Unstage a deleted file in git

Question

Usually, to discard changes to a file you would do:

git checkout -- <file> 

What if the change I want to discard is deleting the file? The above line would give an error:

error: pathspec '<file>' did not match any file(s) known to git. 

What command will restore that single file without undoing other changes?

bonus point: Also, what if the change I want to discard is adding a file? I would like to know how to unstage that change as well.

Answer 1

Assuming you're wanting to undo the effects of git rm <file> or rm <file> followed by git add -A or something similar:

# this restores the file status in the index git reset -- <file> # then check out a copy from the index git checkout -- <file> 

To undo git add <file>, the first line above suffices, assuming you haven't committed yet.

Answer 2

Both questions are answered in git status.

To unstage adding a new file use git rm --cached filename.ext

# Changes to be committed: #   (use "git rm --cached <file>..." to unstage) # #   new file:   test 

To unstage deleting a file use git reset HEAD filename.ext

# Changes to be committed: #   (use "git reset HEAD <file>..." to unstage) # #   deleted:    test 

In the other hand, git checkout -- never unstage, it just discards non-staged changes.