How to Check If a Git Stash Exists

Introduction

In this lab, you will learn how to check if a Git stash exists and how to view your list of stashes. We will begin by using the git stash list command to see all currently saved stashes. You will then learn how to identify and refer to specific stashes using their index, such as stash@{0}. Finally, we will explore how to determine if your stash list is empty. This lab will provide you with the fundamental skills to manage your Git stashes effectively.

Skills Graph

Run git stash list

In this step, we will learn how to use the git stash list command. The git stash command is a powerful tool that allows you to temporarily save changes you've made to your working directory and index, so you can work on something else and then come back and reapply them later. Think of it like putting your current work aside on a shelf so you can focus on something urgent, and then easily pick up where you left off.

The git stash list command is used to show the list of stashes that you currently have. Each stash is identified by an index, like stash@{0}, stash@{1}, and so on. The most recent stash is always stash@{0}.

Let's try running the command. First, make sure you are in your project directory:

cd ~/project/my-time-machine

Now, run the git stash list command:

git stash list

Since we haven't created any stashes yet, you should see no output. This means your stash list is currently empty.

Understanding the stash list is important because it helps you keep track of the different sets of changes you've temporarily saved. As you work on more complex projects, you might have multiple stashes for different tasks or experiments. The git stash list command is your way of seeing what's on your "stash shelf".

In the next steps, we will create some changes and use git stash to save them, and then we'll see how the git stash list command updates.

Check for Specific Stash Index

In the previous step, we learned how to list all stashes using git stash list. Now, let's explore how to refer to a specific stash in the list.

As we saw, each stash in the list has an index, starting from stash@{0} for the most recent one. When you have multiple stashes, you might need to apply or inspect a specific one. You can refer to a stash by its index.

For example, if you had three stashes, they would be listed as stash@{0}, stash@{1}, and stash@{2}. stash@{0} is the newest, stash@{1} is the one before that, and so on.

While we don't have any stashes yet to demonstrate applying a specific one, it's important to understand how the indexing works. When you use commands like git stash apply or git stash drop, you can specify the index of the stash you want to operate on. For instance, git stash apply stash@{1} would apply the changes from the second most recent stash.

Let's run git stash list again to confirm our understanding of the output format, even though it will be empty:

git stash list

Again, you should see no output. This reinforces that the list is empty and there are no stashes to refer to by index yet.

Understanding how to reference stashes by their index is crucial for managing multiple stashed changes effectively. It allows you to selectively work with different sets of changes you've saved.

In the next step, we will create some changes and stash them, which will then populate our stash list and allow us to see the index in action.

Test Empty Stash

In the previous steps, we used git stash list and saw that it produced no output because our stash list was empty. This step is a simple confirmation of that state before we move on to creating stashes.

It's important to understand what an empty stash list looks like, as it's the default state and what you'll see after you've applied or dropped all your stashes.

Let's run the command one more time to solidify this understanding:

git stash list

As expected, there is still no output. This confirms that there are no stashed changes in our repository at this moment.

Knowing how to check for an empty stash list is useful. If you expect to see stashed changes but the list is empty, it might indicate that you've already applied or dropped them, or perhaps you are in the wrong repository.

Now that we are familiar with the git stash list command and what an empty list looks like, we are ready to create some changes and learn how to stash them in the upcoming steps. This will allow us to see the stash list populate and understand the full workflow of using git stash.

Summary

In this lab, we learned how to check if a Git stash exists and how to list existing stashes. We started by using the git stash list command to display the current list of stashes. We observed that an empty output indicates no stashes are present.

We then explored how each stash is identified by an index, such as stash@{0} for the most recent one, allowing us to refer to specific stashes within the list. This understanding is crucial for managing multiple saved changes.