GitLab 4.0 Released

http://blog.gitlabhq.com/gitlab-4-release/

by andrewmunsell • 14 years ago

120 52 14 years ago

blog.gitlabhq.com

rustc• 14 years ago

GitLab seems to be getting better and better, every month.

To anyone who is using this, how would you compare 4.0 to the current GitHub, in terms of UI/Features?

I'm thinking of moving from a third party host to GitLab. What should I be aware of?

sytse13• 14 years ago

I'm opinionated on this since I'm running GitLab.com where you can use GitLab as a service.

GitHub has more features than GitLab. GitLab does have all the essentials to work as a team including merge requests and CI integration. Personally I think the GitLab interface is a bit less cluttered.

A list of things that are still missing from GitLab can be found on http://gitlab.uservoice.com/forums/176466-general

The highest votes items there (namespacing) just got added in GitLab 4.0

And the lead author Dmitriy had added many improvements each months for the last few months. Also the number of good pull requests is steadily increasing https://github.com/gitlabhq/gitlabhq/pulls?direction=desc...

If you want to run your own server you need to understand basic Unix systems operations. If you are comfortable with the installation guide than you should be fine https://github.com/gitlabhq/gitlabhq/blob/master/doc/install...

Xylakant4• 14 years ago

The main feature I'm missing is forks/pull-requests across repos. It's a nice way to keep strict control over the main repo while allowing others to commit code at their leisure. I must admit that this took me a little by suprise after installing GL.

sytse13• 14 years ago

Consider voting for this functionality at http://gitlab.uservoice.com/forums/176466-general/suggestion...

n0nick5• 14 years ago

GitLab looks awesome, both features and design wise, but the installation process is so tedious and complicated that I quit in the middle of it more than once: https://github.com/gitlabhq/gitlabhq/blob/4-0-stable/doc/ins...

This is feedback I heard from fellow developers as well.

I'm curious as to whether the maintainers are planning to simplify the list of dependencies and installation steps in the upcoming versions.

sytse13• 14 years ago

I'm sad to hear your GitLab installation didn't go smooth.

I hope to improve our Chef Cookbook for GitLab to the point where it can replace some of the scripts you need now.

Was there any particular part of the installation guide that we can improve in the near future?

(I run GitLab.com, offering GitLab as a service)

FraaJad• 14 years ago

I think providing a Vagrantfile that would automate the building of an entire vm with all the dependencies installed and software configured would be a good idea, ESP since a typical git user is familiar with Vms and vagrant..

n0nick5• 14 years ago

First of all, thanks a lot for the quick response.

Let me apologise in advance for complaining on an open-source project instead of trying to contribute.

Anyway, my personal feelings were that some of the dependencies could have been avoided (or perhaps set to some default value), at least for the community edition that I'm supposed to get up and running on an existing server machine.

Some examples: * Requiring Python (for a Rails project!), * Asking me to create special system users for the processes, * Setting paths, keys and chmods manually (and not in some install.sh process), * Configuring a database and access to it (this could easily use a default setting that pro users could edit manually).

From the comments around here, I realize that maybe I looked at the project in the wrong way and it should be installed either as a standalone service or as a virtual machine. If that's the case, I think a short Readme or Install doc explaining that would be very helpful for most users.

stblack• 14 years ago

The GitLab website is opaque. I searched for, and did find 1) How to download the product 2) How much it costs 3) what hardware and OS it runs on or 4) how to find out more.

Now I've only been developing web apps since 1997, and work every single day with GitHub. Evidently I'm just stupid.

Oh, I actually tried to find those things twice. Yesterday, and again today.

Are you guys even aware of your website's usability issues? What's with the mystery navigation?

Edit: don't bother giving me links. Fix these serious problems.

Xylakant4• 14 years ago

I found the installation process to be well described and installation went flawless. It seems like a long process but in the end, it's just because every little step from user creation to ruby installation is described in detail.

dlisboa• 14 years ago

Every part of that process could be automated and reasonable defaults given. If someone made an install script this project would fly. It's incredibly boring to do it on your own and while the wiki is thorough and well-written, very few people want to sit through that just to play with it.

If you have it set in your mind you'll use it, then it's a good installation process as any. But if you're trying to evaluate options you might just end up saying "fuck it, I'll just use github", or something like gitorious.

makmanalp• 14 years ago

I was just about to go make a chef cookbook myself when I found this:

https://github.com/atomic-penguin/cookbook-gitlab

also this:

https://github.com/gitlabhq/gitlab-vagrant-vm

mitchty2• 14 years ago

I started to try to get things running at work. We use SLES at work, needless to say this has to be the most annoying product to setup ever.

Also the setup instructions have everything prefixed with sudo, why they don't just say sudo su - user and do the rest as that user is beyond me. Half of the setup could just be a few sh scripts.

I'm about halfway through the setup, but this project won't see a lot of adoption given its insane dependency hell and installation tedium.

mnutt• 14 years ago

Also the setup instructions have everything prefixed with sudo, why they don't just say sudo su - user and do the rest as that user is beyond me. Half of the setup could just be a few sh scripts.

In many of the more security-conscious organizations, `sudo` is preferred over `su` because it leaves an audit trail. They could automate parts of that and perhaps they should, but the way they have it now shows you exactly which parts of your system you are modifying. It's a tradeoff; if they didn't, they'd have people scolding them for the install scripts wreaking havoc on their production systems.

daniellockard• 14 years ago

Man, the feature that I've wanted for a LONG time is in this rev of GitLab. Groups / Namespaces and permissions based on those groups.

