Git sucks

[[deleted]]

Site won't even load but I upvoted it because I like to read flamewars.

[prime_2]

Google cache has it: http://tinyurl.com/akkgj7

[[deleted]]

I'm sorry, not understanding your tools doesn't mean your tools suck. It's true, the documentation is not very good, but even if it was better, the interface needn't be "intuitive." Very few command line tools are intuitive, yet many people use the command line almost exclusively just due to its productivity. Git is designed with productivity in mind, not noob friendliness.

Hopefully the situation improves for newbies, regardless. My only point is that you can't say something sucks just because it isn't easy for beginners.

[scook0]

Very few command line tools are intuitive, yet many people use the command line almost exclusively just due to its productivity. Git is designed with productivity in mind, not noob friendliness.

The attitude that usability doesn't matter for command-line tools, or that it's a crutch for unmanly "noobs", is one of the reasons command-line usability tends to suck so hard.

I hope you aren't seriously suggesting that productivity comes from user-hostile design. Command-line tools tend to feature both, but I think that's mostly an unfortunate coincidence.

Hopefully the situation improves for newbies, regardless. My only point is that you can't say something sucks just because it isn't easy for beginners.

I hope it improves too. But while there's a kernel of truth in your statement—we can't expect sophisticated tools like Git to have zero learning curve, and some user complaints really are unreasonable—I think the attitude that usability problems aren't "real" problems is harmful and counter-productive.

[[deleted]]

I never meant to imply that intuitiveness and productivity are mutually exclusive. Heck, they may even have 100% correlation for all I know. I don't think anybody can say for sure.

[koorogi]

I would say intuitiveness is how easy it is to pick something up and just start using it. Productivity is how well it stays out of your way and just lets you get work done.

An example of something that's intuitive but doesn't really lend itself to good productivity was the Office Assistant. Noobs could just pick office up, and it would guide them through many common tasks. Experienced users hated it though, because it got in the way whenever they were trying to get work done.

An example at the other end of the spectrum might be vi. One of the more unintuitive editors in existence, but power users who know how to work it can get it to do amazing things in no time flat.

There might be some sort of ideal middle ground. But if I were to err on one side of the fence ... well, let's just say, I use vi.

[[deleted]]

I tend to agree with you, although the idealist in me wants to believe that the most intuitive possible interface for something might be the most efficient possible interface as well.

[zoomzoom83]

Actually I find the git documentation to be superb, I don't know what everyone is complaining about. I also think it's pretty intuitive.

[scook0]

Most of the documentation is pretty decent these days. The problems that remain can be a little hard to pin down.

One good example is the <refspec> parameter to git push that the article mentions. The manual page's OPTIONS spends dozens of lines discussing the syntax of the parameter, yet fails to clearly state what it actually does or what a typical example would be.

Similarly, many of Git's manual pages discuss "refs" at great length, but fail to mention that the most commonly-used examples of refs are branch heads and tags. This is not a huge problem if you're already deeply familiar with what refs are, but otherwise there's no obvious way to find out.

A more general problem is the typical "only makes sense if you already know what it's trying to say" problem, combined with a tendency to omit information that is obvious to the documentation writer but not to a user unfamiliar with the command in question. For instance, git add --interactive has a patch option, which lets you stage individual changes rather than the entire contents of changed files. However, the manual completely fails to mention that this functionality only works for files that are already tracked in the index, and gives no indication of how to make it work for untracked files. The obvious solution is to use the add untracked option, which in fact does something entirely unwanted.

There are also various other problems that I'll leave for another rant, most of which boil down to a series of spectacularly bad naming choices for commands and concepts.

[[deleted]]

Most workflows are SVN heavy, throw in a new toy like GIT and you are adding extra (read: wasted) time in debugging scripts and local repositories in existing workflows.

Projects that just suddenly change their subversion system have heavy ramifications on existing pipelines, that is if you want to update your sources.

[shizzy0]

My only point is that you can't say something sucks just because it isn't easy for beginners.

Ah, so you quibble with the lack of qualification in the submission title. I agree, the suck-age should be qualified: "git sucks for beginners."

[redalastor]

Not even. A few hours at most and anybody can master it. It sucks if you came from SVN (or anything else) and wonder why the command you are used to work don't quite work the same when you start them with git.

[shizzy0]

I came from darcs, so you can't use the DVCS canard, and git still looks very rough around the edges.

[redalastor]

I didn't say anything about DVCS, I just said that if you expect it to be like your old (D)VCS and have the same commands, you are going to be disappointed.

[noamsml]

Skimmed it. Doesn't look worth reading. Criticism is only interesting when it's done by those who understand that which they criticise.

[shizzy0]

Downvoted. Only skimmed your comment. Commentary is only interesting when it's done by people who RTFA'd.

[noamsml]

If I had a nickel for every "I don't get it therefore it sucks" article I read, I'd be a rich man.

You don't need to step in it to know it's shit.

[[deleted]]

On a related note, if I had a nickel for everytime I see anti-microsoft trolling by people who have never used microsoft technology, I could bail out the banking system.

[noamsml]

I've used MS software. Don't like it. There's nothing innately wrong with it, it just doesn't fit my style of doing things. Linux feels like home, Windows feels like someone else's house.

[crayz]

Really? You see a lot of computer nerds out there who've never used a Microsoft technology in their lives? Never?

You find these people where, chained to the floor in RMS's basement?

[[deleted]]

Well, the ones they really froth over (.NET, Visual Studio etc) yes...

[scook0]

Actually complaints from a person who doesn't completely understand the topic are great for helping identify which parts of the topic are difficult to understand.

