GitHub

What is GitHub?

• A cloud platform for collaborative software development
• Key features of GitHub:
  • Remote repositories using Git
  • Pull requests (PR)
  • Issues
  • Wikis, Pages, etc.

Pull Request (PR)

• A pull request is a request to merge changes from a feature branch to the main branch on GitHub
  • Note: PR is not a Git command, but a GitHub feature
• PR makes the merge process easier and safer than the git merge locally
• Advantages of PRs
  • Code review
  • Discussion on the changes
  • Conflict detection
  • Integration with issues (tracability of changes)

GitHub Flow

• A standard workflow for softwre develpment with Git/GitHub
• Branch rules
  • The main branch should always be deployable.
  • Code changes are made in a feature branch, created from the main branch.
    • For enhancements: feature/xxx
    • For bug fixes: fix/xxx
• The feature branch is pushed to GitHub and a pull request (PR) is created.
• The PR is reviewed, approved and merged into the main branch.

GitHub Action

• GitHub Actions is a feature to automate workflows for software development.
• It can run tests, build and deploy the software, and more.
• Workflows are defined by a YAML file in the .github/workflows directory of the repository
• Triggers can include: push events, pull request, issue changes, etc.

Example of GitHub Action YAML file

name: Run Tests and Build
on:
  push:
    branches:
      - main # Trigger on push to main branch
  pull_request:
    branches:
      - main # Trigger on pull request to main branch

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest # Use the latest Ubuntu runner (virtual environment)
    steps:
      - name: Checkout code
        uses: actions/checkout@v2 # Checkout the code from the repository..
      - name: Set up Go
        uses: actions/setup-go@v2 # Set up Go environment
    ...

GitHub Issues

• GitHub Issues are used to track bugs, enhancements, and tasks.
• Issues can be assigned, labeled, commented, and organized with milestones.
• Issues can be linked to PRs to ensure traceability.

CD/CI (Continuous Deployment/Integration)

• A software development practice to automate the software development process
• CD: Continuous Deployment
  • Automatically build and test the code when changes are pushed.
• CI: Continuous Integration
  • Automatically deploy the application after the code is merged into the main branch.
• GitHub Actions can be used to implement CD/CI

Note: CD/CI can also be implemented with other platforms such as Jenkins, Travis CI, CircleCI, etc.

Summary

• GitHub is a cloud platform for collaborative software development
• Pull requests are used to review and merge code into the main branch
• GitHub Flow is a standard workflow for team-based development
• GitHub Actions automate testing and deployment workflows
• GitHub Issues help manage tasks and changes

CD/CI cannot be implemented without a platform such as GitHub and other tools.