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🚩 Checkpoint 3: Branch and Pull Request

This is the workflow real teams use every day: make a change on a branch, push it, open a pull request, review it, merge it. You will run the whole loop on your own repo while adding your first SQL file to the portfolio.

Before you start

You need a pushed Checkpoint 2 (your repo on GitHub) and the Branching and Pull Requests lessons. Make sure you are on main and up to date: git switch main && git pull.

Step 1 — Create a branch​

git switch -c add-sales-query

You are now on a separate branch. Anything you do here leaves main untouched until you merge.

Step 2 — Add a SQL query file​

Make a queries folder and create the file:

mkdir queries

Now create queries/monthly_sales.sql. Open it in your editor (code queries/monthly_sales.sql or nano queries/monthly_sales.sql) and paste:

-- Monthly revenue by product category
SELECT
    DATE_TRUNC('month', order_date) AS month,
    category,
    SUM(amount) AS revenue
FROM sales
GROUP BY 1, 2
ORDER BY month, revenue DESC;

This is the kind of query you wrote in the SQL course. Save the file.

Step 3 — Commit and push the branch​

git add queries/monthly_sales.sql
git commit -m "Add monthly sales revenue query"
git push -u origin add-sales-query

The push output includes a GitHub link to "create a pull request" — handy, but we will use the web UI.

Step 4 — Open the pull request​

  1. Go to your repo on GitHub. A banner shows "add-sales-query had recent pushes" with a Compare & pull request button. Click it.
  2. The title is pre-filled from your commit. Add a short description, e.g. "Adds a query for monthly revenue by category."
  3. Click Create pull request.

Step 5 — Review your own diff​

Open the Files changed tab. You should see queries/monthly_sales.sql entirely in green (all new lines). Reviewing your own changes before merging is a habit worth building now.

Step 6 — Merge, then sync locally​

  1. Click Merge pull request → Confirm merge.
  2. Click Delete branch on GitHub (it is merged, so it is safe).
  3. Back in your terminal, bring main up to date and clean up the local branch:
git switch main
git pull
git branch -d add-sales-query

What you should see​

git log --oneline

Your merged commit is now on main, and queries/monthly_sales.sql exists in your folder. On GitHub, the repo now shows a queries/ folder.

If something goes wrong​

Error / situationCauseFix
fatal: The current branch has no upstreamYou ran git push without -u on a new branchRun git push -u origin add-sales-query
No "Compare & pull request" bannerIt expired or you missed itGo to the Pull requests tab → New pull request, pick your branch
git branch -d says "not fully merged"Your local main is behindRun git pull first, then delete; or confirm the PR actually merged on GitHub

✅ Checkpoint complete​

  • You created and pushed the add-sales-query branch
  • You opened, reviewed, and merged a pull request on GitHub
  • queries/monthly_sales.sql is on main both locally and on GitHub
  • The feature branch is deleted

You just did the exact workflow professional analysts and engineers use to ship changes. Next, you will deliberately break things and learn to recover.

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