I'm on a my master branch which is a perfect clean (but git presents it that it is ahead of origin/master by 14 commits). When I try to pull a different branch from origin (Eagle) git wants me to merge a few files.
This is not what I expect: When pulling a branch it should import the remote branch and leave the current HEAD untouched and not bother me with merge conflicts. In my perception The 2 branches live apart but peacefully from eachother, without any conflicts. But this perception holds no longer.
What causes these conflicts and how to restore 2 different branches without merging?
Below a transcript of the git session on commandline.
HEAD is now at 34e47ab ISS-652 misspelled MockBean in test/ApplicationContext
build@jenkins/p-project/workspace> git status
# On branch master
# Your branch is ahead of 'origin/master' by 14 commits.
#
nothing to commit (working directory clean)
build@jenkins/p-project/workspace> git log -5
.. Same as origin
build@jenkins/p-project/workspace> git push origin master
Everything up-to-date
build@jenkins/p-project/workspace> git status
# On branch master
# Your branch is ahead of 'origin/master' by 14 commits.
#
nothing to commit (working directory clean)
build@jenkins/p-project/workspace> git pull origin Eagle
From ssh://[email protected]:7999/hig/p-project-container
* branch Eagle -> FETCH_HEAD
Auto-merged pom.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in pom.xml
Auto-merged p-project-client/pom.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in p-project-client/pom.xml
Auto-merged p-project-container-conf/pom.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in p-project-container-conf/pom.xml
Auto-merged p-project-container-conf/src/main/resources/dpl/P-Project_Container.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in p-project-container-conf/src/main/resources/dpl/P-Project_Container.xml
Auto-merged p-project-container-conf/src/main/resources/was/P-Project_Container-app-env.cfg
Auto-merged p-project-container-ear/pom.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in p-project-container-ear/pom.xml
Auto-merged p-project-container-filters/pom.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in p-project-container-filters/pom.xml
Auto-merged p-project-container-ldap/pom.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in p-project-container-ldap/pom.xml
Auto-merged p-project-container-tomcattest/pom.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in p-project-container-tomcattest/pom.xml
Auto-merged p-project-container-web/pom.xml
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in p-project-container-web/pom.xml
Automatic merge failed; fix conflicts and then commit the result.
build@jenkins/p-project/workspace>
What git pull origin branch does is that it fetches and merges the remote branch into your current local branch. So, the result of the above command is - to merge the remote branch eagle into your local master.
I guess what you want is to create a new local independent branch which tracks the corresponding remote branch. You can do that with
git fetch
git checkout -b eagle --track origin/eagle
This will create a new separate local branch eagle which would reflect the remote branch eagle.
This local branch will be independent of your local master branch and keep your local master untouched.
You can do git status and it will show Your branch is up-to-date with 'origin/eagle'. and you can checkout master with git checkout master and then doing a git status will show ahead by 14 commits.