AutoMapper source moved to GitHub
After putting it through the paces, I’m ready to (finally) announce that the AutoMapper source code has moved to GitHub:
https://github.com/jbogard/AutoMapper
I wanted to wait to “officially” move until I had moved the build over, added new features and processed a few pull requests. For dealing with OSS projects, I really can’t imagine using SVN again, as pull requests and git merges are so much easier than dealing with patch files. Additionally, the branching model of git made my life much, much easier to deal with support requests and bug reports. Git simply and easily supports all the workflows I need to provide a good experience to those using my project, from me adding new features to getting support questions answered quickly and easily.
So can do you contribute? First, check out Jason’s git for Windows developers post:
Next, get over to github and create an account:
Finally, you can check out a few great resources on how to use git and contribute on github:
I really wanted to make sure that the move wasn’t just done to satisfy some personal interest in learning git. But after spending the past few months with AutoMapper on github, it’s just been a much better OSS experience than I had with SVN, and the move can only benefit the project.
Remember, with git, branching is easy and in fact, encouraged!
Moving the codebase
Actually moving the codebase on GitHub was very easy. GitHub supports migration from SVN, including commit history. GitHub walked me through the process, and all I really needed to do was paste in the SVN url. GitHub did the rest.
The only other semi-difficult piece was to change the CI build on teamcity.codebetter.com. Originally, the version number was populated from the SVN revision number. Since git uses hashes for commits, I had to pick a different method. Instead, I now use the build number in the version number from the TeamCity build. All in all, it took all of about 5 minutes to move the source, and around an hour to rework the build script and get a new build going on TeamCity to point to GitHub instead of SVN.
I was quite apprehensive at first about moving, but it was so ridiculously easy, I couldn’t imagine keeping an OSS project on SVN.
As a side note to other OSS project owners, please please PLEASE get off SVN or any other centralized VCS. It’s not a good model for OSS development. Distributed VCS is the platform to host on going forward.