I find it interesting that the remote branch name to be used when pushing back to the remote git repository is named "origin" when it's actually called "master"... Why is this the case?
2 Answers
master is the name of a branch. origin is the name of a remote. A remote is a complete git repository that may contain many symbolic branch names; you're generally trying to push your commits from your local master to the remote's - origin/master in this case.
Comments
The main advantage for origin, which reference where to push, is that it is the default name for a remote repository reference.
So your first push of your local master branch should be:
git push -u origin master (See "Why do I need to explicitly push a new branch?")
But after that, master is linked to origin/master, and a simple git push will be enough, which defaults to git push origin (git push to origin the current branch)
origin/master.origin, is a Git repository. It has its own branches, including itsmaster. What you callorigin/masteris your Git's way of remembering theirmaster, which they just callmaster. (They have no name for yourmasteras they have no need to remember that you even exist :-) .)