DEPOT_TOOLS_TUTORIAL(7)

NAME
depot_tools_tutorial - A tutorial introduction to the Chromium depot_tools git extensions.

DESCRIPTION

The Chromium depot_tools(7) suite contains many git workflow-enhancing tools which are designed to work together to enable anyone to wrangle the Chromium codebase expertly. This tutorial explains how to do development on Chromium using these tools. This will cover:

    • Setting up

    • Getting the code

    • TL;DR

    • Creating / Uploading a CL

    • Updating the code

    • Managing multiple CLs

    • Managing dependent CLs

    • Example Walkthrough

Please refer to the manpages (or --help output) for details about any of the commands mentioned in this tutorial.

    Note

    If your platform does not support manpages (or you prefer something a bit more expressive than plain text) you can find all documentation in html form in the [DEPOT_TOOLS]/man/html folder.

  PREREQUISITES

This tutorial assumes basic familiarity with git terminology and concepts. If you need to brush up on these, the following are very good resources:

    • Think like (a) Git[1] - A lighthearted overview of git. If you’re sorta-familiar with git, but not comfortable with it, then give this a look.

    • Git Immersion Tutorial[2] - An in-depth git tutorial.

    • pcottle’s Visual Git Branching[3] - An excellent interactive/graphical demo on how git handles commits, branches, and shows the operations git performs on them.

    • Pro Git book[4] - “The” book for learning git from basics to advanced concepts. A bit dry, but very through.

If you’ve tried these out and are still having some trouble getting started, there are many other resources online which should help. If you’re really really stuck, then chat up one of the Chromium infrastructure team members for some pointers.

Litmus Test
    If you know what git add, git status, git commit do and you know essentially what git rebase does, then you should know enough to follow along.

SETTING UP

  GET DEPOT TOOLS

Clone the depot_tools repository:

    $ git clone https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/tools/depot_tools.git

Add depot_tools to the front of your PATH (you will probably want to put this in your ~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc). Assuming you cloned depot_tools to /path/to/depot_tools:

    $ export PATH=/path/to/depot_tools:$PATH

  BOOTSTRAPPING CONFIGURATION

If you have never used git before, you’ll need to set some global git configurations; substitute your name and email address in the following commands:

    $ git config --global user.name "John Doe"
    $ git config --global user.email "jdoe@email.com"
    $ git config --global core.autocrlf false
    $ git config --global core.filemode false
    $ # and for fun!
    $ git config --global color.ui true

TL;DR

    $ # get the code
    $ # In an empty directory:
    $ fetch {chromium,...}
    $ # Update third_party repos and run pre-compile hooks
    $ gclient sync
    $ # Make a new change and upload it for review
    $ git new-branch <branch_name>
    $ # repeat: [edit, git add, git commit]
    $ git cl upload
    $ # After change is reviewed, commit with the CQ
    $ git cl set_commit
    $ # Note that the committed hash which lands will /not/ match the
    $ # commit hashes of your local branch.

GETTING THE CODE

Pick an empty directory and run one of the following:

    $ fetch chromium  # Basic checkout for desktop Chromium
    $ fetch android   # Chromium checkout for Android platform
    $ fetch ios       # Chromium checkout for iOS platform

When the fetch tool completes you should have the following in your working directory:

    .gclient   # A configuration file for you source checkout
    src/       # Top-level Chromium source checkout.

If you are on linux and fetching the code for the first time, then you’ll need to run:

    $ cd src && ./build/install-build-deps.sh

And finally:

    $ gclient sync

This will pull all dependencies of the Chromium src checkout. You will need to run this any time you update the main src checkout, including when you switch branches.

CREATING / UPLOADING A CL

    Note

    The remainder of the tutorial assumes that your current working directory is the src/ folder mentioned in Getting the code.

Each CL corresponds exactly with a single branch in git. Any time you want to begin a new CL:

    $ git new-branch <branch_name>

This will create and checkout a new branch named branch_name which will track the default upstream branch (origin/main). See git-new-branch(1) for more features.

