On Piwigo we typically have two active branches:

• trunk holds the main source code with features for the next major version
• 2.7 (in instance) holds the source code of the current major version, only bug fixes and minor features are pushed to this branch

As the SVN concept of branches is very loose we used to develop either on master or 2.7 and then merge specific commits to the other branch if needed. This concept is totally applicable in Git, it's called cherry pick.

But this is not how Git is supposed to work. Git tends to track every changes, and links them to others, and because cherry pick basically forge a new commit from another one, a part of the history is lost.

The workflow we follow is the one described by Vincent Driessen in his excellent article A successful Git branching model.

Don't worry it's actually very simple. There are five types of branches.

Contains the latest stable version of the source code. Production tags are created on this branch. Never commit on this branch.

Contains the latest development code. It's like the trunk on Subversion. It is advised to only make small commits on this branch, prefer using a bug- or feature- branch.

Contain the code of a specific major version and all its minor versions. It is initiated by a single commit making necessary changes (version change, production config, etc.). Like develop it's advised to only make small commits on this branch.

Remember that we NEVER make database changes in minor releases, neither we add translatable strings.

When a new version is released, the branch must be merged in master and a tag created (on master).

Are used to… fix bugs. Create one bug branch by bug. It should be named after a specific issue number (eg: bug-1324).

Once the fix is ready it must be merged in develop and generally the current release branch.
You notice that, unlike Vincent Dressen, we don't merge bug fixes in master but in the current branch, which is then merged back into master when ready.

Don't forget to delete the branch locally and remotely when finished.

Almost the same as bug- but for new features. It can be named after a specific issue number, or an arbitrary name for unlisted features.

Once the feature is ready it must be merge in develop and in the current release branch only if it's a minor feature.

These are some random advices you should really apply in order to have a clean Git history.

When merging a branch into another, the default behavior of Git is to fast-forward it, that means if no changes has been made on the target branch, the source branch will simply disappear from the tree, making it difficult to localize merging point.

By adding the –no-ff option to git merge you will force Git to create an empty technical commit when merging.