If you can spare 13 hours, take a two-day, hands-on Git and GitHub workshop. That 13 CPD hour block is exactly how many Irish trainers package the jump from installing tools to a repeatable team workflow. This guide pulls together the command-line essentials, branching and merge techniques, collaboration rituals and practical training routes so you can convert classroom practice into day-to-day habits. Nexus listings point to concrete course options and durations to match your time.

13 CPD hours is the credit attached to a two-day, hands-on Git and GitHub course offered by an Irish training provider, and that number matters because it's the common unit trainers use to package fundamentals into a single, usable weekend of practice. The classroom format gives time for installing and configuring tools, practising the working-staging-commit cycle, and running through branching and pull request exercises. If you only have a short window to lift your team or your own skills, a structured 13-hour course maps precisely onto the essentials that follow.

1. Start local: install, configure and authenticate

The very first work is local. Install Git on your operating system, set your identity and pick an authentication method before you write meaningful code. The LinkedIn practitioner guide lists the foundational setup commands you will use: git init to start a repository and git clone to copy a remote repository. Course curricula from Irish providers put these tasks at the top of the syllabus for the same reason: a correct global config sets the commit identity and reduces friction when you push and pull.

Practical steps to make routine: first, run the configuration commands that set your name and email in the global config so commits carry a clear author. Second, create or sign in to a GitHub account and add an authentication method: either an SSH key or a properly configured HTTPS remote. Training outlines seen in Irish courses show instructors walking learners through key generation, adding the public key to their GitHub account and testing the connection with a git push. Make sure your IDE integration is configured at this stage if you plan to use an IDE plugin later.

Worked example: you choose SSH for repeated pushes from your laptop. You generate an SSH keypair, add the public key to GitHub, confirm the connection with ssh -T [email protected] and then clone the remote. That short sequence eliminates repeated password prompts and keeps CI tokens distinct from your local identity.

2. Everyday Git: working directory, staging and atomic commits

3 commands will be your daily companions: git status, git add and git commit. The LinkedIn guide frames the working directory, the staging area and the commit history as Git's three areas and trains those commands as the core routine.

Irish course syllabi reinforce this with labs on .gitignore, renames, deletions and the index so learners internalise how Git classifies file states.

Use git status frequently to see what has changed. Stage changes with git add selectively when you want atomic commits, or use git add . When batching small, related edits. Record commits with short subject lines and optional body paragraphs, and keep messages descriptive so tools like git bisect and future rollbacks are straightforward. Course materials recommend creating short aliases for repetitive commands where that helps readability and speed; official curricula list aliasing and shortcuts among early customisation topics.

Worked example: you are fixing a bug and adding a test. First you run git status, add only the bugfix with git add path/to/file, commit with git commit -m 'fix: prevent null pointer in parsing' and then add the test files in a separate commit. Small, focused commits make code review and bisecting simpler.

3. Branching, pull requests and merge strategies

Treat the main branch as the stable production line and do feature work on short-lived branches. The LinkedIn guide sets out the canonical flow: develop locally on a branch, commit frequently and push branches to the remote when ready. Training programmes expand this into a pull-request based collaboration model where a branch is proposed for inclusion through a PR, triggering review, discussion and automated testing.

Adopt a clear branch naming convention, for example feature/your-feature, fix/issue-id or chore/documentation, and document the branch purpose in the PR description. Course outlines list creating and working with branches, viewing and listing branch names, checking out branches and deleting stale branches as routine skills. Use protected branch rules on critical branches in organisations to require passing tests and at least one approving review before a merge. Syllabi emphasise the social side of PRs: clear descriptions, focused diffs and small commits make review faster and reduce merge friction.

Mastheads

Choose merge strategies deliberately. Training curricula and the LinkedIn guide cover git merge, git rebase, git revert, git reset and git cherry-pick and caution about altering history. Use fast-forward merges when the branch can be directly applied to main, use merge commits when you want an explicit record of a topic branch and prefer rebasing for linear histories only when collaborators agree and the branch hasn't been shared widely. Practical labs in Irish courses focus on resolving merge conflicts and demonstrate merge strategies and rebasing in context so learners can choose the safest approach for their team.

Worked example: your team prefers a linear history. You rebase your local branch onto main to keep the history tidy, run local tests and then open a PR. But the training cautions that if others have already pulled your branch, rewriting history creates pain, so you opt for a merge commit instead.

