Every single text file you use should be in version control! Git is great for this, handles large files nicely and it's very easy to setup backup scripts across multiple machines. The line about making so many big changes is total nonsense! Get your text files into version control and do it right now, I think you should really consider what kind of release engineering you are doing for your app. How are you doing code branches so you can do bug fixes on released versions of your software without including experimental new code if you're not in version control??? You should seriously look into branches for your software for this and automating your build process as much as possible, in the end you will be grateful for the meta-work done today.
Ask HN - When is right time to start using version control for a project?
11–18 of 18 posts
Re: Ask HN - When is right time to start using version control for a project?
#12Before you write your first line of code.
I'm probably not the only person on here who keeps any notes and planning documents for projects under version control. I also regularly import research notes into comments before I write the code in question, but I'm weird and I've been told I do too much design up front.
I'm firmly of the opinion that only 10% of writing software is typing code. I have all my text documents in git, experimental ideas, budget plans, everything. The only complaint I have is that I haven't figure a solid plan for doing encryption inside version control effectively yet, but I haven't tried too hard either.
Re: Ask HN - When is right time to start using version control for a project?
#13Before you write your first line of code.
I strongly disagree. It should be immediately after you write your first block of code :)
I have a hangup about every atomic commit needing to be a functioning version of the software. Following this logic, an initial commit that is just notes is not viable. Even if it's just some function/class prototypes that only 'raise NotImplementedError', the first commit has to do something you can execute.
I've noticed a trend of boilerplate projects on GitHub for people to use as a foundational branch, and I think that's terrific.
Re: Ask HN - When is right time to start using version control for a project?
#14Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm probably not the only person on here who keeps any notes and planning documents for projects under version control. I also regularly import research notes into comments before I write the code in question, but I'm weird and I've been told I do too much design up front.
I'm firmly of the opinion that only 10% of writing software is typing code. I have all my text documents in git, experimental ideas, budget plans, everything. The only complaint I have is that I haven't figure a solid plan for doing encryption inside version control effectively yet, but I haven't tried too hard either.
Whole volume encryption works, although it can be a bit cumbersome.
Re: Ask HN - When is right time to start using version control for a project?
#15Before you write your first line of code.
Yup. $ mkdir newproject $ cd newproject $ git init Initialized empty Git repository in /home/mbrubeck/newproject/.git/
But you're not actually using version control (and newproject isn't a valid git repository) until you make a commit.
While that's a bit of git wonkery, it exposes an underlying truth about VC in general: You need to have something to commit to be using it. Whether you init the repository before or after the first file hits the disk is irrelevant.
Re: Ask HN - When is right time to start using version control for a project?
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm firmly of the opinion that only 10% of writing software is typing code. I have all my text documents in git, experimental ideas, budget plans, everything. The only complaint I have is that I haven't figure a solid plan for doing encryption inside version control effectively yet, but I haven't tried too hard either.
Whole volume encryption works, although it can be a bit cumbersome.
How is the performance? I have no experience with whole volume encryption, do you have any useful links?
Re: Ask HN - When is right time to start using version control for a project?
#17Earlier quoted context omitted.
Whole volume encryption works, although it can be a bit cumbersome.
How is the performance? I have no experience with whole volume encryption, do you have any useful links?
There are actually several ways to do this I use encfs which uses FUSE to mount an encrypted directory as another directory, the advantages are that it works in userland and it's braindead simple. I wouldn't want to run a database off of it, but for a bunch of text files it's perfectly adequate. A lot of people are fans of truecrypt and if you are seriously concerned about devoted efforts to get at high-value data you probably want to just encrypt the disk partition you are using.
This post http://www.debianadmin.com/filesystem-encryption-tools-for-l... has a fairly good introduction to the most popular flavours. It's going to vary depending on your needs.
Re: Ask HN - When is right time to start using version control for a project?
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
How is the performance? I have no experience with whole volume encryption, do you have any useful links?
There are actually several ways to do this I use encfs which uses FUSE to mount an encrypted directory as another directory, the advantages are that it works in userland and it's braindead simple. I wouldn't want to run a database off of it, but for a bunch of text files it's perfectly adequate. A lot of people are fans of truecrypt and if you are seriously concerned about devoted efforts to get at high-value data yo…
Thanks for the article, there is lots of great info on there. I need to figure something out where I can make secure backups to some remote server. I guess there is no real perfect solution, but TrueCrypt looks good. I ran across this one talking about some deeper security constraints with this that I think offers a nice insight. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/07/truecrypts_den...