Return to GitHub, Git Glossary, GitOps Glossary, Terraform Glossary, Ansible Glossary, Docker Glossary, Podman Glossary, Containerization Glossary, Kubernetes Glossary, OpenShift Glossary, Rancher Glossary, DevOps Glossary, DevSecOps Glossary, Virtualization Glossary, Cloud Native Glossary, Microservices Glossary, Cloud Computing Glossary, AWS Glossary, Azure Glossary, GCP Glossary, IBM Cloud Glossary, Oracle Cloud Glossary

• Git - GitHub - Git Hub - Git terms - Git articles - Git courses - Github for Web Designers - GitHub concepts - GitHub reference - GitHub glossary - GitHub resources

• Provide a GitHub glossary of the top 40 GitHub concepts sorted by the most commonly used. For each concept include a brief description and the URL for the GitHub official documentation. Answer using MediaWiki format.

Creating a GitHub glossary that encompasses the top 40 concepts, with a focus on their frequency of use, involves highlighting the platform's essential features and functionalities. GitHub is a web-based version control and collaboration platform for software developers. It allows users to store, manage, and track changes to their code projects using Git, a distributed version-control system.

Given the breadth of GitHub's features and the detailed nature of this request, I will outline some foundational GitHub concepts in a simplified MediaWiki format. This list will introduce key terms and practices central to GitHub's operation and user engagement.

This glossary provides an overview of the most commonly used concepts within GitHub, aimed at fostering a better understanding of the platform's functionalities and best practices.

A directory or storage space where your projects can live. It can be local to a folder on your computer, or it can be a storage space on GitHub or another online host. You can keep code files, text files, image files, you name it, inside a repository.

A way to track enhancements, tasks, or bugs for work on GitHub. Issues can act as more than just a place to report software bugs.

Proposed changes to a repository submitted by a user and accepted or rejected by a repository's collaborators. Pull requests can also come with discussion threads and increased information about the proposed changes.

A personal copy of another user's repository that lives on your account. Forks allow you to freely make changes to a project without affecting the original.

A parallel version of a repository. It is contained within the repository, but does not affect the primary or master branch allowing you to work freely without disrupting the live project.

The act of taking the changes from one branch (in the same repository or from a fork), and applying them into another. This often happens as a pull request.

A copy of a repository that lives on your computer instead of on a website's server somewhere, or the act of making that copy.

An open-source version control system that runs in the terminal of your computer. GitHub is built on top of git.

A lightweight markup language with plain-text formatting syntax that can be converted into HTML. It's often used for formatting readme files, for writing messages in online discussion forums, and to create rich text using a plain text editor.

A text file that tells Git which files or folders to ignore in a project. Very useful for excluding local configuration files or files generated by the build process.

A document that provides legally binding guidelines for the use and distribution of software. It's important to include a license with your open source projects so others know what they can and can't do with your code.

A document that introduces and explains a project. It often includes information on what the project does, why the project is useful, how users can get started with the project, where users can get help with your project, and who maintains and contributes to the project.

A bookmarking feature that lets you keep track of projects that you find interesting. Starring a repository also shows appreciation to the repository maintainer for their work.

A section in a GitHub repository that is used to hold important documentation about the project, like how to use the software, how to contribute, etc.

GitHub Actions makes it easy to automate all your software workflows, now with world-class CI/CD. Build, test, and deploy your code right from GitHub.

A static site hosting service that takes HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files straight from a repository on GitHub, optionally runs the files through a build process, and publishes a website.

A way to track progress on groups of issues or pull requests in a repository. Milestones can be used to manage sprints, releases, or other project goals.

GitHub's way to keep you informed about various activities, like someone mentioning you, commenting on a thread you're subscribed to, or your pull request being merged.

Webhooks allow you to build or set up integrations, like GitHub Apps or OAuth Apps, which subscribe to certain events on GitHub.com. When one of those events is triggered, GitHub sends a HTTP POST payload to the webhook's configured URL.

This glossary introduces foundational concepts crucial for navigating and utilizing GitHub effectively. For a comprehensive understanding, including advanced features, best practices, and detailed explanations of each term, consulting GitHub's official documentation and resources is highly recommended.

This overview provides a snapshot into GitHub's extensive ecosystem. For more detailed exploration, including all 40 concepts and their nuanced applications, GitHub's official documentation and community resources offer in-depth information and tutorials.

• GitHub concepts
• GitHub reference
• GitHub glossary
• GitHub resources

This is a short glossary of terms you're likely to encounter when learning Github. It's by no means complete, but should give you a good overview of commonly used GitHub terminology and their definitions.

