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by helloguillecl
1349 days ago
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The CLI interface is very good at enforcing you to be aware of the underlying model (local state and the repo’s history). This allows for the user to draw an accurate user-model in his understanding of the system. I have been using Git for around 15 years, without a fuss. Maybe because I was lucky enough to have found a good tutorial. Instead of hiding the abstractions behind a “friendlier” CLI, Git shows you its real power and that of VCSs in general, by having a lower-level API. Not even the multiple GUIs built on top of Git, adventure themselves into hiding or dumbing down the abstractions that allow you to do quite complex things with the code and its history. |
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Before that for a short period I really wanted to get into darcs, the first DVCS I used. I was constantly confused about what commands to use to rectify the off-the-happy-path situations that you find yourself in every now and then. The UI might have been better than git's in a lot of ways but it was distinctly higher-level.
When I learned git and understood the underlying model I had far fewer problems. The commands of early git could have been designed better, but they were more transparent in what they did.
The thought haven't struck me before, but maybe one of the great things about git is that even the low-level/plumbing commands (cat-files/ls-tree/show-ref) have well written man pages.