January 2016 Summaries

On January 28, 2016, GitHub.com experienced a significant service outage lasting two hours and six minutes due to a power disruption at its primary data center, which led to a cascading failure affecting critical services. The service was fully restored by 02:29am UTC after engineers worked to resolve the issue. Recognizing the impact on the development workflows of millions of users and businesses, GitHub expressed regret for the disruption and committed to enhancing its resilience and response capabilities. Investigations into the incident are ongoing, with promises to share findings and improvements with the community.

GitHub announced a series of events for 2016, including two new European conferences, GitHub Satellite in Amsterdam and CodeConf in Copenhagen. Git Merge, taking place in New York City on April 5, is a premier Git conference featuring technical content and workshops aimed at Git users of all expertise levels, with a focus on elevating new community voices and showcasing innovative projects. GitHub Satellite on May 11 in Amsterdam marks the first European conference in the GitHub Universe series, highlighting how the community addresses modern development challenges beyond code. CodeConf, scheduled for June 27-29 in Los Angeles, is a two-day event dedicated to the open-source community, focusing on best practices in open source, documentation, community building, and technical innovation. GitHub Universe will return to San Francisco on September 14-15, celebrating technologists and developers, and promising to build on the success of the previous year’s event by featuring impactful technologies and innovative software development discussions. For ongoing updates, attendees are encouraged to follow GitHub's official Twitter account.

GitHub has introduced a new Markdown text-formatting toolbar across all comment fields, simplifying the text formatting process for users regardless of their familiarity with Markdown syntax. This toolbar provides a streamlined set of tools that enhance text formatting by allowing users to effortlessly add links, headers, italics, and lists without requiring in-depth knowledge of Markdown. Additionally, it integrates GitHub-specific features such as @mentions for involving additional users or teams, issue and pull request links for cross-referencing discussions, and task lists for tracking tasks, all accessible with a single click. This development aims to make writing on GitHub accessible and expressive for both beginners and experienced users.

An upcoming Patchwork hack night is scheduled for January 29, 2016, co-hosted by GitHub and Silversquare Coworking in Brussels, aimed at beginners interested in learning Git and GitHub. The event promises a casual and informal atmosphere where participants can engage in a hands-on workshop, working through the Git-It tutorial with guidance from GitHub staff and local community mentors. Attendees will learn to use Git on the command line, with no prior coding experience required, and will have the opportunity to make new friends and leave with a merged pull request and increased confidence in contributing to the open-source community. GitHub mentors who have had their pull requests merged are encouraged to participate and assist newcomers. The event is wheelchair-accessible, and participants are asked to RSVP and create a GitHub account before attending. Food and refreshments will be provided, and attendees with food allergies are encouraged to notify organizers during registration.

Patchwork hack night is an event designed for beginners to learn Git and GitHub through a hands-on, self-directed workshop, taking place on January 25 at the London School of Economics. Hosted by GitHub staff and local community mentors, the event aims to guide participants through the Hello World tutorial and help them achieve their first merged pull request, fostering confidence to engage further with the open-source community. The atmosphere is casual and supportive, encouraging participants to learn at their own pace with assistance available from mentors. Attendees will also have the opportunity to network and make new friends while enjoying provided snacks and refreshments, with the venue being wheelchair-accessible. Prior registration is required, and participants are encouraged to create a free GitHub account before attending.

Ladies that UX Amsterdam is hosting a meetup in January to provide a platform for women in UX and the broader tech community to share experiences and gain support. The event, which will feature snacks, drinks, and a talk by GitHub's @amosie, is co-hosted by the Amsterdam chapter's founders, Jenny Shen and Nadia Udalova, alongside GitHub contributors. Scheduled for January 13, 2016, at WeWork in Amsterdam, the meetup aims to foster engagement and inspiration among attendees and marks a milestone for the rapidly growing chapter that began in the summer. Attendees are encouraged to RSVP and explore the intersection of design and code.

Git 2.7.0 brings several enhancements and new features, including more flexible naming for the git bisect tool, which now allows users to use custom terms instead of the default "good" and "bad" to mark revisions, making it easier to track various types of changes. The update also introduces a new configuration setting for the --recurse-submodules option, designed to streamline the process of incorporating changes from submodules into the main module. Improvements to the git worktree command now allow for listing linked worktrees and cloning from a linked worktree, while git p4 has been upgraded to support Git LFS for handling large files between Git and Perforce. A more uniform interface for listing references across various commands has been established, all gaining new formatting and sorting options. Additional enhancements include improved git stash and git blame functionalities, better appearance of gitk on high-DPI monitors, and critical security fixes to prevent integer overflows and limit submodule recursive fetches to safe protocols. The release culminates with over 800 commits from 81 contributors, demonstrating a robust effort to refine and secure Git's capabilities.