• Add (github add) - GitHub command used to stage files. Allows the GitHub user to specify which files or directories to include in the next commit (git commit).

• Branch

A parallel version of a repository. Although it is contained within the same repository it allows you to develop it separately and then merge changes back into the ‘live’ repository or with other branches when appropriate.

• Checkout

Git command to switch to a specific file, branch, or commit. Allows you to activate older versions of files or commits or switch between active branches.

• Clone

The process of copying a remote repository to your local machine. When you clone a repo you copy its entire history as well as all branches. Remote tracking for the branches is established enabling you to update and retrieve content by using basic commands without a remote reference.

• Collaborator

Project team member. Collaborators are invited to participate in projects and are given read and/or write access to repos.

• Commit

Snapshot of project history. Records changes to the repository with the unique hash identifier that can be referenced later to revert or rollback changes. A commit can contain the changes of a single file or a range of files and directories.

• Fetching

Retrieve remote changes to a repo without merging them. A Fetch command will retrieve a remote commit but will not merge them into your local commits. This allows you to examine changes and then decide what to merge into your local history.

• Fork

A local copy of another user’s repository. Forking a project allows you to create another copy of it, which you can then edit and develop independently of the main project. Forks are tied to the source project, allowing you to issue pull requests and pull in changes to your local copy.

• Git

Version control system that Github is built around. It is a widely used open source distributed version control system developed by the author of Linux.

• Issues

Bug tracking system for Github. Collaborators can use issues to report bugs, request features, or set milestones for projects. Issues are tracked, reported, and closed by collaborators during the development process. They’re a great way of communicating with your team and reporting progress.

• Merging

The process of combining branches within a repo. Changes are taken from one or more branches and applied to another. When merging in Git several different methods are used to resolve conflicts and choose the appropriate changes. For the most part these methods are chosen automatically by Git. Occasionally the user will have to manually resolve conflicts, which could include editing code or choosing the proper file to use.

• Organizations

Groups of collaborators organized into a team. Github allows you to create organizations with multiple collaborators that can then be administered based on repository access and read/write privileges.

• Pull

Retrieve remote changes. A Pull command is similar to a Fetch command, except that it both retrieves remote changes as well as merging them in to you own commit history.

• Pull Request

Proposed changes to a remote repo. Collaborators without write access can send a pull request to the administrator with the changes they've made to the repo. The administrator can then approve and merge or reject the changes to the main repository. For open source projects pull requests can be sent by anyone that has forked a project.

• Push

Sending changes to a remote repo. The remote repository is updated with the changes pushed and now mirrors the local repo.

• Rebase

Another way to merge changes from one branch to another. Similar to merge, rebase allows you to include changes from one branch on to another. Unlike the merge command rebase replays a branch’s commit history onto the branch it’s merging into. This results in a linear commit history, but overwrites previous commits.

• Release

A means of tagging a specific commit. Github allows you to specify a commit as a release. This will tag the commit with a user created tag. This allows you to specify release points like 1.0 or 1.1 for projects.

• Repo

Short for repository. Refers to a project folder that is being tracked by Git and containing project files. Repos can be local as well as hosted on Github.

• Readme

Text file used for project info. Readme files contain project descriptions and are displayed on the main page of the project repo. These are plain text files although Github supports its own version of Markdown as well.

NOTE: Github for Web Designers by James Williamson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Creative Commons License

• Fair Use Source: http://simpleprimate.com/github-for-web-designers/glossary.html
• Cloud Monk Mirrors:
  • https://DevopsCloud.io/doku.php?id=github_glossary

GitHub glossary

This glossary introduces common Git terminology and GitHub terminology.

• GitHub @mention - To notify a person on GitHub by using @ before their GitHub username. GitHub Users in a GitHub organization on GitHub can also be a part of a GitHub team that can be GitHub mentioned.

• GitHub access token - A GitHub token that is used in place of a GitHub password when performing Git operations over GitHub HTTPS with Git on the command line or the GitHub API. Also called a GitHub personal access token.

• GitHub API preview - A way to try out new APIs and changes to existing API methods before they become part of the official GitHub API.

• GitHub appliance - A software application combined with just enough operating system (JeOS) to run optimally on industry-standard hardware (typically a server) or in a virtual machine.

• GitHub assignee - The user that is assigned to an issue.

• GitHub authentication code - A code you'll supply, in addition to your GitHub password, when signing in with 2FA via the browser. This code is either generated by an application or delivered to your phone via text message. Also called a “2FA authentication code.”

