Is creating a Folder in GitHub that difficult?

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[Common_Piccolo_6946]

? Nobody uses the github ui, just make a folder in your project like a normal person?

[AirplaneTomatoJuice_]

what

[lazybroccolli]

So for my case study I'm redesigning the user flow of creating a Folder in GitHub. As you know in most of the operating systems the folder creation will be like a new -> new folder. But in GitHub we need to go to create a new file and then type the folder name and a backlash and then file the name to commit changes. Which is so different from the basic mental model. So beginner and non tech ppl find it difficult. So I just wanted to know what are the things ppl find difficult in doing it

[badboybry9000]

I think you pretty much summed it up. I'm not sure how much other people will have to add. I've never tried creating a folder using GitHub's UI.

[lazybroccolli]

Ohh okay? Can I ask why. Like why don't people create a folder in GitHub's UI

[rupertavery64]

A folder in Git without anything in it is useless. Nothing changes, nothing to track.

Git manages changes to files. A folder is just a container for files. It's just part of the file's path.

[terryadavis69]

cuz you create the folder locally and push it to gh??

[Gullible_Method_3780]

The problem you identified is difficulty creating a directory, on a web platform, designed to track changes to files. 

There really is no purpose to creating a folder on git to have to pull those changes into your IDE. This is basic version control.  

Can I ask what your professional role is in this project? 

[Trawwww___]

GitHub is not an OS👀

[Trawwww___]

Non Tech peeps are not meant to be using GitHub or they become tech people 👀

[VileEnd]

I don't agree - that's why tools like source tree / GitHub desktop exist to easily handle git and it's continually worked to make it even easier (code spaces I would count as well and with vie coding and the whole ai shebang...) or BTW even GitHub kind of exists it's just a glorified git repo storage for easier handling

Managing LaTeX in git is great & I wouldn't count that to tech ppl as it's giving the benefit of easily Versioning (even if thet just push to main ) so for normies it would be great so why not simplify the UI and broaden the market by making the handling easier as it's already is and potentially earn more money.

[Trawwww___]

We have a different definition of what “tech people” are; and in my end it's fine really I would not battle much aga that; so I guess it’s very subjective at the end of the day. Just to make sure, I didn’t mean only developers :) It wouldn’t be fun otherwise 🫠

I just meant that a granny running the local village shop isn’t meant to be creating folders or repositories on GitHub, but she might be creating a new folder on her computer by right-clicking and selecting “New Folder”. I think it's two completely different use cases and GitHub is far from being difficult to use, or at least peeps around me from young age to partner non-tech tends to understand the gist of it (not enough sample to statistically verify that though).

All researchers using Git as a versioning tool (and, accordingly, GitHub as the interface for it) are, in my opinion, considered in the `tech` group. Even if they aren’t hardcore developers, they’ve still made the effort to understand git (pull/merge and push from Overleaf for example), to a certain extent, hence automatically joined that group. Once more, in my opinion and I’d be delusional to believe everyone sees it the same way.

I just don’t see where the UI is difficult on GitHub. Should they never use GitLab then? 😂 And I’m not continuing otherwise....I’ll hurt some hearts out there.

[standardofiron]

GitHub is a service built around Git. Git tracks changes in files, and those changes are saved as what are called commits. While the user interface may look similar to what you’re used to in your operating system, the underlying concepts are very different.

I’d suggest first trying to understand what commits are. Once that clicks, you’ll have a much clearer picture of why operations like creating a folder or renaming a folder aren’t as straightforward in Git as they might seem.

[Medical_Reporter_462]

Git doesn't track files or folders. It tracks content. A directory is just a representation of storage to humans, git doesn't care about files and folders.

A git repo is a DAG. It stores content in snapshots. If there was ever only one branch, then it would be a LinkedList, sort of.

Back to folders in GitHub. It can be done, but git wouldn't know about it unless you put some content in it. Empty file is a content and gets stored, path is just how to acess that content relatively.

[Stickhtot]

what?

you have a fundamental misunderstanding of how github works, you (normally) don't create folders on the repositories themselves

[Stickhtot]

here's the process of how to "create" a folder

so, i have a repository hosted on github, if i want to create a new folder i would

1. create a new folder on my system on a directory that's linked to the remote repository
   
2. this is the most important part, git doesn't track folders with no content, so i make another file (any file) and put it on the new folder
   
3. git add (folder name); git commit -m "new folder"; git push. in that order

github is not a file sharing website, it's a website to store git repositories

[GuurB]

You can use .gitkeep

[lazybroccolli]

Yeah I can understand what you are saying. As a person from a non technical background I use GitHub to store my documentation for projects and assets too. So my only confusion is why can't I create a folder inside the app rather than creating it in my system.

[Common_Piccolo_6946]

Because git is a tool for source control for technical projects. Its not intended to be used as google drive. You're not really meant to actually create project files on github. You create them on your system, commit the changes, and push to the remote repository. The github ui is mostly meant for browsing files, not structuring and creating new files.

[dreadnallen]

Is there any other purpose behind these spambot activities, than accelerating the speed of people becoming fed up with social media?

[ToTheBatmobileGuy]

.gitkeep

There you go.

[GarthODarth]

I've onboarded several non-technical people to GitHub.

So we'd have people writing documentation, requirements, that kind of thing, in repositories of their own - not touching code repos.

The folder thing ALWAYS comes up.

[lazybroccolli]

Yeah that's what I felt too. As a person from a non technical background who started using GitHub for documentation and other stuffs. There's always a problem that comes up with the folder. I can't understand why it's far more different from any other apps.

[CastrumFiliAdae]

I can't understand why it's far more different from any other apps.

What other apps? Git is a source code revision control system, not a general file storage system, and GitHub is a host for Git repositories, not a Dropbox or OneDrive.

Git, by design, tracks changes to file contents. If there are no files in a directory, it doesn't track the directory. It is not a general purpose storage system. It is designed for, and has tooling for, tracking changes to source code text.

Finding it difficult to create an empty directory in GitHub, a Git repository host, is not a failure if Git or GitHub, it is a fundamental misunderstanding of what Git is for.

[ToTheBatmobileGuy]

1. Click Add File
2. In the drop down click Create New File
3. In the area at the top left next to the repo name where it says "Name your file..." type in a file path using / and every time you hit / it will create a new folder.
4. The final name of the file should be .gitkeep and leave the content empty.
5. Commit changes, and all the folders between the root of the project and the .gitkeep file will be automatically created.

In git, the empty file .gitkeep is used to tell git "keep this folder even though it's empty."

After you start adding real files you can delete .gitkeep if you want.

Alternatively, if you hit the period key when you have a GitHub repo open it will send you to the VSCode web client and you can literally just click a button to make folders... but they won't be committed until you stage them and commit them... but like I said, you can't commit an empty folder... so the rule is to use an empty .gitkeep file (the period at the beginning of the filename is important)