diff --git a/git-hooks/README.md b/git-hooks/README.md
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+++ b/git-hooks/README.md
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+git hooks for IPython
+
+add these to your `.git/hooks`
+
+For now, we just have `post-checkout` and `post-merge`,
+both of which just update submodules,
+so make sure that you have a fully synced repo whenever you checkout or pull.
+
+To use these hooks, you can symlink or copy them to your `.git/hooks` directory.
+
+    ln -s ../../git-hooks/post-checkout .git/hooks/post-checkout
+    ln -s ../../git-hooks/post-merge .git/hooks/post-merge
+
diff --git a/git-hooks/post-checkout b/git-hooks/post-checkout
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index 000000000..2e8348472
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+++ b/git-hooks/post-checkout
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+#!/bin/sh
+
+git submodule init
+git submodule update
diff --git a/git-hooks/post-merge b/git-hooks/post-merge
new file mode 100755
index 000000000..2e8348472
--- /dev/null
+++ b/git-hooks/post-merge
@@ -0,0 +1,4 @@
+#!/bin/sh
+
+git submodule init
+git submodule update