4 ms·

I am new to programming (less than 1 year) and the insignificance of this project is obvious to me. This looks very well done, but my understanding is that a us

by gt_ 9y ago

I am new to programming (less than 1 year) and the insignificance of this project is obvious to me. This looks very well done, but my understanding is that a user friendly wrapper for such a ubiquitous programming tech with already widespread GUIs and pluins is comparable to reinventing a wheel. It's a little frustrating how many projects like this appear to get so much attention and end up on HN, because it makes for a disorienting maze of distractions for newer programmers. I love all the productivity, excitement, possibility but it's still peculiar and debatably problematic. My best guess is this was a personal project that solved some person(s) problems, and for some reason related to networking or self-promotion, it got the decoration of a full release treatment. What else could cause this? I know there are zillions of these every day but this seems like one we all can see through. Can anyone share some insight here? Should I be contributing to the heap of projects like these to further my own career?

nothrabannosir 9y ago
What you're seeing and describing is endemic to the entire field of programming. You will encounter it at every level. Frameworks keep being invented left and right which address solved problems, or solve non-existing ones. Meaningless busywork. This will never stop: it is human. Don't fight it: embrace it. Navigating this wasteland is part of your job. A keen eye for separating wheat from chaff is a valuable asset. Learning to code is only step 1 in learning to program. Learning how to choose your tools, and what to ignore, is just as important.
- gt_ 9y ago
  This does help me a lot to get this response. I personally actually love downloading and testing small tools and sometimes worry my search for better tools or the promise of better tools is a distraction. But, maybe this willingness to continue the search is just highly correlated with my fascination and interest in becoming a programmer.
Normal_gaussian 9y ago
> the insignificance of this project is obvious to me > comparable to reinventing a wheel > many projects like this appear to get so much attention and end up on HN > Can anyone share some insight here? First the HN audience, its core is hackers and startups. These people have certain problems in common, and they are always on the lookout for ways to eliminate them. The hackers build things and the startup people do a lot of management and they are often one and the same. Secondly good version control is hard to use across a project without swamping new arrivals or accidentally breaking something. Git isn't good enough, but it is what we have. So like good hackers we take the first, see the second and try and produce something better. This is how we end up with lots of similar looking projects. Because they are solving real problems being faced by HN users they get upvoted until the comments discover some fatal flaw (leaky? prevents key conflict resolution?). This author reckons hes solved it, so he gives it the full treatment because it is worth a lot to have __actually__ solved it. If I could resolve git woes by handing a newbie a ten minute video I would be ecstatic. Remember, it is important to reinvent the wheel [1] though don't waste time on these projects unless you can see a way through. [1] https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CMyiLuKUwAA6l-V.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CMyiLuKUwAA6l-V.jpg
- jstimpfle 9y ago
  Can't resist: https://www.math.uh.edu/~jmorgan/trinity_talk/square_wheel.htm https://www.math.uh.edu/~jmorgan/trinity_talk/square_wheel.h...
- gt_ 9y ago
  Point taken! Thanks for the response. While I do have a hard time imagining me recommending this project to anyone (without instead opting for real git commands or gui) your comment encourages me to at least try imagining a future where this project gets surprising widespread adoption and something many maintain and depend on. Like you suggest, it could cut a lot of entry costs if it doesn't double them. ;)
frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
There's all sorts of Git wrappers but I haven't been able to find one that does what I want: a visual interface which will tell you the command line equivalent of what you're doing. Does one even exist?
- gt_ 9y ago
  Granted I am a novice, but have been in film post production and vfx for a long time. I'm not very familiar with any GUIs thay truly reflect proprietary commands. Nonetheless, I agree. And if you find it, please share.
- weaksauce 9y ago
  If you use Emacs, magit is phenomenal. If you use vim, spacemacs and magit are phenomenal. Watch a quick video on it. The command that is run is shown if you press `$`. I believe source tree shows you the command too if you set it up. Magit is much better than source tree though.
jstimpfle 9y ago
I think you have to reinvent quite a few wheels yourself to become a competent programmer instead of just comfortable gluing services. And maybe, just maybe you will make an actual improvement on the way.
gt_ 9y ago
I was sorta hoping someone would offer their take on contributing or creating projects like this for their portfolio. I would be a little self-conscious of having a bunch of 'simplifier' tools in my small portfolio. Is this silly for me to even be thinking?
gt_ 9y ago
I was sorta hoping someone would offer their take on contributing or creating projects like this for their portfolio. I would be a little self-conscious of having a bunch of 'simplifier' tools in my small portfolio. Is this silly for me to even be thinking?
kevingoslar 9y ago
Git Town contributor here. This tool was built to help stay sane in large high-velocity development teams. In such environments, one can easily spend an hour (or so) each day resolving merge conflicts. Feature branches go out of sync with the main development branch multiple times a day. One has to keep pulling, merging, or rebasing all open branches regularly to avoid more merge conflicts later. Those things require running many Git commands. Git Town makes all of this quick,easy, and bulletproof. A lot of people have been using it for years and love it for that. Apparently our documentation doesn't get this across well enough. We'll add more details.
eloisant 9y ago
> I am new to programming (less than 1 year) and the insignificance of this project is obvious to me. It's a set of helpers, that are useful for the author and useful enough to other people that (1) it was upvoted on HN and (2) it has 643 stars on github (so it appears to be fairly popular). > my understanding is that a user friendly wrapper for such a ubiquitous programming tech with already widespread GUIs and pluins is comparable to reinventing a wheel Not really. There are many reasons why these functions are not in core git, however for many people these are common tasks and doing it "manually" with git is a chore. Just like carpenters craft their own jigs and tools all the time, programmers write scripts to automatic repetitive tasks all the time. > My best guess is this was a personal project that solved some person(s) problems, and for some reason related to networking or self-promotion, it got the decoration of a full release treatment. What else could cause this? Most Open Source projects start as personal projects that solved some people's problems, and as others found out that it's useful to them they grow in popularity and become "famous" projects. This one also took the time to make a site, with an introduction, FAQ, etc, while most other projects only have a github page and a small README. If this project doesn't seem useful to you, don't spend much time trying to figure out what it is. The best is to be goal driven, i.e. you have a project you want to get through (either for work, school or personal project) and you seek projects that might help you doing that. > Should I be contributing to the heap of projects like these to further my own career? Don't create projects for the sake of your career, it will only lead to pointless projects boring for you and everyone else. Build what you need to build, what you want to build, and if you think it might be useful for just one other person feel free to post it online. It's not like the size of the Internet is limited and your project will prevent others from existing.

