May 2017 Summaries

GitHub recently overhauled its DNS infrastructure to address scalability, visibility, and operational challenges, transitioning from a simple system to a robust, modern architecture designed to support its growth across multiple data centers. The previous system, which involved local DNS caches and a pair of hosts acting as both caches and authorities, faced issues with performance, availability, and lack of metrics, making it difficult to troubleshoot and scale. The new design introduces a tiered architecture with isolated roles for caches, edges, and authorities, each serving distinct functions to improve resolution speed and reliability. The caches act as recursive resolvers, the edges serve as regional hosts for external connectivity, and the authorities manage DNS data and API access. This setup enhances observability with detailed metrics and logging, implemented using Unbound, NSD, and PowerDNS, and supports both internal and external zones, ensuring resilience during connectivity issues. Additionally, the new system allows for a deploy-based workflow and automated API-driven changes, facilitating operations without external dependencies and providing flexibility for future scalability. This transformation not only addresses previous operational issues but also prepares GitHub's DNS infrastructure for continued growth and stability.

The GitHub Training Team now offers live, virtual private classes that bring their classroom experience directly to developers' laptops, catering to all experience levels and allowing teams to learn from anywhere in the world. These classes are designed for distributed teams, with a maximum of 20 participants per session to ensure personalized attention, though multiple concurrent sessions can be arranged for larger groups. Conducted over four 75-minute sessions via Zoom, the classes focus on hands-on practice with fundamental Git and GitHub concepts, such as Git reset and merge conflicts. Participants benefit from post-class follow-up appointments for personalized assistance. For those who prefer not to schedule private sessions, GitHub also offers monthly public classes that individuals and small teams can join, providing a premium learning experience with flexible registration options.

Interaction limits provide a way for maintainers to manage heated discussions in issues or pull requests by temporarily restricting who can comment, create pull requests, and open issues to existing users, collaborators, and prior contributors. These limits automatically expire after 24 hours, allowing normal participation to resume. This feature, accessible under the Settings tab of any repository owned, serves as a tool to foster healthy and reasoned collaboration among team members.

Mikaela Marciales, a student at Lowell High School in San Francisco, finds joy and self-expression in her AP computer science projects, thanks to the innovative teaching methods of her instructor, Art Simon. Simon emphasizes creative and personalized project assignments, allowing students to infuse personal touches into their work, which fosters engagement and understanding. He introduces complex programming concepts like recursion through tangible examples such as fractals, sparking curiosity and linking them to natural patterns. Simon's approach also makes cheating difficult, as students are encouraged to create unique projects, seek peer input, and build on programming concepts using a milestone-based structure. Mikaela's experience in Simon's class has inspired her to pursue further computer science opportunities, including an after-school program and a future engineering internship. Simon shares his teaching resources on platforms like The College Board’s AP Community and GitHub Pages, supporting other educators in their efforts to integrate creativity into computer science education.

GitHub Universe is set to take place on October 10-12 at Pier 70 in San Francisco, offering an early bird ticket option priced at $399 until August 1, which includes access to keynotes, featured talks, breakout sessions, and an after-party. The event invites speaker proposals for breakout sessions focusing on four main themes: Code, Architecture, Operations, and People, emphasizing the technical, operational, and human aspects of software development. Participants can also engage in hands-on workshops conducted by GitHub's Training Team to enhance their experience. The conference aims to explore the latest in programming languages, frameworks, distributed systems, and collaborative practices, providing a platform for developers to share stories and insights, irrespective of their experience level.

The new project card filtering feature enhances the efficiency of navigating large projects on GitHub by allowing users to quickly locate specific cards through a filter box, regardless of the project's size or the number of contributors. Users can type the card title directly into the filter box for quick access or utilize qualifiers to narrow down cards by aspects such as label or author. These qualifiers offer powerful filtering capabilities, enabling tasks like viewing all cards assigned to a specific user with a simple input. For further details on utilizing GitHub project boards, users are directed to consult the documentation.

