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I'm a casual GitHub user, and for me the fork button enabled me to grab a copy of some other repo, make changes , commit to my github repo without perturbing th

by dmh2000 7y ago

I'm a casual GitHub user, and for me the fork button enabled me to grab a copy of some other repo, make changes , commit to my github repo without perturbing the main project and still keeping an online history at github. Its a step above just downloading the zip file and below getting commit rights to the original project. If I just made a personal branch, then I would have everything but the online backup because I couldn't commit. One example is used by many online learning companies: they provide some baseline of code for use in a course. you need to get it to use in the lessons (edit: and make changes that you want to save). You can download a zip, clone or fork the repo. zip and clone don't get you the online backup. It would be interesting to see how many people use Github for the reasons cited in the article (using a fork as staging for a pull request) or like I do. As I wrote this, it made me realize I am a parasite on GitHub and the projects I fork, since I rarely contribute back (mainly because I don't have anything useful).

gowld 7y ago
You aren't a parasite, you are an intended user like every other. A parasite is one that consumes the host, not one that merely benefits from it.
johannes1234321 7y ago
You don't need a fork button for that. git clone ssh://example.com/repo.git [... Edit ...] git push ssh://myserver example.com/myrepo.git master Benefit of the fork button is that GitHub links those repos on their site.
- zbentley 7y ago
  Ah yes, all of the students in GP's example need merely need to learn how to provision, DNS-associate, and maintain a server, then they can store their Git repositories on it. That will surely not add any undue overhead for them.
  - johannes1234321 7y ago
    There is no need to run a server. This is only about the "fork" button. You could but GitHub.com in the place of example.com. Git hosting existed before GitHub.

gowld 7y ago

You aren't a parasite, you are an intended user like every other. A parasite is one that consumes the host, not one that merely benefits from it.

johannes1234321 7y ago

You don't need a fork button for that. git clone ssh://example.com/repo.git [... Edit ...] git push ssh://myserver example.com/myrepo.git master Benefit of the fork button is that GitHub links those repos on their site.

zbentley 7y ago
Ah yes, all of the students in GP's example need merely need to learn how to provision, DNS-associate, and maintain a server, then they can store their Git repositories on it. That will surely not add any undue overhead for them.
- johannes1234321 7y ago
  There is no need to run a server. This is only about the "fork" button. You could but GitHub.com in the place of example.com. Git hosting existed before GitHub.