Commit as many changes as you like to this branch. When you want to upload it for review, run:

    $ git cl upload

This will take the diff of your branch against its upstream branch (in that case origin/main), and will post it to the Chromium code review site[5].

UPDATING THE CODE

Inevitably, you’ll want to pull in changes from the main Chromium repo. This is pretty easy with depot_tools:

    $ git rebase-update

This command will update all of your CLs to contain the latest code from their upstreams. It will also automatically clean up CLs which have been committed and a couple other nice things. See git-rebase-update(1) for the full scoop.

One thing to look out for are merge conflicts. These happen for exactly the same as they do with SVN, but the experience is a little more controllable with git. git rebase-update will try to rebase all your branches for you, but if it encounters a merge conflict in one, it will halt and leave you in a rebase conflict state (see git-rebase(1)). Resolving git rebase merge conflicts is beyond the scope of this tutorial, but there are many good sources online (see the Prerequisites for some).

Sometimes you’re pretty certain that you’ve committed a certain branch, but git rebase-update isn’t able to tell that for sure. This is usually because your branch doesn’t rebase cleanly. You could just delete the branch with git branch -D <branch>, but you’d like to double check the diff of your branch against its upstream before deleting it. If this is the case you can abort the rebase started by git rebase-update, and then run git-squash-branch(1) to flatten your branch into a single commit. When you run git rebase-update again, you’ll get a (hopefully) much smaller / saner diff. If it turns out you were wrong about your branch being fully committed, you can use git-reflog(1) to reset your branch back to where it was before. If the diff looks inconsequential, you can use git rebase --skip to ignore it, and then git rebase-update will clean it up for you.

Once you’re done resolving all of the merge conflict, just run git rebase-update, and it will pick up where it left off. Once the command has finished updating all of your branches, it will return you back to the branch you started on.

    Note

    Running git rebase-update will update all your branches, but it will not automatically run gclient sync to update your dependencies. Use caution when running git reset on branches managed by depot_tools. These tools track the set of "commits contained in the branch" from a branch’s "merge point" to the current branch value. See git help mark-merge-base for more discussion of the merge base.

MANAGING MULTIPLE CLS

Sometimes you want to work on more than one CL at once (say, you have a CL posted for review and want to work on something else). For each CL that you want to work on, just use git new-branch <branch_name>.

Once you start to have more than one CL at a time, it can be easy to lose your bearings. Fortunately, depot_tools has two tools to help you out:

    $ git map
    * 7dcfe47        (frozen_changes) 2014-03-12 ~ FREEZE.unindexed
    * 4b0c180        2014-03-12 ~ modfile
    * 59a7cca        2014-03-12 ~ a deleted file
    * 6bec695        (origin/main) 2014-03-11 ~ Add neat feature    <(frozen_changes)
    * d15a38a        2014-03-11 ~ Epic README update
    * d559894        (main) 2014-03-11 ~ Important upstream change
    | * 9c311fd      (cool_feature) 2014-03-11 ~ Respond to CL comments
    | | * 2a1eeb2    (subfeature) 2014-03-11 ~ integrate with CoolService
    | | * d777af6    2014-03-11 ~ slick commenting action
    | |/
    | * 265803a      2014-03-11 ~ another improvement    <(subfeature)
    | * 6d831ac      (spleen_tag) 2014-03-11 ~ Refactor spleen
    | * 82e74ab      2014-03-11 ~ Add widget
    |/
    * d08c5b3        (bogus_noparent) 2014-03-11 ~ Wonderful beginnings    <(cool_feature)

Note that this example repo is in dire need of a git-rebase-update(1)!

    $ git map-branches
    origin/main
      cool_feature
        subfeature
      frozen_changes *
      main

git-map(1)
    This tool shows you the history of all of your branches in a pseudo-graphical format. In particular, it will show you which commits all of your branches are on, which commit you currently have checked out, and more. Check out the doc for the full details.

git-map-branches(1)
    This tool just shows you which branches you have in your repo, and their upstream relationship to each other (as well as which branch you have checked out at the moment).

