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By reading the stream of comments on the PR, and from my own experience, I feel that it is extremely cumbersome to do code reviews on Github. Atlassian's Fishey

by alderz 6y ago

By reading the stream of comments on the PR, and from my own experience, I feel that it is extremely cumbersome to do code reviews on Github. Atlassian's Fisheye/Crucible looks like a better solution. Does anyone think otherwise? I think Github has a large room of improvement in this regard; a PR is not the same as an issue.

ChrisMarshallNY 6y ago
I don't feel like GH is really meant to be a code review platform. It does PRs, but I assume that review should be done offline (like in other tools, like Crucible). We have used GH as a review platform for an open-source project, but they tend to be relatively minor PRs. If they got hairier, we'd probably find something else. Personally, I really don't like having a gazillion different tools. If we can use one tool for several purposes, then that's what I prefer. If the tool becomes too cumbersome, then I'll work with something more specialized.
- aspenmayer 6y ago
  Is there a good self-hosted open source platform for this? I’m new to all this, even though I’ve been computing since I was in grade school. Coding is a new discipline for me, and it’s hard to know the territory without a guide. I’ve seen you around and would trust a recommendation from you.
  - emmelaich 6y ago
    I suggest https://www.gerritcodereview.com/ https://www.gerritcodereview.com/
    - aspenmayer 6y ago
      Thank you, I’m going to look into this more.
- skrtskrt 6y ago
  I have used and enjoyed Upsource (JetBrains code review tool) particularly for trunk development where you often need to be able to cherry-pick randomly-ordered commits into a review. I honestly don't know how much our org paid for it though.
momothereal 6y ago
I've been using GitHub for code review (both open-source and commercial projects) for about 5 years. It's improved a little bit, but for PRs with >100 files changed it's obviously lacking good UX. For me, the biggest improvement would be the tree-view you get in Fisheye/Crucible. It's so hard to get a grasp on large refactoring PRs on GitHub.
- the_af 6y ago
  I wonder how one does manage a PR with >100 files changed. I realize these are sometimes unavoidable, but shouldn't we strive for smaller PRs? No tool will help you with exploding complexity...
  - fotta 6y ago
    Usually with massive PRs of that sort I’ll have several smaller PRs to a separate branch that get reviewed so that everything in the massive PR to the main branch has already been reviewed and the big one is just a cursory look. But this approach probably isn’t as feasible with open source projects.
- outadoc 6y ago
  This extension [1] makes code reviews more bearable, I highly recommend it. I don't understand why Github hasn't shipped this years ago. They've been improving the UX since their acquisition but there's still a long ways to go. [1]: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/better-pull-request-for-github/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/better-pull-r...
ahnick 6y ago
On GH I can see the files that are changed and make/read comments that are inline on the files as well. This has been sufficient for my needs. What is it that Fisheye/Crucible brings to the table that you think would be desirable on GH?
- alderz 6y ago
  I guess that for some people, and particularly in small reviews, it is enough with the list of files and inline comments. I would like to have a tree view where I can see all the files at a glance, and, more importantly, switch back a forth between them. I find it hard to follow the code in Github's UX. Also, Fisheye/Crucible gives you more flexibility to edit the review, by allowing you to remove files, and add or remove commits. Github PRs are based on branches, while Fisheye/Crucible code reviews are based on commits; it is an entire paradigm shift that gives the user more control. For example, I can create two separate reviews from the same branch on Crucible; that's impossible on Github.
MaxBarraclough 6y ago
You might be interested in Torvalds' low opinion of GitHub pull-requests. https://github.com/torvalds/linux/pull/17#issuecomment-5659933 https://github.com/torvalds/linux/pull/17#issuecomment-56599... Discussed at: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3960876 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3960876 https://old.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/tionj/ https://old.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/tionj/
secondcoming 6y ago
Agreed. We moved to GH from Bitbucket and code reviews is the only thing that Bitbucket did better.
dathinab 6y ago
It's not just git. I have yet to see a platform which does PR code reviews in a way I like. If it's small PR or PR's from trusted sources it's not an problem but once it's bigger and from a third party reviewing it can easily become much more annoying then it should. Besides UX aspects on major offender IMHO is the text based diff algorithm. I had to often changes where you could have created a easily readable diff but non content aware git diffs just produced total garbage.
- lmm 6y ago
  I spent four years working at a company that uses stash/"bitbucket server". Coming back to GitHub I was shocked at how much worse their PR workflow is.
berkut 6y ago
I agree whole-heartedly (against both Github and Gitlab code reviews for serious large changes), but from what I've heard Crucible is apparently EOL now?

