Version control repository management has got a pivotal role to play in the software development workflow. In the recent past, Github and Gitlab positioned themselves as handy assistants for developers, significantly operating in giant groups. With the launch of Gitlab 10.0, Gitlab propelled enormously from code management to deployment and monitoring. They look forward to capturing the entire software development, deployment, and DevOps market.
Github
Github is a web-based Git repository manager that provides a notable contribution in the larger working group. Github leads the software development platform with about 37 million users and more than 100 million repositories. Their huge community is highly active and supportive. On the platform side, you can assign tasks, conduct reviews and discuss ideas in Github via pull requests. As changes happen to your repository, you can use diffs to compare different versions of source code. Meanwhile, you can also play Blackjack online.
With Github, branch permissions limit who can push to a specific branch. Repositories can be set to require to pull request reviews and status checks, further helping to reduce errors. In addition, Github offers a great desktop app for easily managing your local device and pushing changes without needing to fire up your browser.
Gitlab
Gitlab is a web-based Git repository manager developed for team collaboration. The platform includes shared runners so you can use the built-in Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery. Commit graph and reporting tools can be used to gauge the work performance of collaborators. Milestones in Gitlab offer a method of tracking issues and merge requests created to achieve a high-level goal. You can create and manage milestones across projects.
You can define filters for any property to quickly find what you need. You can also move issues between projects while retaining all links, history, and comments. Gitlab streamlines community contributions by allowing patches from upstream maintainers in a branch. That reduces the back and forth that would happen otherwise.
Authentication levels
With Gitlab, you can set and modify user’s permissions based on their role. In Github, you can determine if someone gets a read or write access to a repository. With Gitlab, you can grant access to the issue tracker without giving permission to the source code. This is absolutely impressive for larger teams and enterprises with role-based contributors.
Built-in CI/CD
One of the key differences between Gitlab and Github is the built-in Continuous Integration/Delivery of Gitlab. CI is a huge time saver for many development teams and a great way of QA. Gitlab provided its own CI for free. Gitlab is also moving towards the topic of Auto CI and how to automatically run CI/CD without a human being actually setting it up. While Github offers various third-party integrations for running and testing your code. But there are no in-built CI solutions at the moment.
Issue tracking
Both Gitlab and Github offer a simple issue tracker that allows you to change status and assignee for multiple issues at the same time. Both are excellent issue trackers where your developers enjoy the great issue tracking interface of Gitlab and Github. Bug reports and user feedback can instantly be sent to Github and Gitlab
Indubitably, Github is still the most popular git repository with the largest number of users and projects. However, Gitlab is doing a fantastic job offering your entire development teams great tools for more efficient workflows. Solo developers who are looking for a free code-hosting platform can try out both and decide which one suits them best.