Git keeps a project's history on your own computer. GitHub puts that project online, so your whole team (or the whole world) can work on it.
Git on its own is like a scrapbook of every version of your project, kept on your desk. Useful, but nobody else can see it.
GitHub is a huge library for those scrapbooks. It stores Git projects online, so a team can share one project, see each other’s changes and work on it together from anywhere.
What people use it for
- keeping a safe copy of their project online
- checking each other's changes before they go in (pull requests)
- tracking bugs and ideas in one place
- sharing open-source projects with the world
Private or public
A project on GitHub can be private (only people you invite) or public (anyone can read it). Many of the tools the internet runs on are public projects on GitHub, built by volunteers and companies together.
What it isn’t
It isn’t Git. Git is the tool that keeps the history. GitHub is a website built around Git, owned by Microsoft.
Where the comparison breaks down
In a library you borrow a book and give it back. On GitHub, everyone works on copies of the same project at once. Git keeps all those copies in step.
How the words fit together
Git keeps the history. GitHub keeps it online for a team. A pull request asks for a check before merging. A fork is your own copy of someone else’s project.
GitHub isn't the only one. GitLab and Bitbucket do much the same job. They all store Git projects, so moving between them is fairly easy.
When you'll hear it
“It's on GitHub.” The project and its full history are stored on GitHub, so others can get them.
“Open a PR.” Create a pull request, asking others to check your changes before they're merged.
“Is it open source?” Is the project public, so anyone can read and reuse the code?
“Who has access to our GitHub? Should anyone be removed?”
Try it yourselfReady to use it? The exact commands are on my other site, devcmds: Create an SSH key and add it to GitHub ↗
