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Comment by kapp_in_life | Hacker News Reader

Is it? That's when git is simplest, having a single branch and never merging removes most of the complexities of git.

Why tho?

You can create as many branches as you want and do all the experimentation you want.

When I stopped caring about committing and branching (something I’ve too long associated with pushing code, like reaching milestones) and started doing both as much as possible I really felt lots of freedom.

Instead of overthinking I can create parallel different approaches and see where they lead to. It’s amazing.

Sure, but it also removes most of the reason to use Git.

In my experience, most people use git as version control. Branching etc is very useful, but not necessary for a 1-person project.

It is if you want to bug fix released items but keep steam rolling features for the next version.

I find branching useful whilst working on my own, I certainly wouldn't want to go back to CVS/SVN.

Don't underestimate all the useful information a complete git log contains, even for solo developers. You can look years back and find out exactly why a change was made.

I invite you to try using Git as much as possible for two weeks. After a week I started using Git for branching out of my main branch to test several different ideas and then compare them at once with other developers - colleagues or friends. I think that moved the meetings and discussions with my teammates up a level.

I have used Git when working with FOSS projects, and I tried using it for my own but it never took. The sort of workflow it is built for just isn't how I like to do things when I work on my own.

Solo workflow is as simple as write code, git commit, repeat. Throw in a git push every once in a while. All on master, no branching or forking.

That's a lot of commandline I don't normally have to bother with. And if I'm not living in the commandline then I only end up running git when I reach some milestone I want to back up... which I can do just as easily with 7zip without installing anything I don't already have, and I can copy archives to my NAS without having to set up some remote repo.

You can try and convince me until you're blue in the face dude, but I've tried it and I just don't like it. End of story.

You don't have to use the command line, most code editors have built in UI for this, especially when you're only using these basic git features.

I just use Notepad++. I like to keep my development environment simple.

I do a lot of that in my solo project. I would add to your list "write a commit comment". It's like keeping a journal you can go back to. It gives me time to stop and think what have I done, what needs to be done next.

I don't much read my git-commit-comments but I think it is useful to write them.

I don't usually branch, at least at this stage of the project. Probably yes when I go to production when there is a need to fix bugs in the released version(s) without having to put all the latest code into it.

Even without branching commits are a good way to save the latest known good state I can easily go back to if things didn't work out.

Personally, I started using git for my projects after I accidentally deleted a good chunk of source code and my closest backup was several weeks old.

The exact same thing happened to me, and I kicked myself hard for it. At the time I used source control at work (TFS and SVN; git wasn't yet ubiquitous), so I didn't really have an excuse.

I've used source control for all personal projects since, and it's in no way a burden. In fact, there have been another couple of instances since the first, where I would have lost a bunch of work without it.

How? It’s very hard to completely lose code in git. Did you know about the reflog?

The main reason is the ability to undo mistakes. Or compare working code with non-working code (including bisect)

That's very valuable even when solo, and worth typing a "commit" command once in a while.

When I'm hacking away on a personal project a huge amount of value in git (probably moreso than any other feature) just comes from having "what's in the repo" and "what I've changed today" (uncommitted changes) visible as diffs.

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