In this chapter we have learned how to better manage the contents of the working directory, and the contents of the staging area, preparing to create a new commit.

We know how to undo the last commit, how to drop changes to the working area, how to retroactively change the branch we are working on, and other uses of the git reset command. We now understand the three (and a half) forms of the reset.

We have learned how to examine and search the contents of the working directory, the staging area, and committed changes. We know how to use Git to copy the file version from the worktree, the index, or the HEAD into the worktree or the index. We can use Git to clean (remove) untracked files.

This chapter showed how to configure the handling of files in the working directory; how to make Git ignore files (by making them intentionally untracked) and why. It described how to handle the differences between line ending formats between operating systems. It explained how to enable (and write) keyword expansion, how to configure the handling of binary files, and enhance viewing the diff and merging specific classes of files.

We learned to stash away changes to handle interruptions, and to make it possible to test interactively prepared commits, before creating a commit. This chapter explained how Git manages stashes, enabling us to go beyond built-in operations.

This chapter, together with Chapter 3, Developing with Git, taught how to create your contribution to a project; together with Chapter 2, Exploring Project History, it also taught how to examine your clone of a project's repository.

The following chapters will teach you how to collaborate with other people, how to send what you contributed, and how to merge changes from other developers.