Re: checkout vs reset

On 2009-02-26, Jay Soffian [off-list ref] wrote:

On Thu, Feb 26, 2009 at 2:08 AM, Jay Soffian [off-list ref] wrote:

quoted

Is there any different between the following two commands?

git reset <commit> -- <paths>...
git checkout <commit> -- <paths>...

As far as I can tell from the man pages, they are equivalent. To wit:
both update the index and working copy for the given paths to the
state that they were in in <commit>.

Doh, answering my own question. reset only touches the index, not the
working copy. checkout updates both.

However, if the <commit> doesn't even _have_ the <path> in
question, it leaves the index alone (doesn't remove it, for
instance):

Using HEAD as the <commit> in question for this example:

    echo hi > abc       # new file, untracked so far
    git add abc
    git status          # it's staged
    git reset HEAD -- abc
    git status          # untracked

    # now with checkout
    git add abc
    git status          # staged
    git checkout HEAD -- abc
    git status          # still staged