by alderz 6y ago

ChrisMarshallNY 6y ago

I don't feel like GH is really meant to be a code review platform. It does PRs, but I assume that review should be done offline (like in other tools, like Crucible). We have used GH as a review platform for an open-source project, but they tend to be relatively minor PRs. If they got hairier, we'd probably find something else. Personally, I really don't like having a gazillion different tools. If we can use one tool for several purposes, then that's what I prefer. If the tool becomes too cumbersome, then I'll work with something more specialized.

aspenmayer 6y ago
Is there a good self-hosted open source platform for this? I’m new to all this, even though I’ve been computing since I was in grade school. Coding is a new discipline for me, and it’s hard to know the territory without a guide. I’ve seen you around and would trust a recommendation from you.
- emmelaich 6y ago
  I suggest https://www.gerritcodereview.com/ https://www.gerritcodereview.com/
  - aspenmayer 6y ago
    Thank you, I’m going to look into this more.
skrtskrt 6y ago
I have used and enjoyed Upsource (JetBrains code review tool) particularly for trunk development where you often need to be able to cherry-pick randomly-ordered commits into a review. I honestly don't know how much our org paid for it though.

momothereal 6y ago

I've been using GitHub for code review (both open-source and commercial projects) for about 5 years. It's improved a little bit, but for PRs with >100 files changed it's obviously lacking good UX. For me, the biggest improvement would be the tree-view you get in Fisheye/Crucible. It's so hard to get a grasp on large refactoring PRs on GitHub.

the_af 6y ago
I wonder how one does manage a PR with >100 files changed. I realize these are sometimes unavoidable, but shouldn't we strive for smaller PRs? No tool will help you with exploding complexity...
- fotta 6y ago
  Usually with massive PRs of that sort I’ll have several smaller PRs to a separate branch that get reviewed so that everything in the massive PR to the main branch has already been reviewed and the big one is just a cursory look. But this approach probably isn’t as feasible with open source projects.
outadoc 6y ago
This extension [1] makes code reviews more bearable, I highly recommend it. I don't understand why Github hasn't shipped this years ago. They've been improving the UX since their acquisition but there's still a long ways to go. [1]: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/better-pull-request-for-github/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/better-pull-r...

ahnick 6y ago

On GH I can see the files that are changed and make/read comments that are inline on the files as well. This has been sufficient for my needs. What is it that Fisheye/Crucible brings to the table that you think would be desirable on GH?

alderz 6y ago
I guess that for some people, and particularly in small reviews, it is enough with the list of files and inline comments. I would like to have a tree view where I can see all the files at a glance, and, more importantly, switch back a forth between them. I find it hard to follow the code in Github's UX. Also, Fisheye/Crucible gives you more flexibility to edit the review, by allowing you to remove files, and add or remove commits. Github PRs are based on branches, while Fisheye/Crucible code reviews are based on commits; it is an entire paradigm shift that gives the user more control. For example, I can create two separate reviews from the same branch on Crucible; that's impossible on Github.

MaxBarraclough 6y ago

You might be interested in Torvalds' low opinion of GitHub pull-requests. https://github.com/torvalds/linux/pull/17#issuecomment-5659933 https://github.com/torvalds/linux/pull/17#issuecomment-56599... Discussed at: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3960876 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3960876 https://old.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/tionj/ https://old.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/tionj/

secondcoming 6y ago

Agreed. We moved to GH from Bitbucket and code reviews is the only thing that Bitbucket did better.

dathinab 6y ago

It's not just git. I have yet to see a platform which does PR code reviews in a way I like. If it's small PR or PR's from trusted sources it's not an problem but once it's bigger and from a third party reviewing it can easily become much more annoying then it should. Besides UX aspects on major offender IMHO is the text based diff algorithm. I had to often changes where you could have created a easily readable diff but non content aware git diffs just produced total garbage.

lmm 6y ago
I spent four years working at a company that uses stash/"bitbucket server". Coming back to GitHub I was shocked at how much worse their PR workflow is.

berkut 6y ago

I agree whole-heartedly (against both Github and Gitlab code reviews for serious large changes), but from what I've heard Crucible is apparently EOL now?