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Also, of note, is that currently if you "fork" using git and push it into a github repository, there's no way to re-attach/hint github about the original ancest

Also, of note, is that currently if you "fork" using git and push it into a github repository, there's no way to re-attach/hint github about the original ancestor. The problem is compounded by the fact that doing anything related to the ancestor, such as pull requests, or even just diffs, will not be possible. I submitted a feature request to the github folks years ago, but nothing has really happened (I was just suggested to delete and fork the repository again). Not that it's hard: you could determine the ancestor and different lineages just using the hashes of the commits upon the first push to github. You could also do it completely offline, it wouldn't matter. There's also quite a number of forks available on github which aren't really visible because of that. I know that for some of my own projects and smaller projects that I checked, a code search would actually reveal many non-linked repositories. And I also know why: I often don't fork on github (why would I if I know nothing about the project yet?), I just shallow clone locally. Forking on github doesn't serve any purpose until you actually change the code, which oftentimes has already been done locally.

kpcyrd 11y ago
git clone git@github.com:original/repo.git # make some commits git remote rename origin upstream # fork the repo on github git remote add origin git@github.com:your/repo.git git fetch origin git push -u origin master
- tenfingers 11y ago
  Sure it's possible, however the only way to do it afterwards is to delete the repository and fork it manually again. Deleting the repository is only fine if there are no issue/wiki/data associated with it. The main problem is not omitting the "fork the repo on github" part voluntarily. Sometimes you're just not aware that you're pushing a repository which already has some ancestor on github, while you originally cloned from the main author's website instead. This has happened to me countless times. The graph network is totally useless in these cases.
- zimbatm 11y ago
  This would be perfectly fine if all the project data was stored into git. Unfortunately github issues, comments, project metadata, webhook setup, team membership, ... are not part of the repository.
  - TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
    Not to mention past and outstanding pull requests.

kpcyrd 11y ago

git clone git@github.com:original/repo.git # make some commits git remote rename origin upstream # fork the repo on github git remote add origin git@github.com:your/repo.git git fetch origin git push -u origin master

tenfingers 11y ago
Sure it's possible, however the only way to do it afterwards is to delete the repository and fork it manually again. Deleting the repository is only fine if there are no issue/wiki/data associated with it. The main problem is not omitting the "fork the repo on github" part voluntarily. Sometimes you're just not aware that you're pushing a repository which already has some ancestor on github, while you originally cloned from the main author's website instead. This has happened to me countless times. The graph network is totally useless in these cases.
zimbatm 11y ago
This would be perfectly fine if all the project data was stored into git. Unfortunately github issues, comments, project metadata, webhook setup, team membership, ... are not part of the repository.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
  Not to mention past and outstanding pull requests.