GitHub For Music: Sharing DAW sessions to GitHub
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| GitHub Octocat illustration by Tom Ray |
I've been posting about how we use GitHub to collaborate on full DAW files remotely.
In the last post, I went over setting up a DAW session in GitHub, from creating the repository and downloading the folder by making a "clone" and managing all that with the GitHub Desktop App.
In the last example, we also added the DAW recording session to the "local" repository folder. Now I need to upload these changes to GitHub.com to put them in the GitHub repository that we'll be using to share these DAW files with each other.
Sharing recording sessions to GitHub
Now we are going to add the recording changes to the remote repository on GitHub.com by “pushing” (uploading) the local repository folder to it.
First, let's go over some of the terminology we are going to use because the words are a little different for GitHub.
Here are the terms we will be using and what they mean.
- "Add" looks for new changes made
- "Commit" marks these added changes for upload
- "Push" is uploading changes
- "Pull" is downloading changes
I said in the last post, as an example, I've recorded the drums after creating the DAW session in the GitHub repository I cloned to my computer, and now I need to put the recording sessions online for collaboration.
But I have to do a few steps first before doing this.
(Related Post: GitHub For Music: Setting Up A DAW Session For GitHub)
Save and close the DAW
First, I need to shut down the DAW completely before I add these changes to GitHub.
Sometimes when you close a program, it actually does some work behind the scenes in the actual code of the program itself, and we don't want those to be left out when it's uploaded to GitHub.
"Add" or look for all the changes in the local folder
This part of the process is a little strange to understand at first, because the GitHub repository folder we cloned to our computer isn't a folder that syncs automatically. It's a folder that has GitHub in it, and it just kind of sits there and waits for you to tell GitHub when something happened.
So first, I need to tell GitHub that I've made changes, and I do that by using the GitHub Desktop app by choosing "Add" the changes.
GitHub will then look for new changes made in the folder of the session.
"Commit" or mark the changes in the local folder
Next, I'm gonna "commit" those changes I added. I know because of the word "commit" that this makes it sound like I've uploaded them to GitHub now, but I have not.
As I mentioned in the list of terms above, it's really just putting a marker on the changes. The GitHub Desktop is just being told, there are a bunch of new files here in the folder, I want you to mark them for upload.
"Push" or upload the changes
Now we need to "push" the changes to upload them to GitHub. In another strange terminology word, I'm not uploading them, I'm going to push those changes.
They all mean the same thing; they're just different ways of saying it. And again, it's confusing, but yes, it's not in GitHub.com until you've pushed the changes.
So now that we've added the changes, committed the changes, and then pushed them, they are now officially on the GitHub repository.
More later...
You can go to GitHub and see that the changes are there, and there should also be a message at the top of the repository that says there has been a recent update.
Next, I will go over how the band members can clone their own version of the DAW repository to work on.
Download My GitHub For Music Process
GitHub for Music Collaboration With A Full DAW Is Possible... If You Use It Incorrectly!
This document explains my full method on how to use GitHub for collaborating on music projects with full DAW sessions.
The document outlines an unconventional way to use GitHub for music collaboration.
