The day I finally figured out what 'git push' actually does after 6 months of guessing

I started learning to code back in January and for months I was just typing git commands that I copied from tutorials without really getting what was happening. Like I knew push sent my code somewhere but I didn't understand where or why. Last week I finally used git status and git log to trace my own commits and it clicked. Now I can actually fix my own mistakes instead of starting over. Has anyone else spent way too long faking it with version control?

2 comments

2 Comments

cameronf881mo ago

Oh man, I was about 4 months deep before I realized 'git push' wasn't a magic spell that just made my code appear on GitHub lmao. I straight up deleted my entire repo once because git log showed like 50 commits and I panicked thinking I broke something. Spent a whole weekend rebuilding from scratch because I didn't know how to revert a single file. It's embarrassing how long you can fake it before the lightbulb finally flickers on.

raymitchell1mo ago

God that feeling when it finally clicks is so good. I was probably a good 8-9 months into coding before I really understood branches. I remember deleting my whole project folder like three times because I thought I broke git and just wanted a clean slate. Using git log to actually see the chain of commits was the moment for me too, it felt like I was finally peeking behind the curtain instead of just mashing buttons. It's wild how long we go just repeating commands without asking what they're actually doing.