GitHub Background

Git. Hub.

Git

The Git portion, is a low-level system created by Linus Torvalds to:

  • Manage file version
  • Easily add in patches and updates created by collaborators
  • Backup files

The origin of the word git is that Linus Torvalds was an egotistical personality - so he named all of his projects after himself. Git is British slang for “unlikeable person.” Humorously, Linus himself nicknamed Git “the stupid content tracker”

Does it make sense to keep 20 versions of the same file on your laptop? Imagine being able to open up a document online and:

  • Trust that it’s the latest version
  • See its edit history
  • Even see comments that explain why each edit was made

That’s the power of having a version control system, which in our case is Github.

Hub

The Hub portion takes everything we do to a social level. Github is a web-based social network for users to host and share code.

In Github, you can

  • Follow the work of other people
  • Share your work to the public
  • Contribute to other projects.

By giving exposure to our work, it changes the way we think about working on code. We no longer have to write programs in siloes.