A pull request, often abbreviated as PR, is a proposal to merge changes made in one branch of a repository into another, typically from a feature branch into the main branch
. Pull requests serve several purposes, including:
- Facilitating code reviews
- Encouraging collaboration
- Maintaining a clean, well-documented codebase
Some key aspects of pull requests include:
- Differences : Pull requests display the differences, or diffs, between the content in the source branch and the content in the target branch
- Review and Discussion : Collaborators can review and discuss the proposed set of changes before integrating them
- Force Pushing : Be cautious when force pushing commits to a pull request, as it can corrupt the pull request and overwrite commits that other collaborators based their work on
- Topic Branch : It is recommended to use a topic branch for your pull request, as it allows you to push follow-up commits if you need to update your proposed changes
To create a pull request, you can use GitHub.com, GitHub Desktop, or other Git client tools
. Once the pull request is created, collaborators can review the changes, provide feedback, and either approve or reject the request
. After the pull request has been reviewed and approved, it can be merged into the repository
