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The solution is pretty simple: GitHub needs a "Fav" or "Star" button. Basically just a bookmark. There's a lot of projects I want to remember but don't necessa

The solution is pretty simple: GitHub needs a "Fav" or "Star" button. Basically just a bookmark. There's a lot of projects I want to remember but don't necessarily care about the daily activity. And no, browser bookmarks aren't good enough. A nice faved/starred page would show stats and maybe last commit/activity. That's it.

hydrozen 15y ago
+1
pooriaazimi 15y ago
Exactly. I've asked it a couple times via email, hopefully they'll do something about it now that it's on HN front page (githubers read HN!).
colinloretz 15y ago
Agreed. There are many times I just want to sort favorite repositories that I want to refer to later. I've thought many times about building this using the Github API (like what Favoritizer does for Etsy) but then you would have a whole different website for browsing github.
petercooper 15y ago
Yes. This. I "watch" a lot of projects in lieu of favoriting them and because of how "watching" pollutes the timeline, I find the timeline totally useless. In theory I could just bookmark them using my normal system with a tag of "github" or something but the "Watched Repositories" widget is too useful to miss.
- entropie 15y ago
  I agree. The timeline is useless. But not that watch button, because i do have all projects i find interesting in one place. Thats absolutely ok for me and works fine.
- matthewcford 15y ago
  I'm building a browser extension that should solve this issue, basically a delicious for github. It's not up for public use yet, as i've yet to replicate the watched repos widget inline with bookmarks but next weekend I'll have a crack at it. https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/110983919160550210204/110983919160550210204/posts https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/110983919160550210204/11098391...
mvanveen 15y ago
I disagree. I don't have a button on Facebook for "bookmarking someone." Facebook's news feed has managed to keep the news feed relevant despite massive social changes in my lifetime Facebook usage (everything from high school, to college, to working as a professional software engineer). A new button will not fix Github's news feed problem. Making the news feed more relevant to users will.
- swang 15y ago
  Facebook has metrics like, how often you browse that person's page, how often you comment on that person's post and vice versa. But could you apply it to GitHub where all you care about in Project X is Feature Y or Issue Z? I guess the easiest way is if you could somehow figure out that the pages the User was looking and commenting on all related to one thing, such as CSS issues or problems with C pointers and only display those issues. I'm not sure if that is doable but the people at GitHub probably don't have the necessary resources to devote to implementing this (at least in the near future), whereas Facebook has more engineers, resources, data, and time to throw at the problem.
- mindcrime 15y ago
  Facebook's news feed has managed to keep the news feed relevant despite massive social changes in my lifetime Facebook usage (everything from high school, to college, to working as a professional software engineer). Maybe for you, but my experience is exactly the opposite. I find the Facebook news feed to be just about as useful as the Github news feed... which is to say, totally useless. The problem, as I see it, is that G+, Twitter, Github, etc. all make the same fundamental mistake... assuming that "connecting" to an "entity" means "I want to see every update from/about this entity." So, I "friend" somebody on G+ or "watch" a project on Github, now I'm on the hook to see all their updates. But there's NO particular reason to think that the above assertion holds. At best, "friending" a person or "watching" a project says you're more interested in it/them than a random project/person. These "event stream" implementations really need one or both of two things: The ability to specify more about what it is you're interested in, and smarter ML algorithms to figure out what to show you, based on both declared (or, for that matter, inferred) interests, and social connections, OR the ability to specify filters to exclude "stuff you don't want." If I had to choose, I'd ask for the latter. Better filters would go a long way towards giving us control of our streams / news-feeds. I'd like, for example to be able to say "I don't want any pictures of cats with funny hats, regardless of who posted them, in my stream." Or, in the Github example "I don't want any commits from project $FOO in my stream." If I'd seen much (or any) evidence to suggest that the machine learning stuff was smart enough to give me a truly meaningful feed without manual tweaking, I would care less about filters, but so far I'm just not seeing it. Facebook appear to try, but my feed there is still full of crap because they assume too much based on who I follow, not what I'm interested in. <rant-over />
bratsche 15y ago
Until they make such a feature, https://github.com/jacksonh/gitmarks https://github.com/jacksonh/gitmarks (edit: put the wrong gitmarks project in here, updated to the one I meant)
weaksauce 15y ago
I agree 100%. This has bugged me for a while. I use the watch button to basically favorite something that I don't want to fork. The way the current timeline operates right now is useless to me. Perhaps a way to show activity without regurgitating the commit log in a timeline form. sort the watched repos by recent activity and then when you click on it show some things that happened via ajax.
sek 15y ago
Additional they should introduce some "version notice", you get all the notices on new versions on your favorites. Just a simple function for the creator. This is the thing i always click watch in the first place, but i never get to the dashboard in reality.
cmicali 15y ago
Exactly +1
captn3m0 15y ago
I'm surprised no one here has yet mentioned https://www.codeshelver.com https://www.codeshelver.com >Codeshelver lets you clean up your GitHub watchlist by storing repositories you would like to remember on your shelf. You can tag any repository and search for it later on - until then it won't spam your dashboard timeline. Codeshelver helps you find that one project that you had seen ages ago, which you did not want to follow (watch), but perhaps use somewhere.
- mitchellmckenna 15y ago
  only downside is when I look at a user's profile I like to see what their 'watching' to see what their interested in but if they shelve everything I wouldn't see that
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
rsanchez1 15y ago
Agree with this. I started out using the watch button as a "watch" button, and ended up using it as a "Fav" button. Having two separate buttons would let me have a list of favorite projects, and a news feed at the same time.
tsigo 15y ago
I just launched a site and browser extension combination that does exactly that. I wrote a Show HN post about it: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3649551 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3649551

hydrozen 15y ago

pooriaazimi 15y ago

Exactly. I've asked it a couple times via email, hopefully they'll do something about it now that it's on HN front page (githubers read HN!).