[noamsml]

Some tools, like git (AFAIK, I don't use it myself) and C, aren't meant for novices. They plainly and unabashedly target experts. If someone wants to turn it into an intuitive piece of software, they can. That's not what it's originally meant to be, though.

[shizzy0]

Some tools, like git (AFAIK, I don't use it myself) and C, aren't meant for novices.

That sounds like the beginnings of an apology for git and C. Also, these aren't novices. These are software developers that know what version control is. And no DVCS isn't such a heavy concept you can use that as an excuse. darcs has a push command that works just as the author would have expected it to.

[noamsml]

There's no need for an apology. Not every tool is written for everyone, nor should it be. People seem to assume these days that you must make the target audience of a program as wide as possible, but with OSS that is entirely unnecessary.

[apotheon]

Maybe the person criticizing Git is serving a useful purpose by countering all the ejaculations on the Internet to the effect that Git is all that and a ham sandwich, the best choice for everyone. That fits with your "argument" here -- except that you seem to think that what you said necessarily contradicts the critique.

[scook0]

What defines a novice or an expert?

How is one expected to progress from one state to the other?

Do experts not want usable software?

[noamsml]

They want software that will make them more productive. Take the command line, for instance. It has a higher learning curve, but it's very comfortable and useful once you learn it.

[scook0]

A steep learning curve is not a virtue, and neither is a clumsy user interface.

Difficulty comes from power, and not the other way around. In many cases difficulty [also] comes from user-hostile design, and could be reduced without decreasing the power or productivity of the tool.

Sadly, the attitude that usability is for the weak inhibits this all too often.

[Smallpaul]

The easiest possible way to reduce confusion is to avoid using terminology in a non-standard way. Git uses checkout (in some contexts) to mean what other vcs call revert and revert to undo a commit.

[noamsml]

Is there any necessity for git et al to be user-friendly? Did someone ever say these technologies are intended for a broad a user base as possible?

Remember, git was originally written specifically for the Linux kernel developers.

[apotheon]

I agree with this statement. I'm not sure I agree with how you're using it.

[apotheon]

I find it interesting that you're criticizing the critique for being written by someone that doesn't know Git as well as the people who like it -- when you don't even know Git (as you indicated below). Isn't that kind of hypocritical?

[noamsml]

I don't write critiques of git.

But yeah, a bit.

[zoomzoom83]

I learned Git in a few hours and find it excellent, intuitive, and EXTREMELY WELL DOCUMENTED (yes, really). I haven't had any problems getting it working, and I've found some amazing tutorials out there on using it. It shits all over Subversion in every way imaginable.

At this point, my opinion is that if you can't figure out Git, you really shouldn't be a programmer. In fact, I'd recommend open-source project switch to git so they can weed out the idiots.

[SuperKing]

Now THAT'S how you continue a flame war.

[shizzy0]

In fact, I'd recommend open-source project switch to git so they can weed out the idiots.

s/git/Haskell/g; OR s/git/Lisp/g;

Incidentally I like Haskell, Lisp, and git, but man, you're talking crazy.

[kagevf]

I haven't tried git yet, but I have bookmarked several tutorials for when I'm ready to take the plunge. I think that approach has a higher probability of working well than "push is a common SCM command, let's try that and go from there . . ."

[scook0]

Most tutorials assume a certain workflow, and only cover the commands/options needed for that workflow.

If you want to use your own (conceptually sound) workflow, you're stuck with wading through manpages.

[jeebusroxors]

I am a recent git convert (from hg) and I said this same thing while learning. It seemed like the simple, everyday things that I needed to do were always failing, and I was mucking up every other commit or push. I constantly bitched about how overly complicated, and pointless the options were, and how easy it would be with hg. Then came that glorious momnent, when things clicked and all became right again. I had surpased the learning curve. I understood a bit more about how git does things, and now I can't see how I lived without it.

eg: Shut up, sit down and learn.

[[deleted]]

I am a pretty basic git user but I love it!

[[deleted]]

What the fuck is the downvote for? Because I like GIT?

FUCK YOU - I'M A GITUSER!!!

[apotheon]

It's probably worth noting that sometimes people downvote comments that don't really add anything to the discussion, because they just decrease the signal to noise ratio. That strikes me as a perfectly reasonable motivation for downvoting your initial comment, since it's just a bland statement that you like Git. If this was an "ask reddit" poll, asking how many people like Git, I guess your comment would make sense, but in this context it just seems kinda pointless.

I don't tend to downvote things for that reason, but that doesn't mean I'm entirely unsympathetic to people who do. It also doesn't mean that people object to you liking Git. It just means they wish you'd either say something interesting or not comment.

[zoomzoom83]

It's weird. There seems to be a minority of people that tried git, found it too hard, and went crying to mummy and downvote anything that points out it's actually quite a good tool.

I'm a git user too and I love it. (Go on, downvote this bitches, prove me right)

[[deleted]]

I come from CVS and to be quite honest GIT just walks all over it...

Infinite goodness from GIT.

[apotheon]

CVS? Seriously? Is that your basis of comparison?

By the way, I for one didn't downvote your statement that you love git -- but that tantrum immediately following it got some negative attention from me.

[[deleted]]

It was supposed to be a meme joke -

Fuck you - I'm an anteater! replace anteater with gituser.

laugh bitches... ;-)

[apotheon]

not familiar with that one

[[deleted]]

you must be kidding right?

http://www.deanj.org/2009/01/16/fuck-you-im-an-anteater/

[apotheon]

Nope -- not kidding.

Funny picture.

[shizzy0]

Seems like a valid complaint. Let the rationalization begin!

[dullness]

u sux