I’ve been out of version control for a bit, and GitHub itself for quite a bit longer, but this part was interesting to me:
> Because: It isn't really about Git anymore. GitHub used to be a Git repository hosting company. But now, they are about providing other software development and management infrastructure that augments the version control. They might as well change their name to Hub at this point.
Just for added color: starting around 2010 or 2011 or so (around when we added Subversion to GitHub), we had a pretty solid idea that version control wasn’t “the thing”. Mostly because Mercurial was a strong alternative, and there always felt like there might be something new in the wings that could dominate in the next few years. Version control felt really dynamic, and deeply susceptible to change. And if something was better, we’d totally ditch Git for the new thing. The name was a bit of a misnomer, from that perspective.
I think that changed over time — I had a hell of a time trying to get movement on basic version control improvements back in 2014 — and now they’re clearly much more about the ecosystem rather than version control itself. It’s where the money is, of course, but it’s also where the bigger innovation is, at least for the time being.
I think the author is right to say that Microsoft is targeting a different area than version control specifically, though you could argue if the outcome of that is good or bad. It’s certainly different, though- they’re especially growing headcount right now, and the company makeup is wildly different than what many customers tend think it is today, imo.