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Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

blog.jaredsinclair.com

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Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#61

Post by simplehuman »

jsmeaton wrote: post #10
stkdump wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slightly offtopic, I have always considered a strange failure of git that branches are second class citizen in git, not worthy of the same versioning mechanisms as files. It is not unreasonable to expect a versioning system to be able to track the history of branches. And if I don't want to loose a file, just because it was deleted some time in the past, surely I also don't want to loose a branchjust because it was d…

Doesn’t the reflog serve that purpose though? Branches are just labels for a commit, and all commits (and names) are visible in the reflog.

reflog is local only

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#62

Post by theamk »

copperx wrote: post #56
amelius wrote: post #42

I think it's stupid that GitHub stores (meta-) data in a place that's not governed by git. Everything should be in git.

Are you suggesting that GitHub should fork git to add new features?

No of course.

Have you seen how github wikis work? Their backend is anoth git repo, with markdown files. Very nice for backups and change detection.

Same method can be appplied to configuration. Separate repo with json files or something.

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#63

Post by chrisweekly »

stkdump wrote: post #9
johnchristopher wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Git and github aren't backup tools. I always feel like github (and others) added to the git workflow things that are bolted on top of it and tie you to their platform.

Slightly offtopic, I have always considered a strange failure of git that branches are second class citizen in git, not worthy of the same versioning mechanisms as files. It is not unreasonable to expect a versioning system to be able to track the history of branches. And if I don't want to loose a file, just because it was deleted some time in the past, surely I also don't want to loose a branchjust because it was d…

Don't lose sight of the simple fact that in git, a branch is just a name. In the end, it's all about commit(ish)s.

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#64

Post by ebg13 »

copperx wrote: post #56
amelius wrote: post #42

I think it's stupid that GitHub stores (meta-) data in a place that's not governed by git. Everything should be in git.

Are you suggesting that GitHub should fork git to add new features?

Not needed. They already know how to use special repo branches for special things. See e.g. gh-pages and yourproject.wiki.git. They could _trivially_ have yourproject.issues.git etc, except that not doing that gives them a competitive moat making it harder to migrate away.

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#65

Post by eugeniub »

I'm seeing people here chastising the OP for not fully knowing what he was getting into. But in all the excitement about the new free plan with private repos in January, GitHub failed to highlight other differences between the new free plan and the rebranded Pro plan.

We can blame the end user all we want, but GitHub could have prevented all of this.

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#66

Post by swish_bob »

sigi45 wrote: post #60
d2p wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's fairly common to do `git push --force` (or hopefully `--force-with-lease`) after operations like rebasing. This overwrites the remote history, so can easily lose work. Many people set some branches as protected, so they can't be force-pushed over accidentally.

Its not and it shouldn't. I do often rebase on my local branch but i will communicate a force push on master to the whole team and will disable protection temporarily. If thats the only reason, he should overthink his workflow.

People aren't talking about force pushing to master, they're talking about force pushing to another branch, but with master unprotected, and therefore, by accident, force pushing to master as well.

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#67

Post by thrownaway954 »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #38
thrownaway954 wrote: post #34

honestly though... how many everyday devs actually use something like this?

If you have a job where you arent allowed to commit directly to master / development branches this is probably how they enforce it. It keeps juniors from pushing bad code without peer review. It forces developers into doing PRs instead. Protected branches are the first thing we setup when we make a new repository at work once we hit the "getting good enough for production and autobuilds" stage of development.

but you're talking about a company or corporate environment where, if they do use Github, it ain't you who is going to be in charge of the account and making a decision like OP did.

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#68

Post by dragonwriter »

Shish2k wrote: post #48
dustinmoris wrote: post #41

Did someone really just write a blog post on not downgrading an account without knowing what you're doing? Yes, you should not do that. You also shouldn't buy something without knowing what you're paying for, shouldn't vote for something you don't know what it is, you shouldn't eat stuff which might be poisonous but don't know for sure, you shouldn't cross a street without looking, gosh you certainly shouldn't drive…

> shouldn't vote for something you don't know what it is Isn't the whole point of democracy "a large enough volume of ignorance will average out to something sensible"? :P

> Isn't the whole point of democracy "a large enough volume of ignorance will average out to something sensible"?

No, which is why the avdocates of liberal democracy from the very beginning have also argued that an an informed populace is critical to it.

It is the point that “self interest averaged out over the whole population equals public interest”, though, but greed and ignorance aren't the same thing.

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#69

Post by mort96 »

d2p wrote: post #19
sigi45 wrote: post #16

What? What is he doing that it makes him fear code loss?

It's fairly common to do `git push --force` (or hopefully `--force-with-lease`) after operations like rebasing. This overwrites the remote history, so can easily lose work. Many people set some branches as protected, so they can't be force-pushed over accidentally.

Isn't it a pretty bad idea to have a workflow which involves --force? If it's to keep history tidy, why not just develop on a separate branch and do squash merges?

I'll admit I haven't used git in extremely complex circumstances, but I've always viewed --force as something you do only if you really mess up, such as pushing secrets (and that should obviously be in addition to invalidating those keys and generating new ones).

Re: Think Twice Before Downgrading to a Free GitHub Account

#70

Post by dragonwriter »

barry-cotter wrote: post #53
Shish2k wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> shouldn't vote for something you don't know what it is Isn't the whole point of democracy "a large enough volume of ignorance will average out to something sensible"? :P

No, it isn’t. The hope is that the ignorance averages out and the informed and motivated voters are the decisive factors. In practice democracy works better than if that model was correct because while voters have preferences that they will happily profess that reliably lead to bad outcomes they reliably vote out parties that are in power when things go badly. Politicians have an incentive to do things that will get…

> they reliably vote out parties that are in power when things go badly.

That's not at all the case, and even to the extent it is it is frustrated in separation of powers systems like the US, where the faction voted out will often be the one least responsible for the problems, since three are multiple factions in power at any given time a day the ignorance leads to blaming the wrong one.

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