• GitHub base branch - The branch into which changes are combined when you merge a pull request. When you create a pull request, you can change the base branch from the repository's default branch to another branch if required.

• GitHub basic authentication - A method of authentication where the credentials are sent as unencrypted text.

• GitHub bio - The user-generated description found on a profile: Adding a bio to your profile

• GitHub billing cycle - The interval of time for your specific billing plan.

• GitHub billing email - The organization email address where GitHub sends receipts, credit card or PayPal charges, and other billing-related communication.

• GitHub billing manager - The organization member that manages billing settings for an organization.

• GitHub billing plan - Payment plans for users and organizations that include set features for each type of plan.

• GitHub blame - The “blame” feature in Git describes the last modification to each line of a file, which generally displays the revision, author and time. This is helpful, for example, in tracking down when a feature was added, or which commit led to a particular bug.

• GitHub block - To remove a user's ability to collaborate on an organization's repositories.

• GitHub branch - A branch is a parallel version of a repository. It is contained within the repository, but does not affect the primary or main branch allowing you to work freely without disrupting the “live” version. When you've made the changes you want to make, you can merge your branch back into the main branch to publish your changes.

• GitHub branch restriction - A restriction that repository admins can enable so that only certain users or teams can push or make certain changes to the branch.

• GitHub Business plan - An organization billing plan where you can collaborate on unlimited public and private repositories, allow or require organization members to authenticate to GitHub using SAML SSO, and provision and deprovision access with SAML or SCIM.

• GitHub CA certificate - A digital certificate issued by Certificate Authority (CA) that ensures there are valid connections between two machines, such as a user's computer and GitHub.com and verifies the ownership of a site.

• GitHub card - A movable square within a project board associated with an issue or pull request.

• GitHub check - A check is a type of status check on GitHub. See “Status checks.”

• GitHub checkout - You can use git checkout on the command line to create a new branch, change your current working branch to a different branch, or even to switch to a different version of a file from a different branch with git checkout [branchname] [path to file]. The “checkout” action updates all or part of the working tree with a tree object or blob from the object database, and updates the index and HEAD if the whole working tree is pointing to a new branch.

• GitHub cherry-picking - To choose a subset of changes from a series of changes (typically commits) and record them as a new series of changes on top of a different codebase. In Git, this is performed by the git cherry-pick command to extract the change introduced by an existing commit on another branch and to record it based on the tip of the current branch as a new commit. For more information, see git-cherry-pick in the Git documentation.

• GitHub child team - Within nested teams, the subteam that inherits the parent team's access permissions and @mentions.

• GitHub clean - A working tree is clean if it corresponds to the revision referenced by the current HEAD. Also see “dirty”.

• GitHub clone - A clone is a copy of a repository that lives on your computer instead of on a website's server somewhere, or the act of making that copy. When you make a clone, you can edit the files in your preferred editor and use Git to keep track of your changes without having to be online. The repository you cloned is still connected to the remote version so that you can push your local changes to the remote to keep them synced when you're online.

• GitHub clustering - The ability to run GitHub Enterprise services across multiple nodes and load balance requests between them.

• GitHub code frequency graph - A repository graph that shows the content additions and deletions for each week in a repository's history.

• GitHub code of conduct - A document that defines standards for how to engage in a community.

• GitHub code owner - A person who is designated as an owner of a portion of a repository's code. The code owner is automatically requested for review when someone opens a pull request (not in draft mode) that makes changes to code the code owner owns.

• GitHub collaborator - A collaborator is a person with read and write access to a repository who has been invited to contribute by the repository owner.

• GitHub commit - A commit, or “revision”, is an individual change to a file (or set of files). When you make a commit to save your work, Git creates a unique ID (a.k.a. the “SHA” or “hash”) that allows you to keep record of the specific changes committed along with who made them and when. Commits usually contain a commit message which is a brief description of what changes were made.

• GitHub commit author - The user who makes the commit.

• GitHub Commit graph - A repository graph that shows all the commits made to a repository in the past year.

• GitHub commit ID - Also known as SHA. A 40-character checksum hash that identifies the commit.

• GitHub commit message - Short, descriptive text that accompanies a commit and communicates the change the commit is introducing.

• GitHub compare branch - The branch you use to create a pull request. This branch is compared to the base branch you choose for the pull request, and the changes are identified. When the pull request is merged, the base branch is updated with the changes from the compare branch. Also known as the “head branch” of the pull request.

• GitHub continuous integration - Also known as CI. A process that runs automated builds and tests once a person commits a change to a configured repository on GitHub. CI is a common best practice in software development that helps detect errors.

