the date; more commits load as you scroll.

  • Filter by text in the message, by branch, by author or by path in the bar above the log.
  • Select a commit to see its message, author, parents and changed files. Double-click a file to see what the commit changed in it.
  • Right-click a commit to check it out, branch from it, cherry-pick or revert it, reset the current branch to it, copy its hash or open it on its hosting service, such as GitHub.

See a file's history​

Open the file and choose Git › Show File History, or right-click in the editor, or on the file in the Explorer, and choose Show File History. The Git window shows the commits that changed the file, following it through renames. On a folder in the Explorer, it shows the commits that changed anything in the folder.

Undo changes​

  • To undo every change to a file since the last commit, open it and choose Git › Roll Back..., right-click the file or a folder in the Explorer and choose Roll Back..., or select files in the Commit window and press Delete. Runesmith asks first; untracked files are deleted.
  • To undo only some changed lines, select them and press CtrlAltZ, or right-click and choose Rollback Lines.
  • To put your changes aside for a while, choose Git › Stash Changes..., and Git › Unstash Changes... to bring them back.
  • To move the current branch back to an earlier commit, right-click the commit in the Git window and choose Reset branch to Here.