Re: Question about "git pull --rebase"

Quoting Francis Moreau [off-list ref]

Let's say I'm on a branch called 'foo'.
...
    $ git pull --rebase origin master:foo

With this command line, you are asking:

 1) Please first fetch master from origin and update the local 
    'foo' with it, but please fail if this doesn't fast forward;

 2) If the first step was successful, please rebase the current 
    branch on top of that commit.

If your current branch 'foo' doesn't fast forward, the first step 
should fail, and that is the failure you saw.

Your request doesn't make any sense. The first step would succeed 
only when your 'foo' doesn't have anything to replay on 'master' 
from origin, and the second step either isn't executed (when 'foo' 
has some commits), or it doesn't do anything (when 'foo' doesn't 
have any commit).

    $ git pull --rebase origin master

With this command line, you are asking:

 1) Please first fetch master from origin, but don't store it anywhere;

 2) Then on top of that fetched commit, please rebase the current branch.

That is a much saner request.

-- 
Nanako Shiraishi
http://ivory.ap.teacup.com/nanako3/