Q:

Ocotopress with github repo branch

I'm new to both Github and Ocotopress. I've made a blog, and i have been following a tutorial from: http://schuyler.info/blog/how-to-setup-a-new-octopress-blog-on-github-pages.html
I've used rake generate and then rake deploy - which works a treat. I can see in my repo the files from _deploy. However, it says this is the master branch. And i am under the impression it shouldn't be? As the rest of the folders i added to my source folder don't show up in this site. 
I can visit the website via gitpages fine. I can see my two test posts. But i updated the navigation file within the source folder and tried to push this but it doesn't seem to appear. 
In the tutorial there is a bit: 
$ git add .
$ git commit -m "I made a post." -a
$ git push

This doesn't do anything for me. It says:
Everything up-to-date

Even when i am sure it's not.. Can anyone save a damsel in distress?
Note - I don't see any of the commit comments on my repo, so i am figuring something has gone wrong and my master is not correct.

A:

You have to first switch to the source branch with
git checkout source

This branch will exist, as Octopress creates it for you. Then you can continue with
git add .
git commit -m "I made a post." -a
git push

Your generated files should indeed be in the master branch, due to the way that Github pages is set up. The source branch is created by Octopress so that the source that is being used to generate what is in the master branch is also available, in case you go to another computer, for example, and have to do a fresh clone of your repository. Without the source branch, you'd have to reverse engineer your own website!

