[git] How to get just one file from another branch

I am using git and working on master branch. This branch has a file called app.js.

I have an experiment branch in which I made a bunch of changes and tons of commits. Now I want to bring all the changes done only to app.js from experiment to master branch.

How do I do that?

Once again I do not want a merge. I just want to bring all the changes in app.js from experiment branch to master branch.

How to check out one or more files from another branch or commit hash into your currently-checked-out branch:

# check out all files in <paths> from branch <branch_name>
git checkout <branch_name> -- <paths>

Source: http://nicolasgallagher.com/git-checkout-specific-files-from-another-branch/.

See also man git checkout.

Examples:

# Check out "somefile.c" from branch `my_branch`
git checkout my_branch -- somefile.c

# Check out these 4 files from `my_branch`
git checkout my_branch -- file1.h file1.cpp mydir/file2.h mydir/file2.cpp

# Check out ALL files from my_branch which are in
# directory "path/to/dir"
git checkout my_branch -- path/to/dir

If you don't specify, the branch_name it is automatically assumed to be HEAD, which is your most-recent commit of the currently-checked-out branch. So, you can also just do this to check out "somefile.c" and have it overwrite any local, uncommitted changes:

# Check out "somefile.c" from `HEAD`, to overwrite any local, uncommitted
# changes
git checkout -- somefile.c

# Or check out a whole folder from `HEAD`:
git checkout -- some_directory

See also:

1. I show some more of these examples of git checkout -- in my answer here: Who is "us" and who is "them" according to Git?.

git checkout master               -go to the master branch first
git checkout <your-branch> -- <your-file> --copy your file data from your branch.

git show <your-branch>:path/to/<your-file> 

Hope this will help you. Please let me know If you have any query.

Supplemental to VonC's and chhh's answers.

git show experiment:path/to/relative/app.js > app.js
# If your current working directory is relative than just use
git show experiment:app.js > app.js

or

git checkout experiment -- app.js

Review the file on github and pull it from there

This is a pragmatic approach which doesn't directly answer the OP, but some have found useful:

If the branch in question is on GitHub, then you can navigate to the desired branch and file using any of the many tools that GitHub offers, then click 'Raw' to view the plain text, and (optionally) copy and paste the text as desired.

I like this approach because it lets you look at the remote file in its entirety before pulling it to your local machine.

If you want the file from a particular commit (any branch) , say 06f8251f

git checkout 06f8251f path_to_file

for example , in windows:

git checkout 06f8251f C:\A\B\C\D\file.h

To restore a file from another branch, simply use the following command from your working branch:

git restore -s my-other-branch -- ./path/to/file

The -s flag is short for source i.e. the branch from where you want to pull the file.

(The chosen answer is very informative but also a bit overwhelming.)

Everything is much simpler, use git checkout for that.

Suppose you're on master branch, to get app.js from new-feature branch do:

git checkout new-feature path/to/app.js

// note that there is no leading slash in the path!

This will bring you the contents of the desired file. You can, as always, use part of sha1 instead of new-feature branch name to get the file as it was in that particular commit.

Note:new-feature needs to be a local branch, not a remote one.

Another way is to create a patch with the differences and apply it in the master branch For instance. Let's say the last commit before you started working on app.js is 00000aaaaa and the commit containg the version you want is 00000bbbbb

The you run this on the experiment branch:

git diff 00000aaaaa 00000bbbbb app.js > ~/app_changes.git

This will create a file with all the differences between those two commits for app.js that you can apply wherever you want. You can keep that file anywhere outside the project

Then, in master you just run:

git apply ~/app_changes.git

now you are gonna see the changes in the projects as if you had made them manually.

git checkout branch_name file_name

Example:

git checkout master App.java

This will not work if your branch name has a period in it.

git checkout "fix.june" alive.html
error: pathspec 'fix.june' did not match any file(s) known to git.

Or if you want all the files from another branch:

git checkout <branch name> -- .