Set up your fork

First you follow the instructions for :ref:`forking`.

Overview

git clone https://github.com/your-user-name/matplotlib.git
cd matplotlib
git remote add upstream https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib.git

In detail

Clone your fork

1. Clone your fork to the local computer with git clone https://github.com/your-user-name/matplotlib.git

2. Investigate. Change directory to your new repo: cd matplotlib. Then git branch -a to show you all branches. You'll get something like:

   * main
   remotes/origin/main
   

   This tells you that you are currently on the main branch, and that you also have a remote connection to origin/main. What remote repository is remote/origin? Try git remote -v to see the URLs for the remote. They will point to your github fork.

   Now you want to connect to the upstream `Matplotlib github`_ repository, so you can merge in changes from trunk.

Linking your repository to the upstream repo

cd matplotlib
git remote add upstream https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib.git

upstream here is just the arbitrary name we're using to refer to the main `Matplotlib`_ repository at `Matplotlib github`_.

Just for your own satisfaction, show yourself that you now have a new 'remote', with git remote -v show, giving you something like:

upstream     https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib.git (fetch)
upstream     https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib.git (push)
origin       https://github.com/your-user-name/matplotlib.git (fetch)
origin       https://github.com/your-user-name/matplotlib.git (push)