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I've installed, looking forward to trying it out. So far I've found a number of GitHub extensions useful, namely: Awesome Autocomplete https://chrome.google.com

I've installed, looking forward to trying it out. So far I've found a number of GitHub extensions useful, namely: Awesome Autocomplete https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/github-awesome-autocomple/djkfdjpoelphhdclfjhnffmnlnoknfnd?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/github-awesome-aut... and Octotree https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/octotree/bkhaagjahfmjljalopjnoealnfndnagc https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/octotree/bkhaagjah...

sdesol 11y ago
Yeah there are a lot of interesting plugins out there and like the ones that you mentioned, enhances GitHub productivity by quite a bit. GitHub is certainly an enigma at the moment. You have a situation like Bitbucket where they are focused on creating a product that is designed to be built on top of, but they really aren't getting a lot of love. https://marketplace.atlassian.com/plugins/app/bitbucket https://marketplace.atlassian.com/plugins/app/bitbucket GitHub on the other hand, requires you to parse DOM objects, but people are still building on top of it. I'd have to imagine there will be some turning point in the future, where this will change. If GitLab and Bitbucket can sort out its UX, I can see developers focusing more on developing for their platform.
- sytse 11y ago
  We're working to improve the GitLab UX, anything you would like to see? BTW we're thinking about shipping Octotree as part of GitLab https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/13723 https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/13723
  - sdesol 11y ago
    > We're working to improve the GitLab UX, anything you would like to see? The issue with GitLab's UX right now, is there is a lot of little things, which adds up to big things. This is expected since UX is hard and if you look at GitHub's interface from 5 years ago, they (GitHub) would probably feel embarrassed by some of the things that they have done. For things to improve, you need a lot of feedback/iterations and I won't be surprised if GitHub's UX evolution was the result of strong feedback from designers outside of GitHub. By being the first movers, GitHub was able to attract everybody, which included designers. GitLab right now is not attractive for designers. To overcome this, I would personally put some resources into showcasing how you can tweak GitLab's CSS without having to dig into Ruby or JavaScript or anything else. And if it is not easy to do, design GitLab so it is. Right now the fonts in GitLab really bug me, and I want to use the font that GitHub is using. GitHub has really nailed fonts among other things. If there was a simple way for people to tweak GitLab's UX without having to understand anything else, I can see it drawing in a lot more people and creating a lot more feedback. Also create a way for people to showcase their tweaks. I'm sure 90% of them will be crap, but that 10% can make all the difference in the world. I might be over analyzing things, but I think GitLab's desire to be no longer called a "GitHub clone" is creating too many poor design decisions. The recent move to put the search icon in the middle of the search text field is an example of this. I'm pretty sure designers at Google, Twitter, Microsoft, etc. played around with the icon placement and found that putting it in the middle was not a good idea. If it was a good idea, we would have seen more sites/products adopt this. So to make the long story short, to improve your UX situation, make it insanely easy for designers to tweak things and to share/showcase their tweaks.
    - sytse 11y ago
      Thanks for your feedback, I really appreciate it. To summarize: 1. Make a blog post how to tweak's GitLab CSS 2. Consider using another font 3. Allow people to showcase their work 4. Move the search icon back to the left One thing we can't do is customizing the interface of GitLab (except for the colors) since this causes things to break without a lot of testing. 1. Good idea https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/blog-posts/issues/153 https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/blog-posts/issues/153 2. I've shared this suggestion with our team, if you care deeply about it consider opening an issue on https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues 3. As a showcase we ask people to open a merge request on https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/merge_requests https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/merge_requests with before/after screenshots 4. I've made https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/13919 https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/13919 Thanks again for the feedback and keep it coming.
    - jakecodes 11y ago
      Thanks @sdesol for the fantastic feedback. It's great that you took the time to write this down.

sdesol 11y ago

Yeah there are a lot of interesting plugins out there and like the ones that you mentioned, enhances GitHub productivity by quite a bit. GitHub is certainly an enigma at the moment. You have a situation like Bitbucket where they are focused on creating a product that is designed to be built on top of, but they really aren't getting a lot of love. https://marketplace.atlassian.com/plugins/app/bitbucket https://marketplace.atlassian.com/plugins/app/bitbucket GitHub on the other hand, requires you to parse DOM objects, but people are still building on top of it. I'd have to imagine there will be some turning point in the future, where this will change. If GitLab and Bitbucket can sort out its UX, I can see developers focusing more on developing for their platform.

sytse 11y ago
We're working to improve the GitLab UX, anything you would like to see? BTW we're thinking about shipping Octotree as part of GitLab https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/13723 https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/13723
- sdesol 11y ago
  > We're working to improve the GitLab UX, anything you would like to see? The issue with GitLab's UX right now, is there is a lot of little things, which adds up to big things. This is expected since UX is hard and if you look at GitHub's interface from 5 years ago, they (GitHub) would probably feel embarrassed by some of the things that they have done. For things to improve, you need a lot of feedback/iterations and I won't be surprised if GitHub's UX evolution was the result of strong feedback from designers outside of GitHub. By being the first movers, GitHub was able to attract everybody, which included designers. GitLab right now is not attractive for designers. To overcome this, I would personally put some resources into showcasing how you can tweak GitLab's CSS without having to dig into Ruby or JavaScript or anything else. And if it is not easy to do, design GitLab so it is. Right now the fonts in GitLab really bug me, and I want to use the font that GitHub is using. GitHub has really nailed fonts among other things. If there was a simple way for people to tweak GitLab's UX without having to understand anything else, I can see it drawing in a lot more people and creating a lot more feedback. Also create a way for people to showcase their tweaks. I'm sure 90% of them will be crap, but that 10% can make all the difference in the world. I might be over analyzing things, but I think GitLab's desire to be no longer called a "GitHub clone" is creating too many poor design decisions. The recent move to put the search icon in the middle of the search text field is an example of this. I'm pretty sure designers at Google, Twitter, Microsoft, etc. played around with the icon placement and found that putting it in the middle was not a good idea. If it was a good idea, we would have seen more sites/products adopt this. So to make the long story short, to improve your UX situation, make it insanely easy for designers to tweak things and to share/showcase their tweaks.
  - sytse 11y ago
    Thanks for your feedback, I really appreciate it. To summarize: 1. Make a blog post how to tweak's GitLab CSS 2. Consider using another font 3. Allow people to showcase their work 4. Move the search icon back to the left One thing we can't do is customizing the interface of GitLab (except for the colors) since this causes things to break without a lot of testing. 1. Good idea https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/blog-posts/issues/153 https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/blog-posts/issues/153 2. I've shared this suggestion with our team, if you care deeply about it consider opening an issue on https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues 3. As a showcase we ask people to open a merge request on https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/merge_requests https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/merge_requests with before/after screenshots 4. I've made https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/13919 https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/13919 Thanks again for the feedback and keep it coming.
  - jakecodes 11y ago
    Thanks @sdesol for the fantastic feedback. It's great that you took the time to write this down.