GitHub Releases Desktop App Version 1.2

A brand-new release of the GitHub Desktop app just shipped yesterday that will help you more easily sync up your changes with coworkers and teammates.

The headline release feature is that you can compare your branch to another branch in the repository. You can then merge that branch (i.e., master) into your current working branch.

Next up, you can select multiple files and perform actions on them like discarding changes. You can select multiple files with Shift + Command/Ctrl and clicking on individual files.

If you weren’t aware, GitHub desktop is an Electron-based application, which enables you to build cross-platform desktop applications with JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. Eighteen different people contributed to the v1.2 release though GitHub pull requests:

GitHub Desktop is open source. Thanks to our community, we’ve merged 26 contributions from 18 different contributors. Since launching 1.1 in February, we’ve fixed bugs, improved existing features, and extended GitHub Desktop. In fact, our multi-file select feature started as a pull request from our community ❤️. We’d love to have you join us and contribute to future versions of Desktop.

Here are the full release notes for v1.2.0:

• [New] History now has ability to compare to another branch and merge oustanding commits
• [New] Support for selecting more than one file in the changes list
• [New] Render bitmap images in diffs
• [Added] Add PowerShell Core support for Windows and macOS
• [Added] Add MacVim support for macOS
• [Added] Syntax highlighting for JavaServer Pages (JSP)
• [Added] Syntax highlighting for Haxe files
• [Added] Syntax highlighting for R files
• [Fixed] ‘Open in Shell’ on Linux ensures Git is on PATH
• [Fixed] Pressing ‘Enter’ on filtered Pull Request does not checkout
• [Fixed] Alert icon shrinks in rename dialog when branch name is long
• [Fixed] ‘Open in Desktop’ performs fetch to ensure branch exists before checkout
• [Fixed] ‘Open in Default Program’ on Windows changes the window title
• [Fixed] Skip fast-forwarding when there are many eligible local branches
• [Fixed] Image diffs not working for files with upper-case file extension
• [Fixed] Syntax highlighting not working for files with upper-case file extension
• [Fixed] Error when creating Git LFS progress causes clone to fail
• [Fixed] ‘Open File in External Editor’ always opens a new instance
• [Fixed] ‘Select All’ shortcut now works for changes list
• [Improved] Automatically add valid repository when using command line interface
• [Improved] Always fast-forward the default branch
• [Improved] Warn when trying to rename a published branch
• [Improved] Added context menu for files in commit history
• [Improved] Discarding all changes always prompts for confirmation,
• [Improved] Getting list of changed files is now more efficient when dealing with thousands of files
• [Improved] Checking out a Pull Request may skip unnecessary fetch
• [Improved] Commit summary now has a hint to indicate why committing is disabled
• [Improved] Pull request status text now matches format on GitHub
• [Improved] Add escape hatch to disable hardware acceleration when launching