• GitHub contribution graph - The part of a user's profile that shows their contributions over a period of up to one year, day by day.

• GitHub contribution guidelines - A document explaining how people should contribute to your project.

• GitHub contributions - Specific activities on GitHub that will: - Add a square to a user's contribution graph: “What counts as a contribution” - Add activities to a user's timeline on their profile: “Contribution activity”

• GitHub contributor - A contributor is someone who does not have collaborator access to a repository but has contributed to a project and had a pull request they opened merged into the repository.

• GitHub contributors graph - A repository graph that displays the top 100 contributors to a repository.

• GitHub coupon - A GitHub-provided code that users or organizations can use to pay for all or part of their subscription.

• GitHub cron - A time-based job scheduler in Unix-like computer operating systems.

• GitHub cURL - Used in command lines or scripts to transfer data.

• GitHub dashboard - Your personal dashboard is the main hub of your activity on GitHub. From your personal dashboard, you can keep track of issues and pull requests you're following or working on, navigate to your top repositories and team pages, and learn about recent activity in repositories you're watching or participating in. You can also discover new repositories, which are recommended based on users you're following and repositories you have starred. To only view activity for a specific organization, visit your organization's dashboard. For more information, see “About your personal dashboard” or “About your organization dashboard.”

• GitHub default branch - The base branch for new pull requests and code commits in a repository. Each repository has at least one branch, which Git creates when you initialize the repository. The first branch is usually called main, and is often the default branch.

• GitHub dependents graph - A repository graph that shows the packages, projects, and repositories that depend on a public repository.

• GitHub dependency graph - A repository graph that shows the packages and projects that the repository depends on.

• GitHub deploy key - A deploy key is an SSH key that is stored on your server and grants access to a single GitHub repository. This key is attached directly to the repository instead of to a personal user account.

• GitHub detached HEAD - Git will warn you if you're working on a detached HEAD, which means that Git is not pointing to a branch and that any commits you make will not appear in commit history. For example, when you check out an arbitrary commit that is not the latest commit of any particular branch, you're working on a “detached HEAD.”

• GitHub diagnostics - An overview of a GitHub Enterprise instance's settings and environment.

• GitHub diff - A diff is the difference in changes between two commits, or saved changes. The diff will visually describe what was added or removed from a file since its last commit.

• GitHub dirty - A working tree is considered “dirty” if it contains modifications that have not been committed to the current branch.

• GitHub email notifications - Notifications sent to a user's email address.

• GitHub enterprise account - Enterprise accounts allow you to centrally manage policy and billing for multiple organizations. Enterprise accounts are available with GitHub Enterprise Cloud and GitHub Enterprise Server. For more information, see “About enterprise accounts” in the GitHub Enterprise Cloud documentation.

• GitHub Explorer - An instance of GraphiQL, which is a “graphical interactive in-browser GraphQL IDE.”

• GitHub fast-forward - A fast-forward is a special type of merge where you have a revision and you are “merging” another branch's changes that happen to be a descendant of what you have. In such a case, you do not make a new merge commit but instead just update to this revision. This will happen frequently on a remote-tracking branch of a remote repository.

• GitHub feature branch - A branch used to experiment with a new feature or fix an issue that is not in production. Also called a topic branch.

• GitHub fenced code block - An indented block of code you can create with GitHub Flavored Markdown using triple backticks ``` before and after the code block. See this example.

• GitHub fetch - When you use git fetch, you're adding changes from the remote repository to your local working branch without committing them. Unlike git pull, fetching allows you to review changes before committing them to your local branch.

• GitHub following (users) - To get notifications about another user's contributions and activity.

• GitHub force push - A Git push that overwrites the remote repository with local changes without regard for conflicts.

• GitHub fork - A fork is a personal copy of another user's repository that lives on your account. Forks allow you to freely make changes to a project without affecting the original upstream repository. You can also open a pull request in the upstream repository and keep your fork synced with the latest changes since both repositories are still connected.

• GitHub Free plan - A user account billing plan that is free. Users can collaborate on unlimited public repositories with unlimited collaborators.

• GitHub gist - A gist is a shareable file that you can edit, clone, and fork on GitHub. You can make a gist public or secret, although secret gists will be available to anyone with the URL.

• GitHub Git - Git is an open source program for tracking changes in text files. It was written by the author of the Linux operating system, and is the core technology that GitHub, the social and user interface, is built on top of.

• GitHub App - GitHub Apps provide a service to an entire organization and use their own identity when performing their function. They can be installed directly on organizations and user accounts and granted access to specific repositories. They come with granular permissions and built-in webhooks.

