Re: [Census] So who uses git?

On Sun, 29 Jan 2006, Dave Jones wrote:

> On Sat, Jan 28, 2006 at 01:08:54PM -0800, Junio C Hamano wrote:
>  > Can I hear experiences from other big projects that tried to use
>  > git [*1*]?  I suspect there are many that have tried, and I
>  > would not be surprised at all if git did not work out well for
>  > them.  For projects that already run on a (free) SCM, I would be
>  > very surprised if the developers find the current git 10 times
>  > better than the SCM they have been using (probably with an
>  > exception of CVS), unless they have very specific need, such as
>  > parallel development of distributed nature like the Linux
>  > kernel.
> 
> I've found switching from cvs->git even for small projects has
> made me more productive.  In part because it's got me away from
> the 'check in to a centralised server like sourceforge' mentality,
> without the need to set up a local cvs server of my own.
> Adding changesets to a small project like x86info, now takes
> seconds, whereas it used to take minutes of thumb-twiddling whilst
> I waited for sf.net to do its thing.   The ability to check in
> changesets locally whilst I'm travelling, and then push them when
> I have network connectivity again is also a massive productivity
> win over cvs.
> 
> There's also another git usage that I doubt I'm alone in doing.
> I regularly use git to import cvs trees from sourceforge etc for
> random projects, because I now find browsing history of projects
> with tools like gitk much nicer than any cvs tool I've used.
> (cvs annotate is the only thing I really miss).

I think this is the real driving factor for git adoption: it doesn't have 
to be 10x better for people to use it, because individuals can use it for 
interacting with CVS projects without causing anybody else any pain. It 
doesn't just enable distributed development, it enables a distributed 
choice of SCM, which means a much lower activation energy threshold. I 
think we'll see a lot more adoption when we have a CVS daemon interface 
(so projects can stop having a CVS repository, and support both sorts of 
users with a git repository and have better metadata), and also if someone 
sets up a place for putting git imports of CVS projects, so people will 
know that other people are using git.

	-Daniel
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