Git Interview Questions and Answers

1. What is Git, and why is it important?

Git is a distributed version control system that helps developers track changes, collaborate efficiently, and manage code versions.

2. What’s the difference between Git and GitHub?

Git is a version control system, while GitHub is a hosting service that provides cloud-based repositories and collaboration tools.

3. How do I revert to a previous commit in Git?

You can use:

git reset --hard <commit-hash> (Dangerous: overwrites history)
git revert <commit-hash> (Safer: creates a new commit that undoes changes)

4. How do I resolve Git merge conflicts?

Use:

git status to identify conflicts
Manually edit conflicting files
git add <file> and git commit to save the resolved merge

5. How can I undo the last commit?

git reset --soft HEAD~1 (Keep changes in staging)
git reset --mixed HEAD~1 (Keep changes in working directory)
git reset --hard HEAD~1 (Discard changes completely)

6. How do I check my Git commit history?

Run git log or git log --oneline --graph --all for a structured view.

7. How do I create and switch branches in Git?

Use:

git branch feature-branch (Create a new branch)
git checkout feature-branch or git switch feature-branch (Switch to it)

8. What is Git stash used for?

git stash temporarily saves uncommitted changes without committing them, so you can switch branches safely.

9. How do I push an existing project to GitHub?

Run:

git remote add origin <repository-url>
git branch -M main
git push -u origin main

10. What is the difference between `git pull` and `git fetch`?

git fetch downloads changes from the remote repository without applying them.
git pull downloads and merges the changes automatically.

11. What are the key differences between Git and SVN?

Answer:

Git is distributed, while SVN is centralized.
Git allows local commits, SVN requires a central repository.
Git has better branching and merging support than SVN.

12. What is the difference between `git merge` and `git rebase`?

Answer:

git merge creates a new merge commit and preserves history.
git rebase reapplies commits on top of another branch, making the history cleaner.

13. What is the HEAD in Git?

Answer:
HEAD is a pointer that represents the current commit in a branch.

14. What is the difference between `git pull` and `git fetch`?

Answer:

git fetch downloads changes without merging.
git pull fetches and merges in one step.

15. How do you resolve merge conflicts in Git?

Answer:

Use git status to check conflicts.
Open conflicting files and manually fix them.
Add resolved files using git add <file>.
Commit changes with git commit -m "Resolved merge conflict".

16. How can you undo a commit in Git?

Answer:

git reset --soft HEAD~1 (Undo commit, keep changes staged)
git reset --hard HEAD~1 (Undo commit and remove changes)
git revert <commit-hash> (Create a new commit that undoes changes)

17. What is Git stash, and how do you use it?

Answer:
git stash temporarily saves uncommitted changes. Use:

git stash       # Save changes
git stash list  # View saved stashes
git stash pop   # Restore and remove stash

18. How do you delete a branch in Git?

Answer:

Locally: git branch -d <branch-name>
Remotely: git push origin --delete <branch-name>

19. How can you list all remote branches in Git?

Answer:
Use: git branch -r

20. What is `git bisect`, and how does it help debug issues?

Answer:
git bisect helps find a faulty commit using binary search:

git bisect start
git bisect bad
git bisect good <commit-hash>

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