by gt_ 9y ago

nothrabannosir 9y ago

What you're seeing and describing is endemic to the entire field of programming. You will encounter it at every level. Frameworks keep being invented left and right which address solved problems, or solve non-existing ones. Meaningless busywork. This will never stop: it is human. Don't fight it: embrace it. Navigating this wasteland is part of your job. A keen eye for separating wheat from chaff is a valuable asset. Learning to code is only step 1 in learning to program. Learning how to choose your tools, and what to ignore, is just as important.

gt_ 9y ago
This does help me a lot to get this response. I personally actually love downloading and testing small tools and sometimes worry my search for better tools or the promise of better tools is a distraction. But, maybe this willingness to continue the search is just highly correlated with my fascination and interest in becoming a programmer.

Normal_gaussian 9y ago

> the insignificance of this project is obvious to me > comparable to reinventing a wheel > many projects like this appear to get so much attention and end up on HN > Can anyone share some insight here? First the HN audience, its core is hackers and startups. These people have certain problems in common, and they are always on the lookout for ways to eliminate them. The hackers build things and the startup people do a lot of management and they are often one and the same. Secondly good version control is hard to use across a project without swamping new arrivals or accidentally breaking something. Git isn't good enough, but it is what we have. So like good hackers we take the first, see the second and try and produce something better. This is how we end up with lots of similar looking projects. Because they are solving real problems being faced by HN users they get upvoted until the comments discover some fatal flaw (leaky? prevents key conflict resolution?). This author reckons hes solved it, so he gives it the full treatment because it is worth a lot to have __actually__ solved it. If I could resolve git woes by handing a newbie a ten minute video I would be ecstatic. Remember, it is important to reinvent the wheel [1] though don't waste time on these projects unless you can see a way through. [1] https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CMyiLuKUwAA6l-V.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CMyiLuKUwAA6l-V.jpg