4. Conflicts, scale, automation and governance

Merge conflicts are an inevitable part of collaborative work and resolving them methodically is a transferable team skill. Course syllabi list hands-on sessions on conflicts, showing how to use git diff and GUIs or IDE integrations to inspect differences, edit conflicted files and complete the merge with git add and git commit. The Nexus training material and other providers name merge conflict resolution as a core lab sequence.

To reduce conflict pain, avoid giant PRs. Break work into smaller pieces and run local tests before pushing. Use GUI tools or IDE integrations if the team prefers them; many Irish training outlines include configuring GitHub in Eclipse and introducing the EGit plugin to speed common tasks. Tools like GitKraken and other GUIs surface diffs and branch graphs for teams that don't live in the terminal.

When projects scale, learn repository structure, submodules and hooks. Course outlines include configuring remotes and tracking branches, working with multiple repositories and installing hooks to automate checks. Advanced online courses discussed in the training material cover submodules and the trade-offs they introduce. The advice from curricula is consistent: use submodules sparingly, document their setup in README files and include commit guidelines so contributors stay aligned.

Build routines for repository governance. Course modules cover creating organisations, managing teams and adding collaborators on GitHub. Use teams and role-based permissions to limit who can push to protected branches. Make issues the canonical work tracker and link PRs to issue IDs. Adopt a release tagging convention and use annotated tags for formal releases so deployments and rollbacks reference immutable points in history. The Irish course curricula emphasise configuring repositories, managing teams and introducing issues as part of collaboration labs.

When processes are stable, scale with automation and policy. Attach CI pipelines to PRs, use branch protection rules to enforce required statuses and apply code ownership and review policies in repository settings. Training modules that cover publishing repositories recommend documenting server-side hooks and CI policies so new contributors follow established conventions.

5. Practice routes and what course formats teach

Practice matters. Multiple Irish course offerings and online providers present layered curricula so you can choose a format that matches your starting point. The Nexus listings describe a two-day, 13 CPD hour workshop focused on fundamentals and command-line workflows and also set out a separate 4-day, 26 CPD hour course for deeper coverage. The Nexus listings were updated on 19/06/2026 and include explicit lab sequences on installing Git, configuring repositories, branching, PR collaboration, merge strategies and IDE integration.

Some providers offer a one-day fundamentals course with no formal prerequisites, while online platforms such as Udemy host multi-hour courses that cover basics and advanced workflows. These course descriptions indicate concrete entry points for readers who want classroom-format practice, while practitioner command summaries provide the day-to-day commands to start applying an optimized GitHub workflow immediately.

Choose your learning path by time and depth. If you have 13 hours, the two-day hands-on workshop will get you through installation, identity, the index, branching, pull requests and basic merge conflict exercises. If you can allocate more days, the 26 CPD hour course covers submodules, hooks and repository publishing in greater depth. And if you need a single-day primer to get the team aligned quickly, a short fundamentals course is an option that lists no prerequisites.

Worked example: your team is new to GitHub and has two days for training. The two-day, 13 CPD hour format maps well to onboarding.

Day one covers installation, config and the working-staging-commit cycle with labs. Day two focuses on branching, PRs, merge strategies and a conflict resolution lab. That mix reproduces what many Irish training providers show in their syllabi.

Hygiene and default habits are the small decisions that pay compound returns. Course materials and practitioner guides converge on a handful of durable habits: clear commit messages, atomic commits, a full .gitignore to avoid committing build artifacts and regular housekeeping such as pruning stale branches. Use CI to run linters and tests on PRs so the main branch remains healthy. When your team has stable practices, document them and automate enforcement through CI and branch protection rules.

I'll save you the trouble of chasing every option: start with the smallest workable habit set, get the team to follow it for two sprints, then add automation. The recommended starter set from course curricula is simple: a configured global identity, a project .gitignore, a branch naming rule, protected main and at least one required approver for merges.

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The single practical takeaway is this: a structured, two-day workshop, commonly listed as 13 CPD hours, is the time many Irish trainers use to move learners from setup to a functioning GitHub workflow. Commit those 13 hours, follow the Nexus lab sequences and the command routines outlined here, and you will leave with a team-ready process.

This article was created with AI assistance.