• GitHub Flavored Markdown - GitHub-specific Markdown used to format prose and code across GitHub. See GitHub Flavored Markdown Spec or Getting started with writing and formatting on GitHub.

• GitHub Importer - A tool that quickly imports source code repositories, including commits and revision history, to GitHub for users.

• GitHub Jobs - A GitHub site where employers can post jobs that GitHub users may be interested in.

• GitHub Marketplace - A subsite for GitHub users and organizations to purchase and install applications that extend and complement their workflow.

• GitHub Pages - Also referred to as Pages. A static site hosting service designed to host your personal, organization, or project pages directly from a GitHub repository.

• GitHub Wiki - A section for hosting wiki style documentation on a GitHub repository.

• GitHub gitfile - A plain .git file, which is always at the root of a working tree and points to the Git directory, which has the entire Git repository and its meta data. You can view this file for your repository on the command line with git rev-parse –git-dir. that is the real repository.

• GitHub GraphQL - A query language for APIs and a runtime for fulfilling those queries with your existing data.

• GitHub HEAD - A defined commit of a branch, usually the most recent commit at the tip of the branch.

• GitHub head branch - The branch whose changes are combined into the base branch when you merge a pull request. Also known as the “compare branch.”

• GitHub Hello, World - A “Hello, World!” program is a computer program that outputs or displays “Hello, World!” to a user. Since this program is usually very simple, it is often used as an example of a programming language's basic syntax and serves as a common first exercise for learning a new programming language.

• GitHub high-availability - A system or component that is continuously operational for a desirably long length of time.

• GitHub hook - During the normal execution of several Git commands, call-outs are made to optional scripts that allow a developer to add functionality or checking. Typically, the hooks allow for a command to be pre-verified and potentially aborted, and allow for a post-notification after the operation is done.

• GitHub hostname - Human-readable nicknames that correspond to the address of a device connected to a network.

• GitHub identicon - An auto-generated image used as a default profile photo when users sign up for GitHub. Users can replace their identicon with their own profile photo.

• GitHub identity provider - Also known as an IdP. A trusted provider that lets you use SAML single sign-on (SSO) to access other websites.

• GitHub instance - An organization's private copy of GitHub contained within a virtual machine that they configure and control.

• GitHub integration - A third-party application that integrates with GitHub. These can be GitHub Apps, OAuth Apps, or webhooks.

• GitHub issue - Issues are suggested improvements, tasks or questions related to the repository. Issues can be created by anyone (for public repositories), and are moderated by repository collaborators. Each issue contains its own discussion thread. You can also categorize an issue with labels and assign it to someone.

• GitHub Jekyll - A static site generator for personal, project, or organization sites.

• GitHub Jekyll Theme Chooser - An automated way to select a visual theme for your Jekyll site without editing or copying CSS files.

• GitHub key fingerprint - A short sequence of bytes used to identify a longer public key.

• GitHub keychain - A password management system in macOS.

• GitHub keyword - A specific word that closes an issue when used within a pull request.

• GitHub label - A tag on an issue or pull request. Repositories come with a handful of default labels, but users can create custom labels.

• GitHub LFS - Git Large File Storage. An open source Git extension for versioning large files.

• GitHub license - A document that you can include with your project to let people know what they can and can't do with your source code.

• GitHub Linguist - A library used on GitHub to detect blob languages, ignore binary or vendored files, suppress generated files in diffs, and generate language breakdown graphs.

• GitHub line comment - A comment within a pull request on a specific line of code.

• GitHub line ending - An invisible character or characters that symbolize the end of a line in a text file.

• GitHub locked personal account - A personal account that cannot be accessed by the user. Accounts are locked when users downgrade their paid account to a free one, or if their paid plan is past due.

• GitHub management console - A section within the GitHub Enterprise interface that contains administrative features.

• GitHub Markdown - Markdown is an incredibly simple semantic file format, not too dissimilar from .doc, .rtf and .txt. Markdown makes it easy for even those without a web-publishing background to write prose (including with links, lists, bullets, etc.) and have it displayed like a website. GitHub supports Markdown and uses a particular form of Markdown called GitHub Flavored Markdown. See GitHub Flavored Markdown Spec or Getting started with writing and formatting on GitHub.

• GitHub markup - A system for annotating and formatting a document.

• GitHub main - The default development branch. Whenever you create a Git repository, a branch named main is created, and becomes the active branch. In most cases, this contains the local development, though that is purely by convention and is not required.

