Add daily email for 2024-11-14

Starting with a clean slate

source/_daily_emails/2024-11-14.md

@@ -0,0 +1,31 @@
+---
+title: Starting with a clean slate
+date: 2024-11-14
+permalink: daily/2024/11/14/starting-with-a-clean-slate
+tags:
+  - software-development
+  - git
+cta: ~
+snippet: |
+  Whenever I need to start a new task, I always try to start with a clean slate.
+---
+
+Whenever you need to start a new task in a codebase, I think it's important to always try to start with a clean slate.
+
+This is having an empty staging area and no lingering or uncommitted changes from previous tasks.
+
+I do this to avoid having contaminated commits that contain multiple changes. Each commit should be related to one change.
+
+You can use `git add -p` to [review, stage and commit parts of your changes][1], but as the uncommitted changes grow, you're less likely to do that and more likely to commit them at once with a generic commit message that offers no value when viewed in the commit log.
+
+You're more likely to create better and more valuable commits and write better commit messages if you break them into chunks and commit the changes as you make them.
+
+If you have extra files you don't want to commit, add them to a `.gitignore` file or `.git/info/exclude` so they're ignored.
+
+If you have uncommitted changes that you want to hide for now but re-add later, [git stash is your friend][0].
+
+If you want your changes to be completely separate, maybe [git worktrees are for you][2].
+
+[0]: {{site.url}}/daily/2024/10/24/git-stash-is-underrated
+[1]: {{site.url}}/daily/2024/10/25/always-review-your-changes
+[2]: {{site.url}}/daily/2022/08/12/git-worktrees-docker-compose