Code review can be a bit of a recipe for drama. There was a large-ish amount of drama in a close project quite recently that stemmed from patch review, and it got me thinking about how we handle this in free software.

In free software code review, along with other practices that we call “agile practices” (such as continuous integration, unit testing, behavior driven design, test driven development) is a relatively new thing in some projects, especially those on the desktop stack.

If you’re a designer or developer, you’ve probably heard about Git, and you might know that it has become immensely popular, especially among the open source community. Though it may seem cryptic at first, this version control system could change the way you work with text, whether you’re writing code, or a novel.

This article covers why version control is important, how to install the Git version control system, and how to get started with your first repository. Once you start using Git, you’ll want to throw everything into it, from full-blown apps to blog post drafts, because it’s so easy and versatile.