Easy Steps To Install Latest Git on Debian 11 From Source

In this guide from the Orcacore website, we want to teach you How To Install Latest Git on Debian 11. By far, the most widely used modern version control system in the world today is Git. Git is a mature, actively maintained open-source project originally developed in 2005 by Linus Torvalds, the famous creator of the Linux operating system kernel. A staggering number of software projects rely on Git for version control, including commercial projects as well as open-source projects.

Steps To Install Latest Git on Debian 11

To install Git, you must log in to your server as a non-root user with sudo privileges. To do this, you can follow our guide on the Initial Server Setup with Debian 11.

Now, follow the steps below to install git in the latest version on Debian 11.

1. Install Git From Source on Debian 11

For those who want the latest Git version, it is recommended to always install from the source. First, update your local package index with the following command:

sudo apt update

Then, you need to install the Dependencies on your server by using the following command:

sudo apt install make libssl-dev libghc-zlib-dev libcurl4-gnutls-dev libexpat1-dev gettext unzip -y

Now you need to visit the Git Release page and find the master zip archive or the latest stable release from Git.

Next, use the wget command to download the Latest git on Debian 11:

sudo wget https://github.com/git/git/archive/refs/tags/v2.49.0.zip

When your download is completed, unzip your file with the command below:

sudo unzip v2.49.0.zip

Switch to your Git directory:

cd git-2.49.0

At this point, use the following commands to install Git:

# sudo make prefix=/usr/local all
# sudo make prefix=/usr/local install

This may take some time to complete. When you are done, verify your Git installation on Debian 11 by checking its version:

git --version

Output
git version 2.49.0

2. Configure Git on Debian 11

At this point, you must configure Git so that the generated commit messages you make will contain the correct information and support you as you build your software project.

You must provide your name and email address because Git embeds this information into each commit you do. To do this, you can use the following commands:

# git config --global user.name "Your Name"
# git config --global user.email "youremail@domain.com"

After setting up the user name and email ID, you can verify the details using git config --list command:

git config --list

Output
user.name=Your Name
user.email=youremail@domain.com

All the configuration done through the git command will save the information in a file called .gitconfig in the user’s home directory. So you can also verify the configuration by checking this file using cat ~/.gitconfig command as shown below:

cat ~/.gitconfig

Output
[user]
   name=Your Name
   email=youremail@domain.com

3. Perform a Git Clone From GitHub

Now that you have set up Git on Debian 11, you can try using it by performing git clone operations from GitHub.

We can just clone a repository called wig by using git clone https://github.com/jekyc/wig.git command as shown below. This will create a directory wig in your local system and copy all the contents from the repository:

git clone https://github.com/jekyc/wig.git

In your output, you will see:

Also, you can check all the subcommands available with the git command using git help -a command as shown below:

git help -a

That’s it, you are done.

Conclusion

At this point, you have learned to install the Latest Git on Debian 11. While Debian’s default repositories often provide older versions, adding an external repository or building Git from source allows you to stay up-to-date. Following a few simple steps, you can successfully install and maintain the latest Git release on your system.

Hope you enjoy it. You may also be interested in these articles:

How To Install MongoDB Server on Debian 11

Set up and configure NTP Server and Client on Debian 11

Install and Use Vagrant on Debian 11

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