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  1. Stackups
  2. DevOps
  3. Version Control
  4. Version Control System
  5. Git vs Mercurial

Git vs Mercurial

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Git
Git
Stacks343.7K
Followers184.2K
Votes6.6K
GitHub Stars57.1K
Forks26.9K
Mercurial
Mercurial
Stacks229
Followers219
Votes105

Git vs Mercurial: What are the differences?

Git and Mercurial are both distributed version control systems (DVCS) that offer functionalities for managing source code. Here are the key differences between Git and Mercurial:

  1. Architecture: Git uses a content-addressable filesystem, where each file is identified by its content hash, and commits are represented as directed acyclic graphs. On the other hand, Mercurial uses a simpler model with changesets that directly track changes to files. This architectural difference impacts how they handle branching, merging, and storage efficiency.

  2. Performance: Git is known for its exceptional performance, especially when it comes to handling large repositories and performing operations like branching and merging. Mercurial, while still performant, may be slightly slower in certain operations due to its different architecture and algorithms.

  3. Learning Curve: Git has a steeper learning curve compared to Mercurial. Git's command-line interface and terminology can be initially challenging for new users. Mercurial, on the other hand, aims for a simpler and more intuitive command set, making it more approachable for beginners or those transitioning from other version control systems.

  4. Ecosystem and Adoption: Git has gained widespread adoption and has a larger ecosystem compared to Mercurial. It is the de facto standard for version control in many open-source projects and industry workflows. Git has an extensive collection of third-party tools, integrations, and hosting platforms like GitHub, GitLab, and Bitbucket. While Mercurial also has its ecosystem and hosting platforms like Bitbucket, it has a smaller community and user base overall.

  5. Windows Compatibility: Git has native support for Windows, making it a popular choice for developers working in Windows environments. Mercurial also supports Windows, but historically, Git has provided better compatibility and performance on this platform.

In summary, Git's widespread adoption and robust tooling make it a popular choice for many developers, while Mercurial's simpler command set and intuitive design may appeal to beginners or those looking for an alternative version control system.

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Advice on Git, Mercurial

Kamaldeep
Kamaldeep

CEO at Zhoustify Agency

Nov 13, 2020

Decided

SVN is much simpler than git for the simple stuff (checking in files and updating them when everyone's online), and much more complex than git for the complicated stuff (branching and merging). Or put another way, git's learning curve is steep up front, and then increases moderately as you do weird things; SVN's learning curve is very shallow up front and then increases rapidly.

If you're storing large files, if you're not branching, if you're not storing source code, and if your team is happy with SVN and the workflow you have, I'd say you should stay on SVN.

If you're writing source code with a relatively modern development practice (developers doing local builds and tests, pre-commit code reviews, preferably automated testing, preferably some amount of open-source code), you should move to git for two reasons: first, this style of working inherently requires frequent branching and merging, and second, your ability to interact with outside projects is easier if you're all comfortable with git instead of snapshotting the outside project into SVN.

83.3k views83.3k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

Git
Git
Mercurial
Mercurial

Git is a free and open source distributed version control system designed to handle everything from small to very large projects with speed and efficiency.

Mercurial is dedicated to speed and efficiency with a sane user interface. It is written in Python. Mercurial's implementation and data structures are designed to be fast. You can generate diffs between revisions, or jump back in time within seconds.

Statistics
GitHub Stars
57.1K
GitHub Stars
-
GitHub Forks
26.9K
GitHub Forks
-
Stacks
343.7K
Stacks
229
Followers
184.2K
Followers
219
Votes
6.6K
Votes
105
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 1429
    Distributed version control system
  • 1053
    Efficient branching and merging
  • 959
    Fast
  • 843
    Open source
  • 726
    Better than svn
Cons
  • 16
    Hard to learn
  • 11
    Inconsistent command line interface
  • 9
    Easy to lose uncommitted work
  • 8
    Worst documentation ever possibly made
  • 5
    Awful merge handling
Pros
  • 18
    A lot easier to extend than git
  • 17
    Easy-to-grasp system with nice tools
  • 13
    Works on windows natively without cygwin nonsense
  • 11
    Written in python
  • 9
    Free
Cons
  • 0
    Does not distinguish between local and remote head
  • 0
    Track single upstream only
Integrations
No integrations available
Windows
Windows
Fedora
Fedora
FreeBSD
FreeBSD
Debian
Debian
Gentoo Linux
Gentoo Linux
Mac OS X
Mac OS X

What are some alternatives to Git, Mercurial?

SVN (Subversion)

SVN (Subversion)

Subversion exists to be universally recognized and adopted as an open-source, centralized version control system characterized by its reliability as a safe haven for valuable data; the simplicity of its model and usage; and its ability to support the needs of a wide variety of users and projects, from individuals to large-scale enterprise operations.

Plastic SCM

Plastic SCM

Plastic SCM is a distributed version control designed for big projects. It excels on branching and merging, graphical user interfaces, and can also deal with large files and even file-locking (great for game devs). It includes "semantic" features like refactor detection to ease diffing complex refactors.

Pijul

Pijul

Pijul is a free and open source (AGPL 3) distributed version control system. Its distinctive feature is to be based on a sound theory of patches, which makes it easy to learn and use, and really distributed.

DVC

DVC

It is an open-source Version Control System for data science and machine learning projects. It is designed to handle large files, data sets, machine learning models, and metrics as well as code.

Magit

Magit

It is an interface to the version control system Git, implemented as an Emacs package. It aspires to be a complete Git porcelain. While we cannot (yet) claim that it wraps and improves upon each and every Git command, it is complete enough to allow even experienced Git users to perform almost all of their daily version control tasks directly from within Emacs. While many fine Git clients exist, only deserve to be called porcelains.

Replicate

Replicate

It lets you run machine learning models with a few lines of code, without needing to understand how machine learning works.

isomorphic-git

isomorphic-git

It is a pure JavaScript reimplementation of git that works in both Node.js and browser JavaScript environments. It can read and write to git repositories, fetch from and push to git remotes (such as GitHub), all without any native C++ module dependencies.

Gitless

Gitless

Gitless is an experiment to see what happens if you put a simple veneer on an app that changes the underlying concepts. Because Gitless is implemented on top of Git (could be considered what Git pros call a "porcelain" of Git), you can always fall back on Git.

Git Reflow

Git Reflow

Reflow automatically creates pull requests, ensures the code review is approved, and squash merges finished branches to master with a great commit message template.

BitKeeper

BitKeeper

BitKeeper is a fast, enterprise-ready, distributed SCM that scales up to very large projects and down to tiny ones.

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