Additionally, sometimes you need to switch between branches, but you’ve got work in progress. You could use git-stash(1), but that can be tricky to manage because you need to remember which branches you stashed what changes on. Helpfully depot_tools includes two tools which can greatly assist in case:

git-freeze(1) allows you to put the current branch in 'suspended animation' by committing your changes to a specially-named commit on the top of your current branch. When you come back to your branch later, you can just run git-thaw(1) to get your work-in-progress changes back to what they were.

Another useful tool is git-rename-branch(1). Unlike git branch -m <old> <new>, this tool will correctly preserve the upstream relationships of your branch compared to its downstreams.

Finally, take a look at git-upstream-diff(1). This will show you the combined diff for all the commits on your branch against the upstream tracking branch. This is exactly what git cl upload will push up to code review. Additionally, consider trying the --wordwise argument to get a colorized per-word diff (instead of a per-line diff).

MANAGING DEPENDENT CLS

Now that you know how to manage independent CLs, we’ll see how to manage dependent CLs. Dependent CLs are useful when your second (or third or fourth or ...) CL depends on the changes in one of your other CLs (such as: CL 2 won’t compile without CL 1, but you want to submit them as two separate reviews).

Like all of the other CLs we’ve created, we use git-new-branch(1), but this time with an extra argument. First, git checkout the branch you want to base the new one on (i.e. CL 1), and then run:

    $ git new-branch --upstream_current <branch_name>

This will make a new branch which tracks the current branch as its upstream (as opposed to origin/main). All changes you commit to this branch will be in addition to the previous branch, but when you git cl upload, you will only upload the diff for the dependent (child) branch. You may have as many branches nested in this fashion as you like.

git-map(1) and git-map-branches(1) are particularly helpful when you have dependent branches. In addition, there are two helper commands which let you traverse your working copy up and down this tree of branches: git-nav-upstream(1) and git-nav-downstream(1).

Sometimes when dealing with dependent CLs, it turns out that you accidentally based a branch on the wrong upstream, but since then you’ve committed changes to it, or even based another branch off of that one. Or you discover that you have two independent CLs that would actually be much better off as dependent CLs. In instances like these, you can check out the offending branch and use git-reparent-branch(1) to move it to track a different parent. Note that this can also be used to move a branch from tracking origin/main to lkgr or vice versa.

EXAMPLE WALKTHROUGH

This section will demo what a typical workflow looks like when writing, updating, and committing multiple CLs.

    $ fetch chromium
    ... truncated output ...
    $ cd src

(only on linux)

    $ ./build/install-build-deps.sh
    ... truncated output ...

Pull in all dependencies for HEAD

    $ gclient sync
    ... truncated output ...

Let's fix something!

    $ git new-branch fix_typo
    $ echo -e '/Banana\ns/Banana/Kuun\nwq' | ed build/whitespace_file.txt
    1503
    It was a Domo-Banana.
    It was a Domo-Kuun.
    1501
    $ git commit -am 'Fix terrible typo.'
    [fix_typo 615ffa7] Fix terrible typo.
     1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
    $ git map
    * 615ffa720f	(HEAD -> fix_typo) 2014-04-10 ~ Fix terrible typo.
    * beec6f4746	(origin/main, origin/HEAD) 2014-04-10 ~ Make ReflectorImpl use mailboxes
    * 41290e02b7	2014-04-10 ~ don't use glibc-specific execinfo.h on uclibc builds
    * a76fde7b7b	2014-04-10 ~ [fsp] Add requestUnmount() method together with the request manager.
    * 9de7a713b3	2014-04-10 ~ linux_aura: Use system configuration for middle clicking the titlebar.
    * 073b0c203a	2014-04-10 ~ ContentView->ContentViewCore in ContentViewRenderView
    * 2250f532d7	2014-04-10 ~ ozone: evdev: Filter devices by path
    * 33a7a742b7	2014-04-10 ~ Always output seccomp error messages to stderr
    $ git status
    On branch fix_typo
    Your branch is ahead of 'origin/main' by 1 commit.
      (use "git push" to publish your local commits)
    nothing to commit, working tree clean
    $ git cl upload -r domo@chromium.org --send-mail
    ... truncated output ...