• GitHub master - The default branch in many Git repositories. By default, when you create a new Git repository on the command line, a branch called master is created. Many tools now use an alternative name for the default branch. For example, when you create a new repository on GitHub, the default branch is called main.

• GitHub members graph - A repository graph that shows all the forks of a repository.

• GitHub mention - A notification sent to a user by prefacing their username with the @ symbol. Users in an organization on GitHub can also be a part of a team that can be mentioned.

• GitHub merge - Merging takes the changes from one branch (in the same repository or from a fork), and applies them into another. This often happens as a “pull request” (which can be thought of as a request to merge), or via the command line. A merge can be done through a pull request via the GitHub.com web interface if there are no conflicting changes, or can always be done via the command line.

• GitHub merge conflict - A difference that occurs between merged branches. Merge conflicts happen when people make different changes to the same line of the same file, or when one person edits a file and another person deletes the same file. The merge conflict must be resolved before you can merge the branches.

• GitHub milestone - A way to track the progress on groups of issues or pull requests in a repository.

• GitHub mirror - A new copy of a repository.

• GitHub nested team - A child team of a parent team. You can have multiple children (or nested) teams.

• GitHub network graph - A repository graph that shows the branch history of the entire repository network, including branches of the root repository and branches of forks that contain commits unique to the network.

• GitHub news feed - An activity view of repositories or people you watch. An organization's News Feed shows activity on repositories owned by the organization.

• GitHub non-fast-forward - When your local copy of a repository is out-of-sync with the upstream repository and you need to fetch the upstream changes before you push your local changes.

• GitHub notification - Updates, delivered by either the web or email depending on your settings, that give you information about the activities you're interested in.

• GitHub OAuth App - A third-party application that uses access tokens rather than passwords to access information for users.

• GitHub OAuth token - The access token used in OAuth Apps to access information for users.

• GitHub outside collaborator - A user who has been given access to one or more of an organization’s repositories, but has no other access to the organization and is not a member of the organization.

• GitHub open source - Open source software is software that can be freely used, modified, and shared (in both modified and unmodified form) by anyone. Today the concept of “open source” is often extended beyond software, to represent a philosophy of collaboration in which working materials are made available online for anyone to fork, modify, discuss, and contribute to.

• GitHub organization - Organizations are a group of two or more users that typically mirror real-world organizations. They are administered by users and can contain both repositories and teams.

• GitHub organization owner - Users who have full administrative access to the organization they own.

• GitHub origin - The default upstream repository. Most projects have at least one upstream project that they track. By default, origin is used for that purpose.

• GitHub owner - Organization members that have complete administrative access to the organization.

• GitHub parent team - Within nested teams, the main team from which child teams inherit access permissions and @mentions.

• GitHub participating notifications - A notification about an update in a conversation in an issue or pull request where your username or team was mentioned or where you have previously replied in a comment.

• GitHub permalink - A permanent static hyperlink to a particular web page.

• GitHub personal account - A GitHub account that belongs to an individual user.

• GitHub primary email address - The main email address where GitHub sends receipts, credit card or PayPal charges, and other billing-related communication.

• GitHub pinned repository - A repository that a user has decided to display prominently on their profile.

• GitHub pre-receive hooks - Scripts that run on the GitHub Enterprise server that you can use to implement quality checks.

• GitHub private contributions - Contributions made to a private (vs. public) repository.

• GitHub private repository - Private repositories are only visible to the repository owner and collaborators that the owner specified.

• GitHub production branch - A branch with final changes that are ready to be used or deployed to an application or site.

• GitHub profile - The page that shows information about a user's activity on GitHub.

• GitHub profile photo - A custom image users upload to GitHub to identify their activity, usually along with their username. This is also referred to as an avatar.

• GitHub project board - Boards within GitHub that are made up of issues, pull requests, and notes that are categorized as cards in columns.

• GitHub protected branch - Protected branches block several features of Git on a branch that a repository administrator chooses to protect. They can't be force pushed, deleted, have changes merged without required checks passing or required reviews approved, or have files uploaded to it from the GitHub web interface. A protected branch is usually the default branch.

• GitHub public contributions - Contributions made to a public (vs. private) repository.

• GitHub public repository - A public repository can be viewed by anyone, including people who aren't GitHub users.

• GitHub pull - Pull refers to when you are fetching in changes and merging them. For instance, if someone has edited the remote file you're both working on, you'll want to pull in those changes to your local copy so that it's up to date. See also fetch.

• GitHub pull access - A synonym for read access.

• GitHub pull request - Pull requests are proposed changes to a repository submitted by a user and accepted or rejected by a repository's collaborators. Like issues, pull requests each have their own discussion forum.