GitHub is enhancing its offerings to streamline and personalize workflows through several new tools and updates, building on previous launches. The GitHub Marketplace allows developers to easily discover and integrate tools like Travis CI and Sentry into their workflows without the hassle of multiple accounts. GitHub Apps, now out of pre-release, provide developers with refined control by allowing them to perform actions directly through the API with specific permissions. The newly released GitHub GraphQL API offers enhanced data access, enabling users to request precise data in real time. Additional updates include a new Git and GitHub integration for Atom, providing seamless access to GitHub workflows, and the open-source GitHub Desktop Beta built on Electron, which offers a cross-platform experience and customization opportunities. These advancements reflect GitHub's ongoing commitment to AI integration and developer-first operations, spearheaded by COO Kyle Daigle, who brings extensive experience in engineering and product leadership to the company's growth and innovation strategies.

Satellite, a major European conference, is set to take place in London with notable speakers such as Amy Dickens, a GitHub Campus Expert and PhD student researching gesture-controlled sound for users with complex disabilities, and Jacob Tomlinson, a Lead Engineer at the Met Office Informatics Lab. Amy Dickens began her development career in audio programming and is passionate about promoting gender equality in tech through community-building projects, while she faces challenges with sensors and machine learning for her research. Jacob Tomlinson's career was sparked by a fascination with web development, and he now works on the Jade project to create scalable data processing systems for environmental scientists, alongside developing a Python chatbot framework called opsdroid. Both speakers express enthusiasm for collaboration and innovation, although they encounter challenges such as processing large volumes of data and advancing machine learning techniques.

Open source enthusiasts will gather in Seattle from July 11-13 for CodeConf and ElectronConf, two consecutive conferences focusing on different aspects of open source development. CodeConf, held on July 11-12, will delve into open source technologies with over 30 sessions exploring advancements in browser engines and extending beyond web into native mobile and desktop software development. Attendees can benefit from early bird pricing and are encouraged to apply as speakers to share their insights and experiences. Following CodeConf, ElectronConf on July 12-13 will concentrate on the Electron framework, offering a workshop and single-track conference designed to unite the Electron community to exchange best practices and explore future developments. Both events provide opportunities for developers to learn, network, and contribute to the open source community through interactive sessions, talks, and workshops.

The Atom team has released a GitHub package for Atom, enabling users to perform Git operations directly within the editor, such as staging changes, making commits, and resolving merge conflicts. Initially utilizing Nodegit, the team transitioned to shelling out to Git for better access to the full range of Git commands and features, despite some performance trade-offs. They developed a minimal Git package called dugite-native and optimized performance by parallelizing operations and using a WorkerManager to manage Git commands in separate processes, preventing UI freezes. Future plans include upgrading to Electron v1.6.x for further optimizations and enhancing Git features and GitHub integration within Atom to improve user experience.

GitHub has released a new beta version of GitHub Desktop, rewritten using Electron, a framework that allows web developers to create desktop applications with web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. The decision to rewrite the application arose from the challenges of maintaining separate codebases for macOS and Windows, which required duplicative efforts and hindered scalability, especially if Linux support was to be added. By leveraging Electron, GitHub aims to unify its codebase and streamline development across platforms, despite the trade-offs involved in shifting from native to web-based applications, such as differing user expectations and platform-specific behaviors. The team chose TypeScript for its expressive type system and strong community support, facilitating a more efficient development process with faster feedback cycles compared to native app development. This transition allows for rapid iteration and innovation, aligning with the broader industry trend of investing in web technologies. The GitHub Desktop team encourages users to engage with the beta, provide feedback, and participate in its ongoing development.

GitHub is enhancing its desktop experience with two significant releases: a new version of Atom featuring Git and GitHub integration, and the redesigned GitHub Desktop Beta built on Electron. These updates aim to streamline workflows and boost productivity by allowing developers to perform common Git operations directly within Atom's UI, thus reducing the need to switch to other interfaces. Atom has integrated Git to enable seamless code staging, committing, branch switching, and merge conflict resolution. Meanwhile, GitHub Desktop Beta offers a simplified and open-source platform for managing GitHub projects without relying on the command line, making it accessible for both novice and experienced developers. The new Desktop Beta provides early access to features before they are officially launched and is open for community feedback and contributions, allowing users to tailor and enhance the app's functionality.

