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Linear – A fast issue tracker

linear.app

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Re: Linear – A fast issue tracker

#31

Post by immy »

tyre wrote: post #3

We've been using Linear for a couple months. It's kind of like Superhuman in that the primary benefit is hotkeys. Otherwise it is an issue tracker. I think the reason we see a steady stream of new issue trackers is that teams are trying to fix with software what are people problems. New issue trackers feel faster for the same reason switching browsers tends to feel faster—you're getting rid of all of the crap you pil…

Boo to this take. Not all tools are the same and “Good tools obviate bad processes.” is a mantra I saw once in a talk that has stuck with me for 15 years. You’re not wrong that it’s a people problem, but tools shape human behavior. That’s Design.

The quote is attributed to Michael B. Johnson, aka wave, Software Director at Pixar.

Re: Linear – A fast issue tracker

#32

Post by robotresearcher »

tyre wrote: post #3

We've been using Linear for a couple months. It's kind of like Superhuman in that the primary benefit is hotkeys. Otherwise it is an issue tracker. I think the reason we see a steady stream of new issue trackers is that teams are trying to fix with software what are people problems. New issue trackers feel faster for the same reason switching browsers tends to feel faster—you're getting rid of all of the crap you pil…

I'm genuinely interested: is this really true? Is Jira necessarily slow when there's a lot of stuff in it? I'm not sure I believe it. There are graph-of-objects-plus-metadata applications out there that are pretty fast. I'm not an expert in this domain, but I bet an issue tracker can be made that doesn't feel painful at real scales.

Re: Linear – A fast issue tracker

#33

Post by ComputerGuru »

ivanfon wrote: post #20
enra wrote: post #9

Founder here. Here to answer any questions you might have. We built Linear as we’re frustrated the practices and the available tools when it came to managing software projects. On the product, we especially tackled the performance problem. Everything is synced to the client and we sync just delta packages between the cloud and client as changes happen. This way all actions a happen instantly and navigating around the…

Is the desktop app native?

No, it’s just electron. I don’t see the benefit over making it a PWA or even just a regular self-hosted web app.

Re: Linear – A fast issue tracker

#34

Post by enra »

tyre wrote: post #3

We've been using Linear for a couple months. It's kind of like Superhuman in that the primary benefit is hotkeys. Otherwise it is an issue tracker. I think the reason we see a steady stream of new issue trackers is that teams are trying to fix with software what are people problems. New issue trackers feel faster for the same reason switching browsers tends to feel faster—you're getting rid of all of the crap you pil…

Thanks for the feedback and trying it out!

I do agree that lot of the process issues often reside in the organization itself.

In ideal world, you don't need any kind of tracking or process. Right things just happen. However, in reality is that companies often have goals and roadmaps they have to deliver. Things move fast and teams need to know what is being worked on. We've worked in 5 and 5000 person engineering organizations and need for coordination is always there. And personally, I just need to know what I need to do next.

We spent the past year talking with our our early users. New startups and even teams of very successful companies, struggle with the process. They might know how they should improve things, but it's hard to find the time or energy to actually implement it. We want to help with this.

So in addition to the tool, we are developing the understanding and practices software help the team to focus and reduces some of the bad habits we might have. The tool will then help teams implement and maintain these practices going forward. We ourselves also been working with this "Linear Method" which we shared here: http://linear.app/linear-method

Re: Linear – A fast issue tracker

#35

Post by elithrar »

robotresearcher wrote: post #32
tyre wrote: post #3

We've been using Linear for a couple months. It's kind of like Superhuman in that the primary benefit is hotkeys. Otherwise it is an issue tracker. I think the reason we see a steady stream of new issue trackers is that teams are trying to fix with software what are people problems. New issue trackers feel faster for the same reason switching browsers tends to feel faster—you're getting rid of all of the crap you pil…

I'm genuinely interested: is this really true? Is Jira necessarily slow when there's a lot of stuff in it? I'm not sure I believe it. There are graph-of-objects-plus-metadata applications out there that are pretty fast. I'm not an expert in this domain, but I bet an issue tracker can be made that doesn't feel painful at real scales.

I didn't interpret the OP to mean slow from an "application performance" perspective - instead, as slow from a "process" perspective.

The ticket needs to be filed in the right queue. It needs the "right" tags. It needs to traverse the "approved" workflow correctly. It didn't get assigned to the right epic. etc, etc, etc.

It's all of that - the process built up over time, in response to organic needs - that makes things "slow" and drives such a rejection of these tools by developers and their teams. We (collectively) rarely step back and say "what process can we cut?" - only when we use a new tool do we have the chance to address that.

Re: Linear – A fast issue tracker

#36

Post by cachestash »

jorde wrote: post #19
bachmeier wrote: post #13

What's the purpose of a restricted "free" plan with a max of 250 issues? There are enough actually free options out there that the free plan doesn't bring anything to the table. Why wouldn't you do a free trial of an unrestricted plan instead? The obvious thing that stands out is that you'd have no way to test their support before paying.

We wanted to make the product free for smaller teams to get started without worrying about who to invite. We only count active issue to the limit, and once you're done with them, you can archive them. And yes, we do have support for all users and priority support (faster response times) for paying users. We want to build a long lasting sustainable business and charging for the product is big part of it.

Just some feedback, but I would consider doing a free tier for open source projects which would get your the coverage and in turn the adoption you need. You need to win developers over who in turn influence tool procurements.

Re: Linear – A fast issue tracker

#37

Post by ryanisnan »

tbrock wrote: post #30
tyre wrote: post #3

We've been using Linear for a couple months. It's kind of like Superhuman in that the primary benefit is hotkeys. Otherwise it is an issue tracker. I think the reason we see a steady stream of new issue trackers is that teams are trying to fix with software what are people problems. New issue trackers feel faster for the same reason switching browsers tends to feel faster—you're getting rid of all of the crap you pil…

I tend to agree but I have a anecdotal counterexample. We recently switched from JIRA to Clubhouse by importing our history and backlog wholesale. Due to the substantial performance bump we have definitively leveled up as a team. Status updates that used to happen in slack channels are now captured in Clubhouse, people log in to check on progress, stories get love and details. JIRA cloud was unusably slow and as a re…

> JIRA cloud was unusably slow and as a result we didn’t want to use the tool. We hated it even though it technically “worked”.

- every JIRA customer ever

Re: Linear – A fast issue tracker

#39

Post by ocdtrekkie »

I have a rough time understanding why I'd pick this over the issue tracker integrated with my source control. I get that it can sync with GitHub or GitLab (Does it sync the issue text/comments such that GitHub users can comment on the issues? Are the issues on both sides using the same numbering? In this case, is Linear just a GitHub issues client?) but I imagine I am losing out on any given feature that my source control adds for issue integration, at least until Linear also does it.

Basically, I feel like you need to sell me a lot more on why I should use Linear over GitHub Issues, and how the benefits outweigh the added complexity of going two places.

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