Feature Request: Checkout Remote Branch

[randomPoison]

In git-cola, going to branch > checkout only lists local branches. It would be nice if it would also list remote branches and would automatically create a local tracking branch if one doesn't already exist. Currently it seems like the only way to checkout a remote branch through git-cola is to go to branch > create and select a remote branch as the starting point.

[dmccuskey]

+1

[djhaskin987]

I like how git cola tracks very closely with the git commandline. This is one example. Git does not let you actually checkout a remote branch. Instead, when you run "Git checkout ", it figures what you wanted to do was create a banch to track a remote branch.

How does git cola even know from which remote you want to track? git checkout <remotebranch> only works because git assumes you mean the remote origin. What if you have two remotes? What will the branch name be? I don't know if a dialogue other than the current "Create branch" dialog would be useful here.

I think the improvement to make here is to add a menu entry branch > checkout remote..., which would pop up the "create branch" dialogue with appropriate defaults set in that dialogue. That way the dialog can more easily present a list of the remote branches and the user would not be confused.

[davvid]

very true. These sound like they'd be good improvements.

[wolftune]

This answer above seems to misunderstand. It would be nice to be able to do just like in the CLI git checkout remotename/branchname which does not make a new branch, it puts you in detached HEAD and lets you look at the remote files. Git-cola should support that, and it doesn't right now.