Git 2.13.0, the latest release of the open-source Git project, introduces numerous enhancements and fixes contributed by over 65 developers. A significant security update addresses a vulnerability in the git shell program that affects specific hosting server configurations, though GitHub.com and GitHub Enterprise remain unaffected. The update notably includes a collision-detecting SHA-1 implementation to safeguard against potential attacks, albeit with a minor performance trade-off. The release also enhances pathspec functionality, making it more user-friendly with new shortcuts for exclusion patterns and support for gitattributes-based file selection. Moreover, Git 2.13 brings conditional configuration includes, enabling users to set different configuration options based on the repository path. Additional improvements include the default decoration of commits in git log, the ability to format git branch output, and improved handling of submodules and repository discovery. This release comprises over 700 commits, reflecting the continuous efforts of the Git community to refine the tool's capabilities.

GitHub is organizing its first-ever conference in Japan, named Constellation Tokyo, on June 6, featuring sessions and networking opportunities with the GitHub team and the local community. The event aims to showcase how Japanese teams are integrating GitHub to enhance the developer experience and includes interactions with open-source contributors. Attendees will receive updates on GitHub's future plans and have the chance to network and gain new insights for improving collaboration with their teams and the open-source community. A pre-conference community meetup is scheduled for June 5 at SuperDeluxe, offering talks on open source and community management, along with socializing opportunities.

GitHub is offering a limited-time 50% discount on tickets for its two major conferences, Satellite and Universe, when purchased together. Satellite will take place in London on May 22-23, featuring talks, workshops, and events focused on the latest developments from GitHub and the software community. Universe, GitHub's flagship conference, will follow in San Francisco on October 10-12, providing an opportunity to continue the discussions and build on the insights gained from Satellite. The offer, designed to provide a comprehensive GitHub event experience, is available until May 22, encouraging attendees to engage with products, partners, and the broader community.

Ahead of Pride Month, GitHub is launching a new shirt inspired by the LGBTQ tech community, which will be available in their shop until September 30. The proceeds from the sales will support various organizations that empower LGBTQ communities. This includes BreakOUT!, which aims to end the criminalization of LGBTQ youth in New Orleans through organizing and leadership development; Communities United Against Violence in San Francisco, which provides support and advocacy for low-income LGBTQ individuals facing violence; Familia: Trans Queer Liberation Movement, focused on organizing the trans and queer Latin community in the U.S. against deportations and detention; Gladt e.V. in Germany, which offers support to queer immigrants and refugees of color; and alQaws in Palestine, which builds community and advocates for gender and sexual diversity. The shirt is designed to celebrate Pride with a colorful touch of code, offering a unique way for supporters to wear their values.

GitHub invites attendees to visit their booth at OSCON, where they will host Open Source Alley, a dedicated space for open source projects, along with demonstrations and presentations from various open source maintainers. Notable projects featured include Exercism, Operation Code, Salt, Hospital Run, Botkit, Homebrew, Keep a Changelog, Hugo, Beeware, Appium, Open Collective, Mimic, and Zulip, each offering unique solutions ranging from code education to infrastructure management. GitHub engineers and product leaders will also give talks on topics like infrastructure management with Terraform, API development with GraphQL, microservices, and community building on GitHub. Visitors can engage with maintainers, learn about open source projects, and discover opportunities for involvement, all while benefiting from the presence of GitHub experts who are eager to connect and share insights.

The Satellite conference offers a diverse array of activities beyond its 14 sessions and two keynotes, encouraging attendees to engage in socializing, workshops, and after-parties. Participants can interact with GitHub experts through complimentary consultations, fostering an opportunity to enhance their GitHub skills and knowledge. The event also emphasizes community-building, allowing developers to connect with peers and service providers amidst art installations and recharge lounges. The festivities continue with an after-party at Hawker House, featuring food stands and games. On the second day, attendees can participate in hands-on workshops for an additional fee, covering topics such as IoT automation and chatbot creation, though space is limited and early registration is advised.

GitHub has introduced a new repository deletion setting for organization owners, allowing them to control who can delete repositories. This feature is available for all GitHub-hosted plans and is set to be included in the upcoming GitHub Enterprise release. By default, organization members with admin permissions can delete repositories, but if the setting is disabled, only organization owners have this capability. The next GitHub Enterprise release will also provide an appliance-level override, enabling only site administrators to delete repositories if the setting is turned off. Users will receive warnings when attempting to delete repositories, and further details are available in GitHub's help documentation.