MartinMond• 14 years ago

GitLab is incredible. I just read the documentation on setting up databases: https://github.com/gitlabhq/gitlabhq/blob/master/doc/install...

So it now supports both MySQL and Postgres, even though MySQL is preferred. Does anyone know what that means for a Postgres guy like me? Does "MySQL is preferred" mean that it has known bugs on Postgres? Is it usable?

sytse13• 14 years ago

According to the release notes GitLab 4.0 offers "Better PostgreSQL support". Unofficial PostgreSQL support has been around since 3.0 http://blog.gitlabhq.com/gitlab-3-dot-0-released/

Right now all the tests are green on PostgreSQL https://travis-ci.org/gitlabhq/gitlabhq/jobs/3796920

wh-uws• 14 years ago

I have it running on postgres

Gitlab uses the idea of a notable to signify things that can be commented on. For git commits comments they store the git commit in the column which you need an explicit cast for in postgres

I think there is one other thing too. But this was when installed version 3 they may have changed this

You can also read more about it on the original support pull request https://github.com/gitlabhq/gitlabhq/pull/1666

josscrowcroft• 14 years ago

This might be the push I need to install GitLab for my biz and site deployments, and bringing on contributors... until now, it seemed like too much hassle when I can simply pay $7/mo to use GitHub mini plan.

Looks fantastic though congrats.

mountaineer• 14 years ago

I've been looking at options for Git repos inside the firewall so happy to see this. Has anyone used Atlassian Stash too? How does it stack up vs GitLab? I've been using GitStack for a few months, which hasn't been bad for the basics.

mikhailt• 14 years ago

Does anybody know if GitLab does limit access to repos for certain people while the rest have unlimited access?

An example, CS team have access to issues/wikis only while the dev team have unlimited access.

This is our only deal breaker with GitHub.

If you know of other git-based system/service that does this, please let me know.

Thanks!

caissy• 14 years ago

Yes by default there are 4 different type of privileges per project that can be assigned to a user : guest, reporter, developer, master & owner. The list of what each is allowed to do can be found here : http://demo.gitlabhq.com/help/permissions

sippndipp• 14 years ago

We're using GitLab for 3 month now and it's an amazing project. Kudos to everyone who helped!

eagsalazar2• 14 years ago

Github isn't just a list of features. It is also the community, expertise and maintaining uptime and availability, security, etc. I guess for so little money I don't know why I'd ever use this unless I was working at a bank or somewhere that was obsessed with security and self-hosting (and didn't realize github is better at this than they are).

Also, I have to admit it is a bit irritating that this is such a direct rip of github. The only real "feature" they're adding over github is getting everything github innovated without paying github.

egeozcan• 14 years ago

There are some projects which legally can't be hosted on third party servers. Sometimes it's not about security but legal bindings. Even though they don't make sense, they do exist. There are also situations where you simply can't explain the benefits of Github to the decision maker.

bchen• 14 years ago

I agree that it bothers me to see Gitlab UI looking too similar to GitHub. I’m hoping that GitHub would not pursue any action against it. I also agree that Gitlab can’t compete against GitHub in the areas you’ve listed.

For my company, however, Gitlab makes a lot of sense. We have a large number of small and close source client projects to manage. We don’t want to pay for file hosting, e.g. $50 a month for 50 repos, when each repo is tiny and we can easily and cheaply host them. GitHub Enterprise is also out of question, as it is not very affordable by a small company.

Cost factor aside, Gitlab does have advantages over GitHub. Legal requirement is one, and the ability to integrate with other tools in the company is also quite nice. Although this feature has not been implemented yet, I look forward to the ability for Gitlab to integrate with Jenkins and display build status.

I will continue to use GitHub for personal and open source projects. For client work, Gitlab will be the one I use.

InclinedPlane• 14 years ago

Isn't this the same argument as saying that linux is a ripoff of unix without compensating the unix creators? Where would we be if we gave in to such notions?

Void_• 14 years ago

I wouldn't throw out the phrase "so little money" so eagerly.

I'm a student with practically no income, and I have about 50 repositories for my school and weekend projects. To use GitHub, I would have to pay them $100/mo.

jstepka• 14 years ago

Bitbucket offers unlimited private repos for students.

BUGHUNTER• 14 years ago

From the website:

  What we removed in 4.0: 
  SQLite support (I like it but this database got locked
  when several users use gitlab at once)

This is a pitty! I am sure there are many small teams where sqlite is totally sufficient.

Have you been able to measure and determine the problems with sqlite more precisely? It would be interesting to see at which point (number of concurrent users) the problems occur. Also it just reads like some data accessing backend is not properly closing connection / file access, so blocking might be just a bug, not a sqlite limitation.

Did you read http://www.sqlite.org/lockingv3.html ?

I personally do like having such important infrastructure like bugtrackers as simple as possible, beeing able to setup anytime anywhere with sqlite backend is really a plus in changing environments.

beagle3• 14 years ago

One important solution is to switch from journal mode to WAL mode. Journal mode (the default) makes readers block writers and vice versa. WAL mode makes it so only writers block writers.

ufukbay• 14 years ago

First of all, GitLab is awesome! However, I have to agree on making the installation steps easier. I was running GitLab 3.1 and followed the instructions on the official "From 3.1 to 4.0" update guide but when I checked GitLab's status at the end, there were several errors or uncomplete parts. Considering its a major release, I decided to reinstall everything from scratch instead of trying to manually fix everything displayed on the GitLab status check.

GitLab 4.0 Released

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