colinloretz 15y ago

Agreed. There are many times I just want to sort favorite repositories that I want to refer to later. I've thought many times about building this using the Github API (like what Favoritizer does for Etsy) but then you would have a whole different website for browsing github.

petercooper 15y ago

Yes. This. I "watch" a lot of projects in lieu of favoriting them and because of how "watching" pollutes the timeline, I find the timeline totally useless. In theory I could just bookmark them using my normal system with a tag of "github" or something but the "Watched Repositories" widget is too useful to miss.

entropie 15y ago
I agree. The timeline is useless. But not that watch button, because i do have all projects i find interesting in one place. Thats absolutely ok for me and works fine.
matthewcford 15y ago
I'm building a browser extension that should solve this issue, basically a delicious for github. It's not up for public use yet, as i've yet to replicate the watched repos widget inline with bookmarks but next weekend I'll have a crack at it. https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/110983919160550210204/110983919160550210204/posts https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/110983919160550210204/11098391...

mvanveen 15y ago

I disagree. I don't have a button on Facebook for "bookmarking someone." Facebook's news feed has managed to keep the news feed relevant despite massive social changes in my lifetime Facebook usage (everything from high school, to college, to working as a professional software engineer). A new button will not fix Github's news feed problem. Making the news feed more relevant to users will.

swang 15y ago
Facebook has metrics like, how often you browse that person's page, how often you comment on that person's post and vice versa. But could you apply it to GitHub where all you care about in Project X is Feature Y or Issue Z? I guess the easiest way is if you could somehow figure out that the pages the User was looking and commenting on all related to one thing, such as CSS issues or problems with C pointers and only display those issues. I'm not sure if that is doable but the people at GitHub probably don't have the necessary resources to devote to implementing this (at least in the near future), whereas Facebook has more engineers, resources, data, and time to throw at the problem.
mindcrime 15y ago
Facebook's news feed has managed to keep the news feed relevant despite massive social changes in my lifetime Facebook usage (everything from high school, to college, to working as a professional software engineer). Maybe for you, but my experience is exactly the opposite. I find the Facebook news feed to be just about as useful as the Github news feed... which is to say, totally useless. The problem, as I see it, is that G+, Twitter, Github, etc. all make the same fundamental mistake... assuming that "connecting" to an "entity" means "I want to see every update from/about this entity." So, I "friend" somebody on G+ or "watch" a project on Github, now I'm on the hook to see all their updates. But there's NO particular reason to think that the above assertion holds. At best, "friending" a person or "watching" a project says you're more interested in it/them than a random project/person. These "event stream" implementations really need one or both of two things: The ability to specify more about what it is you're interested in, and smarter ML algorithms to figure out what to show you, based on both declared (or, for that matter, inferred) interests, and social connections, OR the ability to specify filters to exclude "stuff you don't want." If I had to choose, I'd ask for the latter. Better filters would go a long way towards giving us control of our streams / news-feeds. I'd like, for example to be able to say "I don't want any pictures of cats with funny hats, regardless of who posted them, in my stream." Or, in the Github example "I don't want any commits from project $FOO in my stream." If I'd seen much (or any) evidence to suggest that the machine learning stuff was smart enough to give me a truly meaningful feed without manual tweaking, I would care less about filters, but so far I'm just not seeing it. Facebook appear to try, but my feed there is still full of crap because they assume too much based on who I follow, not what I'm interested in. <rant-over />

bratsche 15y ago

Until they make such a feature, https://github.com/jacksonh/gitmarks https://github.com/jacksonh/gitmarks (edit: put the wrong gitmarks project in here, updated to the one I meant)

weaksauce 15y ago

I agree 100%. This has bugged me for a while. I use the watch button to basically favorite something that I don't want to fork. The way the current timeline operates right now is useless to me. Perhaps a way to show activity without regurgitating the commit log in a timeline form. sort the watched repos by recent activity and then when you click on it show some things that happened via ajax.

sek 15y ago

Additional they should introduce some "version notice", you get all the notices on new versions on your favorites. Just a simple function for the creator. This is the thing i always click watch in the first place, but i never get to the dashboard in reality.

cmicali 15y ago

Exactly +1

captn3m0 15y ago

I'm surprised no one here has yet mentioned https://www.codeshelver.com https://www.codeshelver.com >Codeshelver lets you clean up your GitHub watchlist by storing repositories you would like to remember on your shelf. You can tag any repository and search for it later on - until then it won't spam your dashboard timeline. Codeshelver helps you find that one project that you had seen ages ago, which you did not want to follow (watch), but perhaps use somewhere.

mitchellmckenna 15y ago
only downside is when I look at a user's profile I like to see what their 'watching' to see what their interested in but if they shelve everything I wouldn't see that
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]

rsanchez1 15y ago

Agree with this. I started out using the watch button as a "watch" button, and ended up using it as a "Fav" button. Having two separate buttons would let me have a list of favorite projects, and a news feed at the same time.

tsigo 15y ago

I just launched a site and browser extension combination that does exactly that. I wrote a Show HN post about it: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3649551 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3649551