# 8.2: GitHub Fork and Clone

## Learning Objectives

At the end of this lesson, you should:

* Be able to use the GitHub Fork feature.
* Be able to use the `git clone` command.
* Be able to use the `git push` command.

## Introduction

We will learn more features of Git and GitHub to start and submit SWE Fundamentals projects. As a reminder, Git is the *version control system* and GitHub is the code-hosting website built on top of Git. GitHub extends the capabilities of Git by adding visual code browsing, social features, and collaboration features.

{% hint style="warning" %}
In the below video we demonstrate `git push origin master`, but for SWE Fundamentals `git push` will suffice. `origin` refers to the target Git remote, and `master` refers to the target branch. **Rocket Academy has updated our repos to use `main` as the default branch** name as per GitHub's latest convention, so if you wanted to specify the full command including remote and branch for SWE Fundamentals, you could use **`git push origin main`**.
{% endhint %}

{% embed url="<https://youtu.be/uMNcnLWTmZU>" %}

### GitHub Fork

"Fork" is the GitHub term for *copying* a repo from one GitHub account to another. We can fork a repo by clicking the Fork button on a given GitHub repo page. Forking allows us to make changes to a repo and save those changes to *our own* GitHub account's copy of the repo. Our account's repo is essentially ***independent*** from the original, forked repo.

![How to find the fork button on a repo page.](/files/Kafk9D5Py5lwNWSUd7xX)

"Fork" is a GitHub concept. Forking is not built-in to the Git version control system.

![A "fork" is when we copy a repo from another account to our own inside of GitHub.](/files/-MF68PHy5ncUHRCPcADs)

## Git Clone

We'll use a Git command to download or "clone" a copy of SWE Fundamentals starter code. `<REPO_DOWNLOAD_URL>` is the download URL of our repo, obtained by clicking the Download Code button on the repo's [GitHub page](https://github.com/rocketacademy/fundamentals-starter-code). `<LOCAL_REPO_FOLDER_NAME>` is the name of the destination folder that is created (containing the contents of the repo) when we run the Git command.

**Command Template**

```bash
git clone <REPO_DOWNLOAD_URL> <LOCAL_REPO_FOLDER_NAME>
```

**Sample Command**

```bash
git clone https://github.com/rocketacademy/fundamentals-starter-code.git fundamentalsash-starter-code-test
```

![Clone a repo onto your computer from GitHub](/files/-MEcm7TGou4rbzV6bgyV)

GitHub enables us to coordinate differences between local and "official" versions of the code, but we won't concern ourselves with that just yet.

### Git Push

We will learn 1 new Git command `push` to send local code commits from our computers to GitHub. `push` can also be used as a general command to move code between "remote" repos, but during SWE Fundamentals we will only be using `push` to push code to GitHub.

![The "git push" command can be used to send local code commits to GitHub.](/files/-MF69ZT24IiutUi8JnWT)

## Cheatsheet

Here is the workflow for SWE Fundamentals projects:

1. Go to the project repo page. Click the "Fork" button to copy the repo to our own GitHub account.
2. In the command line on our local computer, **clone the repo from our own Github account's copy of the repo.**
3. Once the repo is on our computer, make the changes we want, and follow the Git workflow and [cheatsheet ](/7-version-control/7.1-git.md#cheat-sheet)to commit those changes.
4. `git push` our changes to our repo. **Refresh** the repo page to see our commits in the repo.
5. Create a [pull request](/8-github/8.3-github-pull-request.md) in GitHub. This connects our work on the repo *in our account* to the original Rocket Academy repo. Fill in the survey and submit.

## Exercise

1. Fork a copy of the [Fundamentals *Beat That*! repo](https://github.com/rocketacademy/basics-beat-that) as setup for Project 2.
2. Clone the repo into a folder on your local machine.
3. Once you start working on your project, make frequent commits and use `git push` to update your GitHub repo.


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