Difference between git pull and git request-pull

Question

What is the difference between git pull and git request-pull?

When I use git request-pull?

Answer 1

git pull: This command will incorporate the changes in a remote repository to your current branch. Simply, it will apply the others modifications to your current branch.

git request-pull: This command will send a request to the maintainers of another repository to pull the modifications you made. Simply, you ask other repository maintainers to apply your modifications.

You may find similar questions from this link. git-pull-vs-pull-request

Furthermore, please refer the Git manual.

Git Pull

Git Request Pull

Answer 2

If you use git pull, you pull the changes from the remote repository into yours.

If you send a pull request to another repository, you ask their maintainers to pull your changes into theirs (you more or less ask them to use a git pull from your repository).

If you are the maintainer of that repository, it seems you're making it a bit more difficult by pretending you're playing two roles in that workflow. You might as well merge locally your development branch into your master branch and push that master branch into your GitHub repository directly.

(As a side note, if you're new to Git, I'd suggest using git fetch and then git merge instead of git pull. git pull is effectively git fetch followed by git merge, but doing them separately gives you better control over potential conflicts.)