I read the free version of the book available from the Git web site. As an introduction and guide to Git, this is a pretty good book. The diagram notation the author uses, while a bit complex, captures what is going on. And the chapter on Git Internals is interesting, though wisely left to the end. The spends a lot of time discussing how to use Git in the context of various workflows, which is great. The author would have done better by saying less in the initial chapter that compares Git with other VCSs. Yes, Git does certain things differently. In some (if not many) cases, that way is better. But it isn't always. Subversion (especially newer versions) might be the right tool for some jobs. And overdoing the distribution and branching facilities of git can easily get a team in trouble. So great book on how and when to use Git. Not so great as a sales vehicle for the tool. There's a lot of good information in this book. It's fine technically, but it starts off a little wonky.All the diagrams have arrows pointed backwards (pointing left to the older commit), which is super confusing. I'm guessing he meant that the arrow means "this commit's parent" but it's super weird his brain would ever work like that, eg against how every culture in humanity views time.For most of the book he actually spells out the short commit hash in every diagram. Again, super confusing, and annoying when you're trying to track which commit he's referring to in the text. You have to go back and forth between text and diagram, comparing hashes until you find the two that match. Around page 140 he finally gets it and says "for brevity, we're going to call this commit A." He should have been doing this the whole time.Most of the book is dry and boring. Only near the end does he find his voice and start telling us some things a human might actually say, like "now git will yell at you" or "how to make git angry."All that said, I did learn a lot. Git commit hooks, config options, log and diff syntax, and how git handles things under the hood.
What do You think about The Git Community Book (2000)?
Nice material, but I find myself not reading it to much to warrant keeping it around.
—Ryleigh
Very helpful for understanding some of the functionality and concepts of Git.
—chasky
