4 ms·

Commits aren't the valuable output of the development process.

• kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
  They're valuable when you're looking for who broke the codebase.
  • coldtea 6y ago
    You can tell that by the author metadata.
    • paledot 6y ago
      They're valuable for when you're looking for why they broke the code base. This looks like dead code, will I break anything if I remove it? Git blame gets me the ticket number, details on the particular change being made, and (if the author writes their commits well) related files and tests associated with this change. From there, I can see if the other code has since been removed, or if there's an edge case I didn't think of, or if the thing was never plugged in in the first place, or if this is a bug no one has noticed. All within two minutes, and without needing to ask the author (if they're even still available).
• u801e 6y ago
  Using git blame and looking at a commit that last updated a line allows one to check the message for the reasoning behind adding or updating that line, and the context that line was added or updated. This could help in terms of preventing regressions by making further updates for example.
• justinclift 6y ago
  At least for me, they definitely are one of the valuable outputs of the development process. Especially when looking back through older code to see "what did we change since X date?", and/or "what changed between (say) the 3rd and 5th of July?". That seems to be a fairly standard thing too (from my perspective).