Thanks to a related question, I found out that I need to “checkout” the remote branch as a new local branch, and specify a new local branch name.
git checkout -b newlocalbranchname origin/branch-name
Or you can do:
git checkout -t origin/branch-name
The latter will create a branch that is also set to track the remote branch.
Update: It’s been 5 years since I originally posted this question. I’ve learned a lot and git has improved since then. My usual workflow is a little different now.
If I want to fetch the remote branches, I simply run:
git pull
This will fetch all of the remote branches and merge the current branch. It will display an output that looks something like this:
From github.com:andrewhavens/example-project
dbd07ad..4316d29 master -> origin/master
* [new branch] production -> origin/production
* [new branch] my-bugfix-branch -> origin/my-bugfix-branch
First, rewinding head to replay your work on top of it...
Fast-forwarded master to 4316d296c55ac2e13992a22161fc327944bcf5b8.
Now git knows about my new my-bugfix-branch. To switch to this branch, I can simply run:
git checkout my-bugfix-branch
Normally, I would need to create the branch before I could check it out, but in newer versions of git, it’s smart enough to know that you want to checkout a local copy of this remote branch.