
 Try Git - DanielRibeiro
http://try.github.com/levels/1/challenges/1
======
allsystemsgo
The github client is, in my humble opinion, not very good. It's simple but,
it's too simple. It's not that intuitive. You still need to know and
understand how github works in order to take advantage of the client.

For instance, if you push, and you get some sort of error, the error will be
very cryptic for a novice. You'll be googling solutions forever. Why? Because
since you don't have a good grasp of working from the command line, you won't
know how to implement the solutions that users are saying works.

~~~
jkubicek
I think the github client is great, but that may be because I only use GUI
clients for the basics: pushing, pulling, branching, committing, and viewing
history. I've never used a GUI client for anything more complex than this
because, honestly, they all suck at everything else.

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vidyesh
Got 15 minutes and want to learn Git? -
<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4199772>

~~~
jordan0day
What's your purpose in posting that link? Were there interesting comments in
that thread that you thought should be mentioned here? If so, would you mind
pointing out which?

~~~
wololo_
I think he's pointing out that this is a repost.

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UnoriginalGuy
This is unhelpful.

It doesn't explain WHY. Alright so the file is in the staging area and needs
to be committed to a repository, ok. What is the significance of this? Is a
staging area a type of repository? What happens if I don't commit? Why have
the add and commit stages at all - what value does that provide? Why not just
have stuff either committed or NOT? etc.

Unfortunately it is one of those learning exercises written by someone who has
forgotten what it was like to learn this stuff, so they presume the reader has
tons of "obvious" information (or more importantly a mental model for how a
git-like system SHOULD work).

Or maybe it was written with a particular audience in mind (i.e. people moving
over from a different version control system).

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mbell
I find this 'intro app' much more engaging:
<https://github.com/pcottle/learnGitBranching>

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emgre
Tried this a few weeks ago - as a relative beginner, thought it was a
fantastic introduction. (Pretty effective promotion for Code School, too.)

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rcknight
I like the idea of this, would be good to wean a few people off the github
client onto the command line.

I can understand that this wants to create a real repository on my github, but
it is asking permission to read/write to private repos, so I stopped at that
point.

~~~
WayneDB
Why would people need to be "weaned" off of a graphical client towards a
command line? Is it a specific client or all of them?

Maybe I'm misunderstanding your sentiment - are you one of those people who
thinks that all GUIs are for children and that command lines are for adults or
something along that line?

~~~
dbaupp
I think it's a case of leaky abstractions: git is sufficiently complicated
that no-one (to my knowledge) has abstracted away the original CLI into a GUI
that works for everything one would want/need to do with git.

~~~
WayneDB
Sure, but they do like 99% of what everybody working with git does every day.

So, do we still need to be "weaned" or can we just add some features to the
GUI clients if and when necessary?

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OliC
Githug is also a really great way to learn Git -
<https://github.com/Gazler/githug>

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drivers99
That got me to create an account and an extremely vague idea of what you can
do with it. I really didn't understand the syntax of most of what it had me
type in. I should probably try it again, but use it for real, and then look
for some more real information. It does finish up with a link to
gitreal.codeschool.com so that will probably be the next place to go.

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danielweber
This doesn't seem to work on Chrome 24.0.1312.69 (Official Build 180721) on
Ubuntu. No commands have any effect.

~~~
thomasmeeks
Hey hey, if you'd like to drop us a line at help.codeschool.com, we can look
into the problem a bit more. I'm in the process of getting ubuntu desktop
tossed up to test, but didn't want to keep you waiting.

Thanks!

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tybulewicz
Is it just me, or can you complete every step with writing 'help' in command
area and pressing Enter?

~~~
recursive
Congratulations on finding a shortcut to learning.

~~~
andrewguenther
Congratulations on finding a bug in this tutorial you mean? Typing 'help' when
you're stuck is a fairly logical way to get guidance on what you should do
next. If this just advances you to the next level, then you haven't gained
anything.

What makes you so sure that tybulewicz just wants to cheat?

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LandoCalrissian
This is very nice, there are quite a few people at my work that aren't
programmers but probably should learn git because it would make their lives
easier. Thanks for sharing.

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richoffrails
I can't believe there isn't tab completion.