• GitHub pull request review - Comments from collaborators on a pull request that approve the changes or request further changes before the pull request is merged.

• GitHub pulse graph - A repository graph that gives you an overview of a repository's activity.

• GitHub punch graph - A repository graph that shows the frequency of updates to a repository based on the day of week and time of day

• GitHub push - To push means to send your committed changes to a remote repository on GitHub.com. For instance, if you change something locally, you can push those changes so that others may access them.

• GitHub push a branch - When you successfully push a branch to a remote repository, you update the remote branch with changes from your local branch. When you “push a branch”, Git will search for the branch's HEAD ref in the remote repository and verify that it is a direct ancestor to the branch's local HEAD ref. Once verified, Git pulls all objects (reachable from the local HEAD ref and missing from the remote repository) into the remote object database and then updates the remote HEAD ref. If the remote HEAD is not an ancestor to the local HEAD, the push fails.

• GitHub push access - A synonym for write access.

• GitHub read access - A permission level on a repository that allows the user to pull, or read, information from the repository. All public repositories give read access to all GitHub users. A synonym for pull access.

• GitHub README - A text file containing information about the files in a repository that is typically the first file a visitor to your repository will see. A README file, along with a repository license, contribution guidelines, and a code of conduct, helps you share expectations and manage contributions to your project.

• GitHub rebase - To reapply a series of changes from a branch to a different base, and reset the HEAD of that branch to the result.

• GitHub recovery code - A code that helps you regain access to your GitHub account.

• GitHub release - GitHub's way of packaging and providing software to your users.

• GitHub remote - This is the version of a repository or branch that is hosted on a server, most likely GitHub.com. Remote versions can be connected to local clones so that changes can be synced.

• GitHub remote repository - A repository that is used to track the same project but resides somewhere else.

• GitHub remote URL - The place where your code is stored: a repository on GitHub, another user's fork, or even a different server.

• GitHub replica - A GitHub Enterprise instance that provides redundancy for the primary GitHub Enterprise instance.

• GitHub repository - A repository is the most basic element of GitHub. They're easiest to imagine as a project's folder. A repository contains all of the project files (including documentation), and stores each file's revision history. Repositories can have multiple collaborators and can be either public or private.

• GitHub repository cache - A read-only mirror of repositories for your GitHub Enterprise server instance, located near distributed teams and CI clients.

• GitHub repository graph - A visual representation of your repository's data.

• GitHub repository maintainer - Someone who manages a repository. This person may help triage issues and use labels and other features to manage the work of the repository. This person may also be responsible for keeping the README and contributing files updated.

• GitHub required pull request review - Required reviews ensure that pull requests have at least one approved review before collaborators can make changes to a protected branch.

• GitHub required status check - Checks on pull requests that ensure all required CI tests are passing before collaborators can make changes to a protected branch.

• GitHub resolve - The action of fixing up manually what a failed automatic merge left behind.

• GitHub revert - When you revert a pull request on GitHub, a new pull request is automatically opened, which has one commit that reverts the merge commit from the original merged pull request. In Git, you can revert commits with git revert.

• GitHub review - Reviews allow others with access to your repository to comment on the changes proposed in pull requests, approve the changes, or request further changes before the pull request is merged.

• GitHub root directory - The first directory in a hierarchy.

• GitHub root filesystem - The base operating system and the GitHub Enterprise application environment.

• GitHub saved reply - A comment you can save and add to your GitHub user account so that you can use it across GitHub in issues and pull requests.

• GitHub scope - Named groups of permissions that an OAuth App can request to access both public and non-public data.

• GitHub seat - A user within a GitHub Enterprise organization. This may be referred to as “seat count.”

• GitHub secret team - A team that is only visible to the other people on the team and people with owner permissions.

• GitHub security log - A log that lists the last 50 actions or those performed within the last 90 days.

• GitHub server-to-server request - An API request used by an application that acts as a bot, independently of any particular user. For example, an application that runs on a scheduled basis and closes issues where there has been no activity for a long time. Applications that use this type of authentication don't use a licensed GitHub account so, in an enterprise with a billing plan that allows a certain number of licenses to be used, a server-to-server bot is not consuming one of your GitHub licenses. The token used in a server-to-server request is acquired programmatically, via the GitHub API. See also, “user-to-server request.”

• GitHub service hook - Also called “webhook.” Webhooks provide a way for notifications to be delivered to an external web server whenever certain actions occur on a repository or organization.

