Mailing Lists vs. GitHub (2018)

https://begriffs.com/posts/2018-06-05-mailing-list-vs-github.html

by shawxe • 6 years ago

12 7 6 years ago

techntoke• 6 years ago

Always wanted to try using email for Git since it is built in and decentralized. A lot of core Linux projects do this, but I wish there was a better guide on getting started.

nix23• 6 years ago

Have Fun:

https://git-send-email.io/

IshKebab• 6 years ago

I think most of these advantages are overblown. Glad I read this though because I didn't know about the 'patience' diff algorithm and I've been looking for something like that for years!

Finally, creating patches by hand with diff can take advantage of other options, like annotating the hunk headers with which C functions are affected (using the -p flag), and the choice of various algorithms such as “patience.”

u801e2• 6 years ago

I think most of these advantages are overblown.

One thing that wasn't mentioned as an advantage of a mailing list is the index a mail client provides for discussion. This allows one to easily see which messages have been read, who has responded to whom and the ability to jump to a particular message in the discussion.

Github, on the other hand, mixes the overall diff with comments, so if there are a lot of comments, and the diff is large, then it requires a lot of scrolling to find a given comment. It also takes some time to find a given comment and see if it someone has responded to it.

cytzol• 6 years ago

There's one thing that keeps stopping me from adopting the mailing list approach, in favour of GitHub Pull Requests, and that's this:

If, ten seconds after I've clicked Submit, I discover an embarrassing error in the code, or that I've accidentally committed some personal information, or I've sent the e-mail from the wrong address, or anything else I haven't thought of yet, there's nothing I can do and it's public forever.

Some would see this as an anti-feature, but I really do like using GitHub because I have the ability to go back and edit or delete my Pull Request if I spot an embarrassing mistake. I know the solution to this is "be more careful", but I still feel anxious sending e-mails to a mailing list, and calm using GitHub.

Does anyone relate?

oweiler• 6 years ago

More careful is actually a stupid advice. People make mistakes, it's unavoidable. GH makes mistakes easy to correct, which is how it should be.

u801e2• 6 years ago

There are bots out there that scrape sensitive information from Github repositories. If you inadvertently push up a commit with a secret in it, then consider it compromised. Email is no different in that regard.

Mailing Lists vs. GitHub (2018)

Related Stories