How do I resolve a merge conflict in GitHub?

[fostira]

I’m currently working on a project with a few colleagues, and I’ve been developing a new feature in my own branch for the past few days. I’ve made several commits and wanted to merge them. However, I just ran into a problem that I’m not sure how to resolve.

Before merging my changes into the main branch, I decided to pull the latest changes from the main branch to ensure everything is up to date. So, I ran the command:
git pull origin main

To my surprise, I received a message indicating that there’s a “merge conflict.” I was a bit taken aback since I thought everything would go smoothly.

When I opened the conflicted file, I saw sections marked with ⁠<<<<<<<, ⁠=======, and ⁠>>>>>>>. It was clear that my teammate had also made changes to the same lines in the file while I was working on my feature. Now, I’m staring at this code spaghetti.

I’m not entirely sure what to do next. I know I need to resolve this conflict, but I’m not familiar with the best way to go about it. Should I keep my changes, my teammate’s, or try to combine both? How do I properly mark the conflict as resolved once I’ve made my edits?

Thank you in advance!

[Armiiin]

Ah well everyone has at least once been there.
To resolve this merge conflict according to best practices, this is what you should do:

1. Identify the Conflict:
   First, check which files are conflicted by running ⁠git status. This will help you locate the files that need your attention.

2. Open the Conflicted File:
   Open the file in your text editor. You will see the conflicting sections marked with ⁠<<<<<<<, ⁠=======, and ⁠>>>>>>>. The lines between ⁠<<<<<<< and ⁠======= are your changes, while those between ⁠======= and ⁠>>>>>>> are your teammate’s changes.

3. Resolve the Conflict:
   Carefully review both sets of changes. Decide how you want to merge them—whether to keep your changes, your teammate’s, or combine both in a new way.

4. Mark the Conflict as Resolved:
   Once you’ve edited the file to resolve the conflict, save your changes and use ⁠git add to mark it as resolved.

5.Complete the Merge:
Finally, commit the resolved changes with ⁠git commit. This will finalize the merge and allow you to push your integrated feature into the main branch.

By following these steps, you can effectively resolve the merge conflict, ensuring that both your work and your teammate’s contributions are respected in the final codebase.

Also make sure to ask your teammate for clarification so your changes doesn't affect his planned work!

Good Luck!

[fostira]

Thank you! 🙏

I know I could google it but there was different results with different approaches and it just feels great when you get the info from people who work with it and have experience! 👍