Looking to make its GitHub social coding and coding-hosting site easier to use for Windows application builders, GitHub beginning on Monday will offer a native graphical Windows client for developers and designers.
The client serves as a Windows desktop application intended to address the challenges of developing on Windows in GitHub, which is based on the popular Git version control system. "Up until now, developers have had to use the command line interface of Git, which is sort of outside their normal workflow," said Tom Preston-Werner, GitHub CTO and founder. "The command line isn't a very good experience on Windows and Windows developers aren't used to working that way."
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The free client will work with the cloud-based version of GitHub or GitHub Enterprise, which runs behind enterprise firewalls. Developers can collaborate on open source and private repositories via GitHub, which also enables the management of large teams, bug- and change-tracking, and maintaining conversation strands about code reviews.
Microsoft has participated in development of the client, offering more than 150 beta testers to try it out. Developers can download the Windows client at windows.github.com. GitHub previously has offered a client for Mac systems. More than 1.6 million developers use GitHub services, GitHub said.
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