While we wait for feedback, let's do something else.

    $ git new-branch chap2
    $ git map-branches
    origin/main
      chap2 *
      fix_typo
    $ cat >> build/whitespace_file.txt <<EOF
    "You recall what happened on Mulholland drive?" The ceiling fan rotated slowly
    overhead, barely disturbing the thick cigarette smoke. No doubt was left about
    when the fan was last cleaned.
    EOF
    $ git status
    On branch chap2
    Your branch is up to date with 'origin/main'.
    Changes not staged for commit:
      (use "git add <file>..." to update what will be committed)
      (use "git restore <file>..." to discard changes in working directory)
    	modified:   build/whitespace_file.txt
    no changes added to commit (use "git add" and/or "git commit -a")

Someone on the code review pointed out that our typo-fix has a typo :( We're still working on 'chap2' but we really want to land 'fix_typo', so let's switch over and fix it.

    $ git freeze
    $ git checkout fix_typo
    Switched to branch 'fix_typo'
    Your branch is ahead of 'origin/main' by 1 commit.
      (use "git push" to publish your local commits)
    $ echo -e '/Kuun\ns/Kuun/Kun\nwq' | ed build/whitespace_file.txt
    1501
    It was a Domo-Kuun.
    It was a Domo-Kun.
    1500
    $ git upstream-diff --wordwise
    diff --git a/build/whitespace_file.txt b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    index 3eba355..57cdcee 100644
    --- a/build/whitespace_file.txt
    +++ b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    @@ -17,7 +17,7 @@ swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along
    the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that
    struggled against the elements. A hooded figure emerged.
    It was a Domo-BananaKun.
    "What took you so long?", inquired his wife.

    $ git commit -am 'Fix typo for good!'
    [fix_typo 2c0ad9c] Fix typo for good!
     1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
    $ git cl upload
    ... truncated output ...

Since we got lgtm, let the CQ land it.

    $ git cl set_commit
    $ git map
    * 0e2e52e72e	(chap2) 2014-04-10 ~ FREEZE.unindexed
    | * 2c0ad9c59b	(HEAD -> fix_typo) 2014-04-10 ~ Fix typo for good!
    | * 615ffa720f	2014-04-10 ~ Fix terrible typo.
    |/
    * beec6f4746	(origin/main, origin/HEAD) 2014-04-10 ~ Make ReflectorImpl use mailboxes    <(chap2)
    * 41290e02b7	2014-04-10 ~ don't use glibc-specific execinfo.h on uclibc builds
    * a76fde7b7b	2014-04-10 ~ [fsp] Add requestUnmount() method together with the request manager.
    * 9de7a713b3	2014-04-10 ~ linux_aura: Use system configuration for middle clicking the titlebar.
    * 073b0c203a	2014-04-10 ~ ContentView->ContentViewCore in ContentViewRenderView
    * 2250f532d7	2014-04-10 ~ ozone: evdev: Filter devices by path
    * 33a7a742b7	2014-04-10 ~ Always output seccomp error messages to stderr

Switch back to where we were using the nav* commands (for fun... git checkout would work here too)

    $ git map-branches
    origin/main
      chap2
      fix_typo *

    $ git nav-upstream
    Note: switching to 'origin/main'.
    You are in 'detached HEAD' state. You can look around, make experimental
    changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this
    state without impacting any branches by switching back to a branch.
    If you want to create a new branch to retain commits you create, you may
    do so (now or later) by using -c with the switch command. Example:
      git switch -c <new-branch-name>
    Or undo this operation with:
      git switch -
    Turn off this advice by setting config variable advice.detachedHead to false
    HEAD is now at beec6f4 Make ReflectorImpl use mailboxes
    $ git nav-downstream
    Previous HEAD position was beec6f4 Make ReflectorImpl use mailboxes
    Switched to branch 'chap2'
    Your branch is ahead of 'origin/main' by 1 commit.
      (use "git push" to publish your local commits)
    Please select a downstream branch
      0. chap2
      1. fix_typo
    Selection (0-1)[0]: 0
    $ git map-branches
    origin/main
      chap2 *
      fix_typo

Now we can pick up on chapter2 where we left off.

