Git is a version control tool. It lives on your computer (is local), and is accessed through the command line.
Above, you can see different versions of the GCDRI's apply webpage over time. Starting from when Keith copied everything over from the repo for our old GCDRB (GC Digital Research Bootcamp) website, to fixing broken links, making stylistic tweaks, adding the new application form, and finally closing applications. Each version is logged here.
Git tracks changes when the user tells it to git add a file, and git commit logs the different versions you see here. When you git add and git commit, all these files live in the .git repository on your computer.
Git is the local power behind version control.
Github is a hosting service for git repositories. You must first set up an account and configure it on your computer. Once your local git repository and a remote GitHub are connected, you can make copies of other users' repositories from GitHub, edit them, and send your proposed changes back to the GitHub repo so that the person who owns that repo can choose to incorporate your changes into their repository.
Github connects Git repositories remotely and is the power behind collaboration.
If you have not signed up for a GitHub account, go to http://github.com/. Remember to save your user name, email, and password as you will need this information twice more!
Markdown is a markup language for formatting text. Unlike HTML, markdown is designed to be human-readable, which makes it much easier to write and edit.
You can think of markdown as a language read by many platforms and sites, including GitHub, to style text. Since markdown is plain text, it's also arguably more sustainable and accessible than formats like .docx. . You'll notice this file is in markdown--check out its extension!
To help you format your text (use markdown to translate plain to pizzazz), try this cheat-sheet: GitHub Markdown Cheatsheet. I used it as a reference to create this repo. It is also appended to the bottom of the README.md file for quick access.
For more: Dennis Tenen and Grant Wythoff, "Sustainable Authorship in Plain Text Using Pandoc and Markdown."
Glossary ~ ~ ~ Helpful commands