What Git clients do you use?
I’m wondering if you use any (graphical) clients to manage your Git, and if so, what client you use. I myself have to use git professionally across all 3 major OS-es, and I currently use Sourcetree on Windows and macOS, and the Git tools built-in into IntelliJ on Linux. Have given MaGit a try, but just couldn’t get all the shortcuts to stick in my mind. Interested to hear your experiences!
CLI first here too, for the same reason.
I’m not above using an editor plugin if it’s simple and reliable and right there waiting, like VDCodium.
You can via git add -i foo.bar
I believe the only issue with that is that it can only go by hunks. If your changes are sufficiently far away, you can select them separately. But if you change one function that should be in patch a, and another function 5 lines down that should be in patch b, I think you’re screwed
Faalangst_26s to split a hunk, and e to edit it. That’s usually enough for me to split things up.
I usually use git add -p to selectively stage hunks. But in git add -i I think running the patch command does the same thing to get into patch mode.
If patch mode shows you a hunk, and you only want some of the lines you can press s to split into smaller hunks. Then you’ll be prompted whether to add each smaller hunk separately.
If you want to stage a change that is on the same line as a change you don’t want to stage, or on an adjacent line, then you need to use e to edit the hunk. Git stages whatever changes are left when you’re done editing. The file in the working tree on disk is unchanged.
hallettjgit add -p?
git gui is nice for this.
(or jj split).
Same, because its UX is actually really good. Years ago when I was new to git, I tried to use Sourcetree to revert a merge commit, and it would just fail. When I tried it in the CLI, it still failed, but it told me how to fix it. (I needed to specify which parent)
That, plus it’s scriptable, plus I’m in the terminal a lot anyway. I’ll also use the IDE git client sometimes if that’s where I am at the moment.
catalyst
slacktoid
SinTan1729lazygit. (I just find it easier to use TUI for some things like only committing some of the changed files, or fixup commits.)
TortoiseGit.
Through settings, I move the Show Log to the top context menu level, and it’s my entry point to every Git operation.
I see a history tree to see and immediately understand commit and branch relationships and states. I can commit, show changes, diff, rebase interactive or not, push, fetch, switch, create branches and tags, squash and split commits, commit chunk-wise through “restet after commit”, … And everything from a repo overview.
/edit: To add; other clients I tried never reached what I want from a UI/GUI, never reached TortoiseGit. Including IDE integrations where I’m already in the IDE; I prefer the separate better TortoiseGit.
GitButler is interesting for it’s different approach, but when I tried it out the git auth didn’t remember my key password. (Since trying out jj I found out it may have been due to disabled OpenSSH Service.)
What do you mean in particular?
The only thing that comes to mind for me is the “restore after commit” being a different chunk-add workflow than add --patch - but I don’t think it’s worse.
Fork on windows, SourceGit on Linux, both have a similar UI layout.
I really like having a clear overview of the commit history, branches and current local state. I haven’t figured out yet how to get such an “at a glance” overview in the CLI.
For advanced stuff the CLI is still very convenient.
Have to take a look at Fork (annoying name to Google I image). Sourcetree can be quite sluggish and downright annoying on macOS.
Ditto on the CLI having its pro’s and cons
I second sourcegit. When I need to I'll drop into the clu. But it's so much easier to just look at the branches in sourcegit.
It's like an open source gitkracken.
For professional use I’ve heard good things about SmartGit, unfortunately my work refused to buy me a license and the trial period wasn’t long enough for me to really form an opinion.
These days I use git CLI for most things, and VSCode to review changes and submit PRs. Of course this also assumes you use a decent shell with git support, like Oh-My-Posh or similar, so it is always clear what you are working on.
CLI for me. I do use the GitLens plugin in vs code but only so I can see commit info inline. I never commit anything from vs code.
I like Kaleidoscope (v3) for diffs but not for merging. I could probably use any graphical difftool for this purpose but it’s what I’m used to.
FYI, VSCode can now natively show commit info inline, no GitLens extension required:
Kissaki
Zarlin
mesa
cnovel
ruffsl
AMillionMonkeys
setsubyougit add -p
git for the same reasons already mentioned, but magit is the gold standard.
Anafabula
roadrunner_extig for visualizing the graph and looking over history, but for actual Git commands, I like the CLI
Mainly the official git CLI for controlling branches and sub modules, and sometimes the GitHub CLI if quickly checking out a pull request from a forked repo.
Also use the source control tab in VSCode rather often, as it’s really convenient to review and stage individual line changes from its diff view, and writing commit messages with a spell check extension.
If it’s a big diff or merge conflict, I’ll break out the big guns like Meld, which has better visualizations for comparing file trees and directories.
About a decade ago, I used to use SmartGit, then tried GitKraken when that came around, but never really use much of the bells and whistles and wasn’t keen on subscription pricing. Especially as the UX for GitHub and other code hosting platforms online have matured.
This is very satisfying to use and is a nice companion to the command line - I particularly use it to stage only certain lines and files from the changes.
I tried lazygit first, but there was a consistent lag that was probably only ¼ second but it ruined the experience for me.
I used a lot of Magit at work (it’s good), as well as jujutsu and command line. Also gitk for browsing history.
Currently I use jujutsu at home for leisure stuff and command line + git gui at work. For some workplaces, more powerful tools are just overkill.
Fugitive, the vim / neovim plugin. It does everything the CLI does, but uses vim interfaces very effectively to enhance the experience. For example it’s quite good for selectively staging changes from a file. I also like the option to open a buffer with the version of a file from any specified commit.
I also tried neogit which aims to port magit to neovim. I didn’t like it as much. Partly because as far as I could tell at the time it lacked features compared to fugitive. But also because it seemed to want me to do everything through UIs in its own custom windows. Fugitive is integrated more thoroughly into vim via command mode, and special buffers.
It’s what they used at my job when I started, it does the job, and I’ve gotten used to it. 🤷♂️
I personally prefer lazygit nowadays, but when it comes to GUI clients on Windows then Git Extensions is definitely a very good pick.
I particularly like that it doesn’t hide that it’s just executing git commands under the hood and its focus on the history graph. Those two things really helped understand how git actually works and why I’m still recommending it.
Yeah, maybe it’s because I learned git from the graph, but I find it really helpful when figuring out why a certain piece of code ended up looking like it does (the ability to see the changes made in every commit and open versions of the files at any point in history without checking out the commit is also very useful).
And yeah, if you need or want the command line it always lets you open a git prompt for you to do whatever you want, which is nice.
Also, again maybe because it’s what I’ve gotten used to, but I find the way it handles merge or rebase conflicts more useable (or rather less unusable) than any other I’ve tried…
I mostly use git from the console.
Deebster
NekuSoul
ALERT
BeigeAgenda
whotookkarl
katy ✨