    $ git thaw
    $ git diff
    diff --git a/build/whitespace_file.txt b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    index 3eba355..9d08d9d 100644
    --- a/build/whitespace_file.txt
    +++ b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    @@ -34,3 +34,7 @@ with his fork, watching the runny jelly spread and pool across his plate,
     like the blood of a dying fawn. \"It reminds me of that time --\" he started, as
     his wife cut in quickly: \"-- please. I can't bear to hear it.\". A flury of
     images coming from the past flowed through his mind.
    +
    +"You recall what happened on Mulholland drive?" The ceiling fan rotated slowly
    +overhead, barely disturbing the thick cigarette smoke. No doubt was left about
    +when the fan was last cleaned.

    $ cat >> build/whitespace_file.txt <<EOF
    There was an poignant pause.
    EOF
    $ git diff
    diff --git a/build/whitespace_file.txt b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    index 3eba355..e3a55de 100644
    --- a/build/whitespace_file.txt
    +++ b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    @@ -34,3 +34,9 @@ with his fork, watching the runny jelly spread and pool across his plate,
     like the blood of a dying fawn. \"It reminds me of that time --\" he started, as
     his wife cut in quickly: \"-- please. I can't bear to hear it.\". A flury of
     images coming from the past flowed through his mind.
    +
    +"You recall what happened on Mulholland drive?" The ceiling fan rotated slowly
    +overhead, barely disturbing the thick cigarette smoke. No doubt was left about
    +when the fan was last cleaned.
    +
    +There was an poignant pause.

    $ git commit -am 'Finish chapter 2'
    [chap2 ceef712] Finish chapter 2
     1 file changed, 6 insertions(+)
    $ git map
    * ceef712d7f	(HEAD -> chap2) 2014-04-10 ~ Finish chapter 2
    | * 2c0ad9c59b	(fix_typo) 2014-04-10 ~ Fix typo for good!
    | * 615ffa720f	2014-04-10 ~ Fix terrible typo.
    |/
    * beec6f4746	(origin/main, origin/HEAD) 2014-04-10 ~ Make ReflectorImpl use mailboxes    <(fix_typo)
    * 41290e02b7	2014-04-10 ~ don't use glibc-specific execinfo.h on uclibc builds
    * a76fde7b7b	2014-04-10 ~ [fsp] Add requestUnmount() method together with the request manager.
    * 9de7a713b3	2014-04-10 ~ linux_aura: Use system configuration for middle clicking the titlebar.
    * 073b0c203a	2014-04-10 ~ ContentView->ContentViewCore in ContentViewRenderView
    * 2250f532d7	2014-04-10 ~ ozone: evdev: Filter devices by path
    * 33a7a742b7	2014-04-10 ~ Always output seccomp error messages to stderr
    $ git cl upload -r domo@chromium.org --send-mail
    ... truncated output ...

We poke a committer until they lgtm :)

    $ git cl set_commit

While that runs through the CQ, let's get started on chapter 3. Since we know that chapter 3 depends on chapter 2, we'll track the current chapter2 branch.

    $ git new-branch --upstream_current chap3
    $ cat >> build/whitespace_file.txt <<EOF
    CHAPTER 3:
    Mr. Usagi felt that something wasn't right. Shortly after the Domo-Kun left he
    began feeling sick.
    EOF
    $ git commit -am 'beginning of chapter 3'
    [chap3 7d4238a] beginning of chapter 3
     1 file changed, 4 insertions(+)
    $ git map
    * 7d4238a1e2	(HEAD -> chap3) 2014-04-10 ~ beginning of chapter 3
    * ceef712d7f	(chap2) 2014-04-10 ~ Finish chapter 2
    | * 2c0ad9c59b	(fix_typo) 2014-04-10 ~ Fix typo for good!
    | * 615ffa720f	2014-04-10 ~ Fix terrible typo.
    |/
    * beec6f4746	(origin/main, origin/HEAD) 2014-04-10 ~ Make ReflectorImpl use mailboxes    <(chap2, fix_typo)
    * 41290e02b7	2014-04-10 ~ don't use glibc-specific execinfo.h on uclibc builds
    * a76fde7b7b	2014-04-10 ~ [fsp] Add requestUnmount() method together with the request manager.
    * 9de7a713b3	2014-04-10 ~ linux_aura: Use system configuration for middle clicking the titlebar.
    * 073b0c203a	2014-04-10 ~ ContentView->ContentViewCore in ContentViewRenderView
    * 2250f532d7	2014-04-10 ~ ozone: evdev: Filter devices by path
    * 33a7a742b7	2014-04-10 ~ Always output seccomp error messages to stderr

