Version Control with Git in PyCharm

Version control is an essential best practice in the field of software development. The mechanics of the process, though, are daunting for new developers. It is easy to make mistakes. As a bootcamp instructor at Southern Methodist University (Go Ponies!), I have seen quite a few blunders, such as accidentally adding your entire home folder to a Git repository, creating repositories inside of other repositories, and wiping out the product of hard work by pushing and pulling out of order. I prefer my students to master Git on the command line. In fact, it is the very first skill I teach, and in my opinion, it is one of the most difficult.

After a developer gains confidence with the whole Git process, it is something of an annoyance to have to constantly jump out of the IDE to perform four or five commands, then jump back into the IDE to continue work. It is true you could use the built-in terminal window available in PyCharm, but the IDE offers...