DEV Community

Why Git Fork Is My Favorite Git Client

Chad Adams on November 28, 2019

Git Fork Git Fork is "a fast and friendly git client for Mac and Windows". Before I start I just wanted to say. I'm not affiliated ...

Read full post

Pierre-Adrien Buisson • Nov 28 '19

My favorite git client is the command-line one tig. Very lightweight, I mainly use it to select the specific chunks of a file I want to commit, and since it's a console tool, it does not disrupt my terminal/neovim workflow: github.com/jonas/tig

Travis J. Terrell • Feb 18 '20 • Edited

Fork is my current fav too when I want to use a GUI. I used to be a big fan of GitKraken, particularly for it's beautiful interface and merge tool. However, once they started charging to use it with a non-GitHub repo, I knew it was time to find an alternative. After trying 5 or 6, Fork was the clear winner.

The only thing I miss from GitKraken is the built-in conflict resolution tool. I use P4Merge now, and am happy with it. While it is more powerful, it does lacks the simplicity and nice design of GitKraken's. With any luck, I'll figure out how to unlock Fork's!

However, I saw that your screenshot shows an internal merge tool! I swear I've clicked the Merge button (which no longer says 'beta') before and was just given the default textual git merge with the comments. After seeing this post, I just tried it again, and I'll be damned if it didn't provide a nice merge tool! I'm thrilled. Thank you so much!

Chad Adams • Feb 18 '20

Can’t agree more. Yeah the built in merge tool is new it’s not as nice as GitKrakens. Since I do a lot of web development I use Visual Studio Code for the merge conflict resolver. I found that to work the best for me.

Frédéric G. MARAND • Mar 25 '21

My favorites are gitk when a UI is available and tig otherwise. Sure, fork looks nicer, but gitk is much faster to start, and I find it's display to be more understandable, not sure exactly why. The main problem being that on most recent versions of macOS, it crashes within wish, so it's usually fork (for complex repos) or tig (for speed) anyway.

Gaurang Parmar • Feb 26 '20

They are about start charging $49.99 very soon. Details pricing and features not yet released so not sure

David Rock • Mar 2 '20

I just saw that too. I hope they won't do the same of gitkraken.

Kokuyo • Nov 30 '20

The $49.99 is a one time fee at least, and it's free for evaluation. So that's still a plus over GitKraken's yearly subscription pricing model for me.

Sorin Sbarnea • May 13 '21 • Edited

While Fork is cool keep in mind is not open-source. Based on previous experience with more than a dozen of git gui clients, anything not open-source will only become more expensive with time. I would gladly sponsor it if it was an open-source and even contribute with fixes. Meanwhile SourceTree is open but it lacks behind, especially as Atlassian did not spend much effort on it after they acquired it.

Chad Adams • May 13 '21

This post was written almost 2 years ago. I use the built in git from VSCode now. At least for me it does everything I need it to and I don’t have to leave my code editor.

SourceTree was the first Git GUI I used but it was very buggy and slow for me.

As far as Fork becoming more expensive, sure everything does. Fork used to be free the only reason they made people pay for it was because so many people were telling them they should make people pay for it. At least it will help support them. It’s only a man and his wife making it. This was before GitHub sponsers came out.