Making some changes, checking the diff

Edit the README.txt file again, adding a new row and then let’s check the status of the working directory.

$ git status

# On branch master
# Changes not staged for commit:
#   (use "git add <file>..." to update what will be committed)
#   (use "git checkout -- <file>..." to discard changes in working directory)
#
#       modified:   README.txt
#
no changes added to commit (use "git add" and/or "git commit -a")

We can see that one file changed.

What were the changes?

$ git diff

WARNING: terminal is not fully functional
diff --git a/README.txt b/README.txt
index e51ca0d..a697828 100644
--- a/README.txt
+++ b/README.txt
@@ -1 +1,2 @@
-Hello Git
+Hello Git
+Second line

Using add mark the file for staging. Then check the status again.

$ git add README.txt
$ git status

# On branch master
# Changes to be committed:
#   (use "git reset HEAD <file>..." to unstage)
#
#       modified:   README.txt
#

What did we change?

$ git diff

This will show nothing as all the changes were marked for staging.

We can use one of the flags to see the changes that were changed that are about to be committed.

$ git diff --cached    (or --staged)

WARNING: terminal is not fully functional
diff --git a/README.txt b/README.txt
index e51ca0d..62567d0 100644
--- a/README.txt
+++ b/README.txt
@@ -1 +1,2 @@
-Hello Git
\ No newline at end of file
+Hello Git
+Second line

If we are satisfied with the changes we can commit them to git providing an explanation using the -m flag.

$ git commit -m "update README"

[main 1251a45] update README
 1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)