We haven't updated the code in a while, so let's do that now.

    $ git rebase-update
    Fetching origin
    From https://upstream
       beec6f4..59cdb73  main       -> origin/main
    Rebasing: chap2
    Rebasing: fix_typo
    Failed! Attempting to squash fix_typo ... Success!
    Rebasing: chap3
    Reparented chap3 to track origin/main (was tracking chap2)
    Deleted branch fix_typo (was 5d26fec).
    Deleted branch chap2 (was 5d26fec).
    Running `git gc --auto` - Ctrl-C to abort is OK.

Well look at that. The CQ landed our typo and chapter2 branches already and git rebase-update cleaned them up for us.

    $ gclient sync
    ... truncated output ...
    $ git map
    * 93fe917ad1	(HEAD -> chap3) 2014-04-10 ~ beginning of chapter 3
    * 5d26fec369	(origin/main, origin/HEAD) 2014-04-10 ~ Finish chapter 2
    * df7fefbf06	2014-04-10 ~ Revert 255617, due to it not tracking use of the link doctor page properly.
    * 4b39cda0ac	2014-04-10 ~ Fix terrible typo.
    * 248c5b6fe3	2014-04-10 ~ Temporarily CHECK(trial) in ChromeRenderProcessObserver::OnSetFieldTrialGroup.
    * 8171df8af9	2014-04-10 ~ Remove AMD family check for the flapper crypto accelerator.
    * d6a30d2e56	2014-04-10 ~ Change the Pica load benchmark to listen for the polymer-ready event
    * beec6f4746	2014-04-10 ~ Make ReflectorImpl use mailboxes
    * 41290e02b7	2014-04-10 ~ don't use glibc-specific execinfo.h on uclibc builds
    * a76fde7b7b	2014-04-10 ~ [fsp] Add requestUnmount() method together with the request manager.
    * 9de7a713b3	2014-04-10 ~ linux_aura: Use system configuration for middle clicking the titlebar.
    * 073b0c203a	2014-04-10 ~ ContentView->ContentViewCore in ContentViewRenderView
    * 2250f532d7	2014-04-10 ~ ozone: evdev: Filter devices by path
    * 33a7a742b7	2014-04-10 ~ Always output seccomp error messages to stderr

Someone on IRC mentions that they actually landed a chapter 3 already! We should pull their changes before continuing. Brace for a code conflict!

    $ git rebase-update
    Fetching origin
    From https://upstream
       5d26fec..59cdb73  main       -> origin/main
    Rebasing: chap2
    ... lots of output, it's a conflict alright :(...
    $ git diff
    diff --cc build/whitespace_file.txt
    index 1293282,f903ea2..0000000
    --- a/build/whitespace_file.txt
    +++ b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    @@@ -42,4 -42,5 +42,9 @@@ when the fan was last cleaned
      There was an poignant pause.
      CHAPTER 3:
    ++<<<<<<< HEAD
     +Hilariousness! This chapter is awesome!
    ++=======
    + Mr. Usagi felt that something wasn't right. Shortly after the Domo-Kun left he
    + began feeling sick.
    ++>>>>>>> 93fe917 (beginning of chapter 3)

Oh, well, that's not too bad. In fact... that's a terrible chapter 3!

