Show HN: Github for normal people.

by Jonovono • 14 years ago

6 5 14 years ago

Jonovono3• 14 years ago

Hey HN!

So this is something I have been working a bit on in my spare time (err, I mean, I just wrote it in 3 seconds :p).

I have been using Github since I got into coding a little while ago and I love it. It makes it super easy to store files, find projects that are helpful, and just encourages the idea of open source by making it easy and fun. I feel like I have learnt a great deal just downloading peoples code and making changes to it and seeing the process they went through. I have been wondering what a similar site like this would look like if it was made for people unfamiliar to Git and would never take the time to learn a new language or whatever do collaborate or use version control.

Right now it works very simply. It is like Google docs but everything is public (I will be introducing private projects). You can upload changes by dragging a new document onto the page and it will be stored. You can annotate files, highlight text, etc. Right now it supports images, text docs (code), pdf, doc(x), and excel. I think it would be exciting to have a system where people could come and collaborate on things such as books, textbooks, etc.

I have seen a few cases here on HN where such a system is discussed but I have not seen any solutions.

One of those was how Wired used Github to publish an article (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3631618). They were not happy with this solution however and are looking for another system that is more user friendly. But the demand is there. I think it would be awesome to be able to easily suggest mistakes on articles and allow an easier way for the author to accept those.

Another was about a git powered Project Gutenberg (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3638917). Gutenberg is a mess (no nice way to view, no consensus on what the base text format should be) and git would be an interesting solution but again it is not that user friendly. As an example I put a couple PG documents on Rubberdocky (http://rubberdocky.com/ProjectGutenbergFiles/Siddhartha).

I am hoping to make use of a cool project I just ran into called substance.io to make it easy for people to collaborate on documents.

Rubberdocky is not the solution yet, but I am hoping to steer it that way by getting some feedback from interested user. If you are interested in the idea email me contact@rubberdocky.com and we could discuss this in more detail! Im looking for some web designers/UI to maybe join forces (I know supposed to find someone you know, but desperate times). If you get some errors email me or Tweet me @Rubberdocky.

Toshio• 14 years ago

Do you intend to eventually open-source it?

Jonovono3• 14 years ago

Well I took an open source project (gitlabhq) and just scraped id down to make it user friendly. So you could check that out for now! Its an awesome software!

jonschwartz• 14 years ago

One quick suggestion. If this is for "normal people" (I'd rather have that say non-techies as it's slightly insulting to us non-normals), try to factor our programming terms. 'Version Control' is a programming term. I would change it to 'File History'.

Jonovono3• 14 years ago

True. I didn't know the best term to use here on HN. But on the site I think changing Version control to File History is a good idea. Thanks.

Show HN: Github for normal people.

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