GitHub is a great tool for researchers and writers. Here's why.
GitHub is a tool that helps you keep track of revisions in your files and share your work with others.
It's not just for software development. GitHub can version just about any type of file - including text, LaTeX, CSV and 3D graphics.
There is a desktop client for Mac or Windows that you can use to manage your files. There are also tools like Flashbake, which automates backup in the background, letting you use the editor of your choice.
You can also just do everything from your web browser (including zen writing mode, which is pretty damn cool).
It's for people who...
- create files
- that change
- (sometimes) working with other people
- (sometimes) to share with other people
There are project management features built in:
- set milestones with due dates
- create issues (you can use this to create a research to-do list)
- assign issues to people
- track your progress by connecting an issue's resolution to a file revision
Repositories ("repos") are collections of files.
Any public repositories are free. Private repos are cheap. There are discounts and free private repos for educational users.
You can also add a license to your public content.
people:
- Loren Burton: CV, teaching materials
- Andrew Famiglietti: syllabi, teaching materials
- John Fink: presentations
- Konrad Lawson: notes, dissertation, presentations
- Tim Lockridge: course materials, presentations
- Lincoln Mullen: R scripts, syllabi, CV, ebook, dissertation
- David Parry: syllabi
- Eric Phetteplace: presentations, research study, snippets
- Matthew Reidsma: articles, presentations
- Lisa Rhody: lesson plans
- Nick Ruest: conference notes
- Kris Shaffer: articles, presentations
- Audrey Watters: white papers, CV, guides, syllabi
- Andromeda Yelton: conference organization, course materials
- Elliott Hauser: 'Professor Jekyll' project for teaching Github
groups:
- GirlDevelopIt: curriculum
- Mozilla Software Carpentry: curriculum
- Church Music Association of America
- Quick, digestible GitHub for Academics presentation from Kris Shaffer. If you look at nothing else, look at this.
- GitHub for academics full blog post
- GitHub for writers Really nice overview from Loren Burton
- ProfHacker: Resources for learning Git and GitHub
- Other ProfHacker posts on GitHub
- David Parry: My new way of handling teaching materials
- Lullabot: Project management with GitHub
GitHub is based on Git, which is free and open source. GitHub is not Git, and Git is not GitHub. GitHub is closed source and but one option of many for hosting your repos. For larger projects, it's worth diving into Git, rather than relying on GitHub. Why switch to Git?