Geek Time with Junio C Hamano

Junio C Hamano is a software engineer in the Google Open Source Programs Office who works on the open source project Git. Git is an increasingly popular distributed version control system that is used by many open source projects including Android, Chrome OS, and the Linux kernel. Jun is the maintainer and one of the primary authors of Git, with 4426 commits!

Jeremy Allison, co-creator of Samba and fellow Open Source Programs Office team member, recently sat down with Jun for some quality Geek Time. Samba uses Git, so there was plenty to talk about! Here are some highlights:

• Jun and Jeremy discuss how Jun began working on open source after the maintainer of GNU’s source control system RCS, Paul Eggert, began mentoring him. (0:56)

• Jun explains why he prefers working within the open source software development model. (2:50)

• Jeremy asks Jun how he became interested and involved with Git. (3:27)

• When Jun first started working on Git, he had to balance his time between working on an open source project with a day job. Jun reveals his secret for making this balance work, and also how he eventually integrated Git into his day job. (7:00)

• Jun and Jeremy discuss the growing popularity of Git in comparison to older version control systems, and Jun gives an overview of some of Git’s features that set it apart. (9:28)

• Jeremy shares his one criticism of Git, which is that it’s hard to use. Jun responds and offers some suggestions for those who are new to Git. (12:48)

• Jun reveals some longer-term goals for Git as well as some new developments for future releases. (17:44)

• Jeremy asks Jun how he ended up at Google and they talk about Git’s growing role within Google. (19:24)

• Jun gives advice to developers who are new to open source and want to get involved. (21:50)

By Ellen Ko, Open Source Team