For the last 5(?) years or so I have been using GitKraken as my daily git driver for a while. I use it at my job mostly and love the functionality. I still use git via command line but jumping into git bash is nice no matter what os I am currently using.
I mainly use it:
- To see what branches have been modified (same as git tree but updates itself).
- Hooks into other git hosting like codeberg/gitea/forgeo without any real work. Login is also super easy and built in. Oauth is built in.
- Git amend is a one click interface.
There is other niceties like issue tracking, easy auto-creation of branches, etc… that I personally don’t use all that much, but I can see the appeal.
The only real issue is the price. It used to be 30$ a year but now it’s over 100+. I would happily pay 30 a year or pay one time for a license…but over 100 is too much in my opinion. I may go back to using all command line if the price keeps going up.
Is there any open source tools that do something similar it’s the same look/feel?
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Probably not very similar, but Git Butler is very interesting. It adds its own layer of management so that you can have multiple branches “applied” to your working tree simultaneously. It’s helpful when you have multiple changes that should go into different branches, and some that shouldn’t be committed - it has a system of lanes that help keep track of all that. Or you can test how changes from two branches interact.
Last time I used it, maybe 6 months ago, it was rough around the edges so I didn’t stick with it. But they’ve done lots of work since then so I’m thinking of giving it another go. It is (last I checked) an all-in tool. When you’re using Butler on a project you probably won’t be able to use other git tools.
Git Fork is absolutely amazing. It has a good (unlimited) free trial but it is well worth the one time purchase too.
May not be the most popular choice, but I absolutely love Sublime Merge. Only issue I have is that it doesn’t support workspaces. But I love how it doesn’t abstract git away. Most actions in the UI are just called like the underlying git command, there are no non-git things like a “sync”. Plus you can always click on the top to see which commands exactly were executed and with what output. And it’s Sublime-typical wicked fast.
It’s an unlimited free trial with the dark mode disabled. License costs $100 and lasts for 3 years of updates.
I miss when Gitkraken used to be free. They nickel and dimed every feature they possibly could have
I’ve recently switched from Windows to Linux and generally I’m using Lazygit on the terminal or SourceGit on the desktop. SourceGit is by and large a very similar UI to Sourcetree but faster (and open source / cross platfrom)
SourceTree by Atlassian is great, I’ve used it for years and love it. It’s also free. They kind of push you into signing up for a BitBucket account, but it’s skippable. I think it checks all the boxes for the requirements you listed.
It’s sooo sloooow though.
Really? I hated SourceTree. It was the reason why I switched to GitKraken in the first place. Haven’t needed to use git in a few years now but especially when dealing with conflicts, GitKraken was just infinitely superior and sourcetree annoyingly barebones.
I think I found a good alternative https://github.com/sourcegit-scm/sourcegit
Playing around with it now.
The open alternatives don’t have particularly good UIs which was a massive perk of GitKraken.
These days I rely heavily on the Git UI within jetbrains various IDEs. If you’re working on open source projects then you can get a free license. Or they do educational discounts. If you’re using it commercially then it’s going to be roughly the same price as for Kraken but you get a best in class IDE included…
Wait gitkraken is getting a price hike? I haven’t received anything on email about this I think. Shit, I’ll look into it because if it is such a surge I might not be able to justify its price with my currency even if it is one of the few licensed apps I use. Dang, thanks for the heads up OP.
Lazygit
If you like Emacs, Magit is the best thing since sliced butter. Even if you don’t use Emacs, I would claim that Magit is a good enough reason to start doing so.
Seconding magit, emacs is an awesome ecosystem well worth learning, and magit is fantastic. I recommend doom emacs - the greatness of vim keybinds for editing with the greatness of the emacs ecosystem
The only Git GUIs that I’ve ever liked:
- GitX, and its many forks. Mac only though.
- Git Extensions. Terrible name, but this is actually a standalone Git GUI and is surprisingly decent. I think it started Windows only but maybe there’s a Linux port now.
- VSCode’s “Git Graph” extension. It’s not quite as fully featured but it integrates well into VSCode and is pretty nicely designed.
I’ve tried almost all the others (SmartGit, Sublime Merge, GitKraken, etc.), and didn’t really like how they worked.
