4 ms·

non-helpful answer: the "Microsoft Acquires GitHub" line in this graph answers all questions https://damrnelson.github.io/github-historical-uptime/ https://damr

non-helpful answer: the "Microsoft Acquires GitHub" line in this graph answers all questions https://damrnelson.github.io/github-historical-uptime/ https://damrnelson.github.io/github-historical-uptime/

ciupicri 2mo ago
On the other hand I think usage increased and GitHub operates now at a different scale.
joshdavham 2mo ago
Microsoft acquiring GitHub is not a valid root cause analysis explaining Github’s degraded SLA.
- cwnyth 2mo ago
  According to that graph, performance drops widely after Microsoft's acquisition before AI enters the scene. If not Microsoft, how else do you explain it, or is the graph somehow misleading?
  - lordgilman 2mo ago
    You're the one making the argument! You need to show causality instead of correlation.
    - cwnyth 2mo ago
      I've made no argument at all. I'm asking a question to a person who made the claim that "Microsoft acquiring GitHub is not a valid root cause analysis."
    - lezojeda 2mo ago
      [dead]
    - dgellow 2mo ago
      No they don’t? They don’t need to do anything. It’s a forum, not a formal debate performance
  - itemize123 2mo ago
    it's just inaccurate data prior to microsft acq
- ryandvm 2mo ago
  Mmmm - I don't do root cause analysis for free. Best I can do is correlation.
traviswingo 2mo ago
Microsoft acquires GitHub and subsequently moves all infrastructure to Azure
flexagoon 2mo ago
Note that most of the downtime in that graph comes from Github Actions, which simply didn't exist before the Microsoft acquisition. The downtime also starts happening in 2020, which is a while after the acquisition. 2020 was the year many people started learning to code while being stuck at home.
preciousoo 2mo ago
No one hates msft more than me, but there’s no way you think this one data point is useful to explain anything at all
ornornor 2mo ago
I’ve noticed the same thing with computers, whenever I install MS windows on them uptime tanks ;)
fallingbananna 2mo ago
To be fair, before the aquisition, GitHub was super stable, but also it felt like they rarely changed or added anything. After Microsoft acquired them, they started rolling out new features at an incredible pace. And if you look at the breakdown of the downtime, most of the downtime is in features that didn't exist before the acquisition. Though not all of the downtime is in new features. The core is also less stable than ever.
- nrr 2mo ago
  My (actuarial) read on this is that pre-Microsoft GitHub acknowledged that the complexity inherent in their technology stack imparted a lot of change risk, and that probably informed their decisions around shipping new features. My (not-so-actuarial 1990's-experience-colored) feeling is that this is Microsoft doing what Microsoft does best, namely including a lot of seemingly compelling features in a product to get people hooked and to keep competitors in a position of trying to keep up.
- a2ff6eeb0 2mo ago
  But I just want stable hosting for my shit. I barely even interact with the web UI, other than commenting on PRs.
  - dspillett 2mo ago
    Unfortunately there isn't as much money to be made¹² serving people who just want a stable host for basic repos. The money comes from the paid accounts, and those do tend to want the extra features - even if the end users don't the management agreeing to the spend will see value in the integration³ of other parts of the development/release/support processes. The problem is they all want a different mix of features, meaning that the feature set needs to be wide to capture as much interest as possible especially in light of competitors that may offer something you don't (yet). -------- [1] Possibly none, are you paying for a pro or enterprise account? [2] There will be a little indirect income perhaps, via deriving value from tracking users and being able to use the combined content for various analytics (including lately AI training). [3] Potentially reducing the cost/complexity of integrating disparate systems⁴, themselves. [4] Sometimes in-house developed systems that might distract key devs from the company's products/services that they can sell.
jm4 2mo ago
In all fairness, the features expanded substantially after the acquisition so there's are a lot more components that can experience downtime. Pre-acquisition, github was a fairly simple code repository with issues bolted on. Actions, Dependabot, Codespaces, Advanced Security, Package Registry, Copilot, etc. all came after the acquisition and probably involve much more overhead than what github was prior to the acquisition. It basically went from code hosting platform where machines are sitting idle when pushes and pulls aren't happening to a fully integrated developer ecosystem. Any one of those things experiencing degraded performance is going to show up on an uptime chart.
- rcxdude 2mo ago
  True, but you could argue whether these were good product decisions especially given they've probably contributed to the cost of running the platform and the instability substantially. (Github did probably want a native CI implementation but I'm not really sure Actions was the way to do it. It seems so needlessly complex to me, not to mention the massive security issues. The rest of those features are just far from something I'd ever use so I don't even really know how to comment on them)
  - jm4 2mo ago
    I dunno. Those features are valuable to somebody. Probably enterprise and government, which is where the money is. They basically get a full stack - and if we're being honest, it's actually pretty damn good aside from the downtime - from one vendor and that's important. The Universal Blue people have done some interesting things with Actions too. I guess if you don't need any of that stuff it's an easy migration for you. I'm in that boat. I switched to Forgejo and there's nothing I miss. Even that's overkill for my use case.
    - rcxdude 2mo ago
      TBH I looked at forgejo as an alternative to Gitlab and the fact that they had cloned Actions is what persuaded me to drop it. IMO Gitlab's CI has been their killer feature for a while.
chem83 2mo ago
Seems to be a pattern that infra teams in and around Azure don't know how to deal with age-of-AI levels of demand and struggle when internal politics + technical hubris get in the way: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47616242 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47616242

ciupicri 2mo ago

On the other hand I think usage increased and GitHub operates now at a different scale.