jstimpfle 9y ago
Can't resist: https://www.math.uh.edu/~jmorgan/trinity_talk/square_wheel.htm https://www.math.uh.edu/~jmorgan/trinity_talk/square_wheel.h...
gt_ 9y ago
Point taken! Thanks for the response. While I do have a hard time imagining me recommending this project to anyone (without instead opting for real git commands or gui) your comment encourages me to at least try imagining a future where this project gets surprising widespread adoption and something many maintain and depend on. Like you suggest, it could cut a lot of entry costs if it doesn't double them. ;)

frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago

There's all sorts of Git wrappers but I haven't been able to find one that does what I want: a visual interface which will tell you the command line equivalent of what you're doing. Does one even exist?

gt_ 9y ago
Granted I am a novice, but have been in film post production and vfx for a long time. I'm not very familiar with any GUIs thay truly reflect proprietary commands. Nonetheless, I agree. And if you find it, please share.
weaksauce 9y ago
If you use Emacs, magit is phenomenal. If you use vim, spacemacs and magit are phenomenal. Watch a quick video on it. The command that is run is shown if you press `$`. I believe source tree shows you the command too if you set it up. Magit is much better than source tree though.

jstimpfle 9y ago

I think you have to reinvent quite a few wheels yourself to become a competent programmer instead of just comfortable gluing services. And maybe, just maybe you will make an actual improvement on the way.

gt_ 9y ago

I was sorta hoping someone would offer their take on contributing or creating projects like this for their portfolio. I would be a little self-conscious of having a bunch of 'simplifier' tools in my small portfolio. Is this silly for me to even be thinking?

gt_ 9y ago

kevingoslar 9y ago

Git Town contributor here. This tool was built to help stay sane in large high-velocity development teams. In such environments, one can easily spend an hour (or so) each day resolving merge conflicts. Feature branches go out of sync with the main development branch multiple times a day. One has to keep pulling, merging, or rebasing all open branches regularly to avoid more merge conflicts later. Those things require running many Git commands. Git Town makes all of this quick,easy, and bulletproof. A lot of people have been using it for years and love it for that. Apparently our documentation doesn't get this across well enough. We'll add more details.

eloisant 9y ago

> I am new to programming (less than 1 year) and the insignificance of this project is obvious to me. It's a set of helpers, that are useful for the author and useful enough to other people that (1) it was upvoted on HN and (2) it has 643 stars on github (so it appears to be fairly popular). > my understanding is that a user friendly wrapper for such a ubiquitous programming tech with already widespread GUIs and pluins is comparable to reinventing a wheel Not really. There are many reasons why these functions are not in core git, however for many people these are common tasks and doing it "manually" with git is a chore. Just like carpenters craft their own jigs and tools all the time, programmers write scripts to automatic repetitive tasks all the time. > My best guess is this was a personal project that solved some person(s) problems, and for some reason related to networking or self-promotion, it got the decoration of a full release treatment. What else could cause this? Most Open Source projects start as personal projects that solved some people's problems, and as others found out that it's useful to them they grow in popularity and become "famous" projects. This one also took the time to make a site, with an introduction, FAQ, etc, while most other projects only have a github page and a small README. If this project doesn't seem useful to you, don't spend much time trying to figure out what it is. The best is to be goal driven, i.e. you have a project you want to get through (either for work, school or personal project) and you seek projects that might help you doing that. > Should I be contributing to the heap of projects like these to further my own career? Don't create projects for the sake of your career, it will only lead to pointless projects boring for you and everyone else. Build what you need to build, what you want to build, and if you think it might be useful for just one other person feel free to post it online. It's not like the size of the Internet is limited and your project will prevent others from existing.