    $ $EDITOR build/whitespace_file.txt
    ... /me deletes bad chapter 3 ...
    $ git add build/whitespace_file.txt
    $ git diff --cached
    diff --git a/build/whitespace_file.txt b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    index 1293282..f903ea2 100644
    --- a/build/whitespace_file.txt
    +++ b/build/whitespace_file.txt
    @@ -42,4 +42,5 @@ when the fan was last cleaned.
     There was an poignant pause.
     CHAPTER 3:
    -Hilariousness! This chapter is awesome!
    +Mr. Usagi felt that something wasn't right. Shortly after the Domo-Kun left he
    +began feeling sick.

Much better

    $ git rebase --continue
    [detached HEAD 1cb4f5b] beginning of chapter 3
     1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
    $ git rebase-update
    Fetching origin
    chap3 up-to-date
    Running `git gc --auto` - Ctrl-C to abort is OK.
    $ gclient sync
    ... truncated output ...
    $ git map
    * 1cb4f5b622	(HEAD -> chap3) 2014-04-10 ~ beginning of chapter 3
    * 59cdb7335b	(origin/main, origin/HEAD) 2014-04-10 ~ Refactor data interchange format.
    * 34676a3583	2014-04-10 ~ Ensure FS is exited for all not-in-same-page navigations.
    * 7d4784e867	2014-04-10 ~ Add best chapter2 ever!
    * 5d26fec369	2014-04-10 ~ Finish chapter 2
    * df7fefbf06	2014-04-10 ~ Revert 255617, due to it not tracking use of the link doctor page properly.
    * 4b39cda0ac	2014-04-10 ~ Fix terrible typo.
    * 248c5b6fe3	2014-04-10 ~ Temporarily CHECK(trial) in ChromeRenderProcessObserver::OnSetFieldTrialGroup.
    * 8171df8af9	2014-04-10 ~ Remove AMD family check for the flapper crypto accelerator.
    * d6a30d2e56	2014-04-10 ~ Change the Pica load benchmark to listen for the polymer-ready event
    * beec6f4746	2014-04-10 ~ Make ReflectorImpl use mailboxes
    * 41290e02b7	2014-04-10 ~ don't use glibc-specific execinfo.h on uclibc builds
    * a76fde7b7b	2014-04-10 ~ [fsp] Add requestUnmount() method together with the request manager.
    * 9de7a713b3	2014-04-10 ~ linux_aura: Use system configuration for middle clicking the titlebar.
    * 073b0c203a	2014-04-10 ~ ContentView->ContentViewCore in ContentViewRenderView
    * 2250f532d7	2014-04-10 ~ ozone: evdev: Filter devices by path
    * 33a7a742b7	2014-04-10 ~ Always output seccomp error messages to stderr
    $ git cl upload
    ... truncated output ...

So there you have the basic flow. Note that you don’t have to do chromium development using these tools. Any git workflow is compatible, as long as git cl upload is able to upload good patches.

CONCLUSION

Hopefully that gives you a good starting overview on Chromium development using depot_tools. If you have questions which weren’t answered by this tutorial or the man pages for the tools (see the index of all tools here: depot_tools(7)), please feel free to ask.

GLOSSARY

CL
    A change-list. This is a diff which you would like to commit to the codebase.

DEPS
    A file in the chromium checkout which gclient sync uses to determine what dependencies to pull in. This file also contains hooks.

LKGR
    Last Known Good Revision. This is a git-tag(1) which tracks the last version of origin/main which has passed the full set of testing on the main Chromium waterfall[6].

CHROMIUM DEPOT_TOOLS

Part of the chromium depot_tools(7) suite. These tools are meant to assist with the development of chromium and related projects. Download the tools by checking out the git repository[7].

NOTES

1.  Think like (a) Git
    http://think-like-a-git.net/

2.  Git Immersion Tutorial
    http://gitimmersion.com/

3.  pcottle’s Visual Git Branching
    http://pcottle.github.io/learnGitBranching

4.  Pro Git book
    http://git-scm.com/book

5.  Chromium code review site
    https://chromium-review.googlesource.com

6.  main Chromium waterfall
    http://build.chromium.org

7.  git repository
    https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/tools/depot_tools.git