joshdavham 2mo ago

Microsoft acquiring GitHub is not a valid root cause analysis explaining Github’s degraded SLA.

cwnyth 2mo ago
According to that graph, performance drops widely after Microsoft's acquisition before AI enters the scene. If not Microsoft, how else do you explain it, or is the graph somehow misleading?
- lordgilman 2mo ago
  You're the one making the argument! You need to show causality instead of correlation.
  - cwnyth 2mo ago
    I've made no argument at all. I'm asking a question to a person who made the claim that "Microsoft acquiring GitHub is not a valid root cause analysis."
  - lezojeda 2mo ago
    [dead]
  - dgellow 2mo ago
    No they don’t? They don’t need to do anything. It’s a forum, not a formal debate performance
- itemize123 2mo ago
  it's just inaccurate data prior to microsft acq
ryandvm 2mo ago
Mmmm - I don't do root cause analysis for free. Best I can do is correlation.

traviswingo 2mo ago

Microsoft acquires GitHub and subsequently moves all infrastructure to Azure

flexagoon 2mo ago

Note that most of the downtime in that graph comes from Github Actions, which simply didn't exist before the Microsoft acquisition. The downtime also starts happening in 2020, which is a while after the acquisition. 2020 was the year many people started learning to code while being stuck at home.

preciousoo 2mo ago

No one hates msft more than me, but there’s no way you think this one data point is useful to explain anything at all

ornornor 2mo ago

I’ve noticed the same thing with computers, whenever I install MS windows on them uptime tanks ;)

fallingbananna 2mo ago

To be fair, before the aquisition, GitHub was super stable, but also it felt like they rarely changed or added anything. After Microsoft acquired them, they started rolling out new features at an incredible pace. And if you look at the breakdown of the downtime, most of the downtime is in features that didn't exist before the acquisition. Though not all of the downtime is in new features. The core is also less stable than ever.

nrr 2mo ago
My (actuarial) read on this is that pre-Microsoft GitHub acknowledged that the complexity inherent in their technology stack imparted a lot of change risk, and that probably informed their decisions around shipping new features. My (not-so-actuarial 1990's-experience-colored) feeling is that this is Microsoft doing what Microsoft does best, namely including a lot of seemingly compelling features in a product to get people hooked and to keep competitors in a position of trying to keep up.
a2ff6eeb0 2mo ago
But I just want stable hosting for my shit. I barely even interact with the web UI, other than commenting on PRs.
- dspillett 2mo ago
  Unfortunately there isn't as much money to be made¹² serving people who just want a stable host for basic repos. The money comes from the paid accounts, and those do tend to want the extra features - even if the end users don't the management agreeing to the spend will see value in the integration³ of other parts of the development/release/support processes. The problem is they all want a different mix of features, meaning that the feature set needs to be wide to capture as much interest as possible especially in light of competitors that may offer something you don't (yet). -------- [1] Possibly none, are you paying for a pro or enterprise account? [2] There will be a little indirect income perhaps, via deriving value from tracking users and being able to use the combined content for various analytics (including lately AI training). [3] Potentially reducing the cost/complexity of integrating disparate systems⁴, themselves. [4] Sometimes in-house developed systems that might distract key devs from the company's products/services that they can sell.

jm4 2mo ago

In all fairness, the features expanded substantially after the acquisition so there's are a lot more components that can experience downtime. Pre-acquisition, github was a fairly simple code repository with issues bolted on. Actions, Dependabot, Codespaces, Advanced Security, Package Registry, Copilot, etc. all came after the acquisition and probably involve much more overhead than what github was prior to the acquisition. It basically went from code hosting platform where machines are sitting idle when pushes and pulls aren't happening to a fully integrated developer ecosystem. Any one of those things experiencing degraded performance is going to show up on an uptime chart.

rcxdude 2mo ago
True, but you could argue whether these were good product decisions especially given they've probably contributed to the cost of running the platform and the instability substantially. (Github did probably want a native CI implementation but I'm not really sure Actions was the way to do it. It seems so needlessly complex to me, not to mention the massive security issues. The rest of those features are just far from something I'd ever use so I don't even really know how to comment on them)
- jm4 2mo ago
  I dunno. Those features are valuable to somebody. Probably enterprise and government, which is where the money is. They basically get a full stack - and if we're being honest, it's actually pretty damn good aside from the downtime - from one vendor and that's important. The Universal Blue people have done some interesting things with Actions too. I guess if you don't need any of that stuff it's an easy migration for you. I'm in that boat. I switched to Forgejo and there's nothing I miss. Even that's overkill for my use case.
  - rcxdude 2mo ago
    TBH I looked at forgejo as an alternative to Gitlab and the fact that they had cloned Actions is what persuaded me to drop it. IMO Gitlab's CI has been their killer feature for a while.

chem83 2mo ago

Seems to be a pattern that infra teams in and around Azure don't know how to deal with age-of-AI levels of demand and struggle when internal politics + technical hubris get in the way: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47616242 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47616242