git

From IndieWeb

Git is a popular distributed source control management system that can be used to host and share code from independent sites.

Why

Why use git on your own site? Good question — to be answered by those that do!

Especially, why use git rather than some other indie code solution.

How to

Documentation

There is plenty of good documentation about Git. Here's a few links to get started:

IndieWeb Examples

(stub - needs per person headings and "since YYYY-MM-DD" dates for each!)

Broken:

Software

The following software can be installed to provide git services on your own site:

Silos Running Open Source Software

You can use their silo or host it yourself with their open source software:

  • GitLab is a complete git hosting solution which provides an interface similar to GitHub.
  • http://repo.or.cz provides git repository hosting using girocco.
  • Codeberg runs Forgejo with similar functionality to GitLab and GitHub, and is operated by a non-profit organization.

Silos

POSSE

Here are some methods one might use to publish on their own site (host the repo on your site) and syndicate elsewhere (push to GitHub):

  • Simplest method is to add the silo (GitHub) as a separate repo and push to it when you're ready:
git remote add github git@github.com:user/repo
git push github

Criticism

Complex Unmemorable Commands

Git, like many command line tools, has so many complex unmemorable commands that interact with each other in strange ways that it's far too easy to get something wrong, and far too hard to remember what the right thing is. They might as well be magic incantations (perhaps that has some appeal, like making it an "insider" jargon thing?).

This satirical parody illustrates the git commands problem quite well:

See Also

  • code
  • projects
  • https://ohshitgit.com/
  • inside .git small comic/pamphlet about what is going on inside the .git folder
  • How Git Works zine by Julia Evans
  • Criticism: unnecessary amounts of ceremony for common prose editing use-cases: https://chat.indieweb.org/meta/2024-06-26#t1719442233333000 (and following)
    • "it's quite satisfying to find a very fixable "hole" like that in Wikipedia and be able to immediately edit save to fix it. No Git(hub) "create a fork" BS, no "Create a patch / pull request" ceremony, no prompted TWO text fields to provide BOTH a summary and a description of the edit, no stupid buttons that say "Merge" or "Squash & Merge" (why?!? so much plumbing BS that the authoring use-case doesn't care about), no "Delete fork" ceremonial" @[tantek] June 26, 2024