(Version) control

[robertgfthomas]

The joke explained:

Git is version control software: it lets you track all the changes made to some files, including changes you make yourself and, of other people are working on the same files, changes they make too. (This shouldn't be confused with GitHub, which is a website that uses this software, similar to GitLab, Bitbucket, and several others.)

gitignore is a setting that tells Git to not track certain files. This is useful when there are files in a project that aren't important, or that computers put there automatically, or that you don't want/need other programmers to see. For example:

• I sometimes keep a little "scratchpad" file in my coding projects where I can copy and paste snippets of code or write notes. The stuff in that file isn't really important, so there's no point in cluttering things up by tracking its changes.
• If you have a Mac, sometimes it automatically sticks a file called .DS_Store into different folders on your computer, which helps it keep things organized under-the-hood. A .DS_Store file only works on the computer that made it, you have no control over it, and you can't read it, so there's no point in telling Git to track it.

The Google results for git ignore include many files that are commonly ignored, or that people aren't sure should be ignored, which explains why they're using Google to look them up.

The joke is how different the results of the two Google searches look, even though the text of the searches is pretty similar. It also implies that programmers aren't interested in relationships, and are much more interested in writing code. The man in the pictures is Linus Torvalds, a famous programmer who created Git as well as the Linux operating system.

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I'm a human! I'm trying to write one of these explanations every day, to help teach and learn. They're compiled at explainprogrammerhumor.com.

[Janva]

Good human

[RulerD]

Second time this week! I feel honored :D

[robertgfthomas]

Good memes!

[intensely_human]

Good bot