In the development of the Web there are a lot of foreign words and combinations of different letters that say nothing to the ordinary mortal. But the more you know about web development standards, why certain technologies are used, and how they can make life easier for you, the easier it will be for you to decide who to entrust the development of your website or software to.
This time we would like to tell you what GIT is, what it is used for in web development and why it is important for you, as a customer.
What is GIT?
GIT is the most common free and open source version management system for development files. In 2005, Linus Torvalds created the GIT to develop a Linux core. Unlike older centralised version management systems such as SVN and CVS, with GIT, each developer has a full code storage history locally. What does it mean – when developers create something (for example, a web system, software, a website), the code is constantly changed, creating new versions until the first official release. GIT maintains these adjustments while also retaining modifications to the Central Repository. GIT is an extremely popular version control system that allows developers to create a history of changes to what happens in their code over time.
How does GIT work?
Conceptually, in most other systems, information is stored as a list of file-based changes. Systems such as CVS, Subversion, Perforce (from 2017 Helix Core), Bazaar and others, the information they store and changes made over time to each file are considered as a set of files. GIT does not think or store data in this way. Instead, GIT thinks of data more than a series of snapshots of a miniature file system. With GIT, each time changes are made or the state of the project is saved, a version of the project is taken, as all files look at that moment, and saves a reference to that snapshot. If the files have not changed, the GIT file is no longer stored, only a link to the previous identical file, which it has already saved.
Why is it important to use GIT in web development?
For example, you don't have to go to the server to browse project history using GIT. To obtain the project history and display it, the information is read directly from the local database. This means that the history of the project can be seen almost immediately. If you need to see the changes introduced between the current version of the file and the file, for example, a month ago, GIT can look for the file or differences in the code a month ago and calculate their differences instead of either requiring the remote server to do so or extracting an earlier version of the file from the server to do so locally. In simple terms, GIT needs to always be able to track any changes in the code. If ever there is a situation when it is necessary to change the developer of the software, web system or website, the new developer will be able to see the entire development history of the project and the changes made to the files and code. Also, if necessary, there will always be an opportunity to return to one of the older versions of the project. With GIT, it is not possible to make any changes so that it is not noticed. This functionality is built into the lower levels of GIT and is an integral part of its philosophy. With GIT, it is not possible to lose the information you are transporting or damage the file so that GIT cannot detect it.
Why is it important for you, as a customer, to use GIT?
- If for some reason you have to change the programmer, everything you have done before is visible and traceable – who did what he did, what he did and when he did it
- You can see what changes your programmer makes
- Your code is safe, even if unexpected server disruption occurs, no project files and code are lost
- GIT allows you to undo errors in code
- If several programmers work on your project, you can see who is doing and what
If you have now planned a web development project, make sure that the developer you choose uses the version control system when developing a website or software for your company. This can save both time and money in the future if you want to change the concept of the developer or website. Apply for a consultation and our team will be happy to help you.