• GitHub single sign-on - Also called SSO. Allows users to sign in to a single location - an identity provider (IdP) - that then gives the user access to other service providers.

• GitHub snapshot - A checkpoint of a virtual machine at a point in time.

• GitHub squash - To combine multiple commits into a single commit. Also a Git command.

• GitHub SSH key - SSH keys are a way to identify yourself to an online server, using an encrypted message. It's as if your computer has its own unique password to another service. GitHub uses SSH keys to securely transfer information to your computer.

• GitHub staging instance - A way to test modifications before they are applied to your actual GitHub Enterprise instance.

• GitHub status - A visual representation within a pull request that your commits meet the conditions set for the repository you're contributing to.

• GitHub status checks - Status checks are external processes, such as continuous integration builds, which run for each commit you make in a repository. For more information, see “About status checks.”

• GitHub star - A bookmark or display of appreciation for a repository. Stars are a manual way to rank the popularity of projects.

• GitHub subscription - A user or organization's GitHub plan.

• GitHub team - A group of organization members that reflect your company or group's structure with cascading access permissions and mentions.

• GitHub team maintainer - Organization members that have a subset of permissions available to organization owners to manage teams.

• GitHub Team plan - An organization billing plan that gives you unlimited public and private repositories.

• GitHub timeline - A series of events in a pull request or on a user profile.

• GitHub topic branch - A regular Git branch that is used by a developer to identify a conceptual line of development. Since branches are very easy and inexpensive, it is often desirable to have several small branches that each contain very well defined concepts or small incremental yet related changes. Can also be called a feature branch.

• GitHub topics - A way to explore repositories in a particular subject area, find projects to contribute to, and discover new solutions to a specific problem on GitHub.

• GitHub traffic graph - A repository graph that shows a repository's traffic, including full clones (not fetches), visitors from the past 14 days, referring sites, and popular content.

• GitHub transfer - To transfer a repository means to change the owner of a repository. The new owner will be able to immediately administer the repository's contents, issues, pull requests, releases, and settings.

• GitHub upstream - When talking about a branch or a fork, the primary branch on the original repository is often referred to as the “upstream”, since that is the main place that other changes will come in from. The branch/fork you are working on is then called the “downstream”. Also called origin.

• GitHub upstream branch - The default branch that is merged into the branch in question (or the branch in question is rebased onto). It is configured via branch.<name>.remote and branch.<name>.merge. If the upstream branch of A is origin/B sometimes we say “A is tracking origin/B”.

• GitHub user - Users are people with personal GitHub accounts. Each user has a personal profile, and can own multiple repositories, public or private. They can create or be invited to join organizations or collaborate on another user's repository.

• GitHub username - A user's handle on GitHub.

• GitHub user-to-server request - An API request used by an application that performs a task on behalf of a particular user. Where a task is carried out with user-to-server authentication it's shown on GitHub as having been done by a user via an application. For example, you might choose to create an issue from within a third-party application, and the application would do this on your behalf on GitHub. The scope of tasks an application can perform using a user-to-server request is restricted by both the app's and the user's permissions and access. The token used in a user-to-server request is acquired via OAuth. For more information, see “Identifying and authorizing users for GitHub Apps.” See also, “server-to-server request.”

• GitHub visible team - A team that can be viewed and @mentioned by every organization member.

• GitHub watch - You can watch a repository or issue to receive notifications when updates are made to an issue or pull request.

• GitHub watching notifications - A notification about activity in a repository a user has subscribed to.

• GitHub web notifications - Notifications displayed in the web interface on GitHub: https://github.com/notifications

• GitHub webhooks - Webhooks allow you to build or set up GitHub Apps which subscribe to certain events on GitHub.com. Webhooks provide a way for notifications to be delivered to an external web server whenever certain actions occur on a repository or organization. Also called a service hook.

• GitHub write access - A permission level on a repository that allows the user to push, or write, changes to the repository.

Fair Use Sources:

• https://docs.github.com/en/get-started/quickstart/github-glossary
• The Official Git Glossary
• Git Reference
• Git SCM
• B0978TF66B (G4Pg 2021)
• B01NBEQCA1 (PrGt 2016)
• B0827FGT77 (BgGH 2019)
• 9781492091127 (VCgt 2022)
• B07RGKKBTY (GHDum 2019)

• GitHub on DuckDuckGo
• GitHub on GitHub
• GitHub on O'Reilly
• GitHub on Stackoverflow
• GitHub on Reddit
• GitHub on YouTube
• GitHub for Archive Access for Fair Use Preservation, quoting, paraphrasing, excerpting and/or commenting upon