Need advice about which tool to choose?Ask the StackShare community!

GitLab

61.6K
52.8K
+ 1
2.5K
Sonatype Nexus

532
366
+ 1
0
Add tool

GitLab vs Sonatype Nexus: What are the differences?

GitLab and Sonatype Nexus are two widely used DevOps tools that facilitate software development and deployment processes. Let's explore the key difference between them.

  1. Cost: GitLab is an open-source platform, allowing users to access and use its features without any additional cost. On the other hand, Sonatype Nexus is a commercial product that requires users to purchase a license for full access to its functionalities.

  2. Repository Types: GitLab primarily focuses on the management of source code repositories and version control, supporting various programming languages. In contrast, Sonatype Nexus specializes in managing different types of software artifacts, including build artifacts, binaries, and libraries, making it suitable for a wider range of development workflows.

  3. Built-in CI/CD: GitLab provides built-in continuous integration and continuous deployment (CI/CD) capabilities, allowing developers to automate the testing and deployment process directly from the GitLab interface. Sonatype Nexus, on the other hand, does not offer built-in CI/CD functionalities, requiring users to integrate it with external CI/CD tools.

  4. Security and Vulnerability Scanning: GitLab includes built-in security features, such as static code analysis, dependency scanning, and container scanning, to help identify and address security vulnerabilities within the codebase. Sonatype Nexus focuses on providing comprehensive vulnerability management and threat intelligence for software components and libraries, offering advanced scanning capabilities.

  5. Community and Plugin Ecosystem: GitLab has a vibrant community and a wide range of plugins and integrations available, allowing users to extend its functionalities and customize their workflows. Sonatype Nexus also has a community around it, but its plugin ecosystem is not as extensive as GitLab's, limiting customization options.

  6. User Interface and User Experience: GitLab provides a seamless and user-friendly interface with features like inline commenting, code reviews, and project management tools, enhancing collaboration and productivity. Sonatype Nexus, being a more specialized tool, has a focused interface that may require some learning curve for new users.

In summary, GitLab offers open-source access, focuses on code repository management, provides built-in CI/CD, and has a vibrant plugin ecosystem, while Sonatype Nexus is a commercial product, specializes in artifact management, offers advanced security scanning, and has a more specialized user interface.

Decisions about GitLab and Sonatype Nexus
Weverton Timoteo

Do you review your Pull/Merge Request before assigning Reviewers?

If you work in a team opening a Pull Request (or Merge Request) looks appropriate. However, have you ever thought about opening a Pull/Merge Request when working by yourself? Here's a checklist of things you can review in your own:

  • Pick the correct target branch
  • Make Drafts explicit
  • Name things properly
  • Ask help for tools
  • Remove the noise
  • Fetch necessary data
  • Understand Mergeability
  • Pass the message
  • Add screenshots
  • Be found in the future
  • Comment inline in your changes

Read the blog post for more detailed explanation for each item :D

What else do you review before asking for code review?

See more
Weverton Timoteo

Using an inclusive language is crucial for fostering a diverse culture. Git has changed the naming conventions to be more language-inclusive, and so you should change. Our development tools, like GitHub and GitLab, already supports the change.

SourceLevel deals very nicely with repositories that changed the master branch to a more appropriate word. Besides, you can use the grep linter the look for exclusive terms contained in the source code.

As the inclusive language gap may happen in other aspects of our lives, have you already thought about them?

See more
Weverton Timoteo

One of the magic tricks git performs is the ability to rewrite log history. You can do it in many ways, but git rebase -i is the one I most use. With this command, It’s possible to switch commits order, remove a commit, squash two or more commits, or edit, for instance.

It’s particularly useful to run it before opening a pull request. It allows developers to “clean up” the mess and organize commits before submitting to review. If you follow the practice 3 and 4, then the list of commits should look very similar to a task list. It should reveal the rationale you had, telling the story of how you end up with that final code.

See more
Kamaleshwar BN
Senior Software Engineer at Pulley · | 8 upvotes · 694.3K views

Out of most of the VCS solutions out there, we found Gitlab was the most feature complete with a free community edition. Their DevSecops offering is also a very robust solution. Gitlab CI/CD was quite easy to setup and the direct integration with your VCS + CI/CD is also a bonus. Out of the box integration with major cloud providers, alerting through instant messages etc. are all extremely convenient. We push our CI/CD updates to MS Teams.

See more

Gitlab as A LOT of features that GitHub and Azure DevOps are missing. Even if both GH and Azure are backed by Microsoft, GitLab being open source has a faster upgrade rate and the hosted by gitlab.com solution seems more appealing than anything else! Quick win: the UI is way better and the Pipeline is way easier to setup on GitLab!

See more
Nazar Atamaniuk
Shared insights
on
DeployPlaceDeployPlaceGitHubGitHubGitLabGitLab

At DeployPlace we use self-hosted GitLab, we have chosen GitLab as most of us are familiar with it. We are happy with all features GitLab provides, I can’t imagine our life without integrated GitLab CI. Another important feature for us is integrated code review tool, we use it every day, we use merge requests, code reviews, branching. To be honest, most of us have GitHub accounts as well, we like to contribute in open source, and we want to be a part of the tech community, but lack of solutions from GitHub in the area of CI doesn’t let us chose it for our projects.

See more
Manage your open source components, licenses, and vulnerabilities
Learn More
Pros of GitLab
Pros of Sonatype Nexus
  • 508
    Self hosted
  • 431
    Free
  • 339
    Has community edition
  • 242
    Easy setup
  • 240
    Familiar interface
  • 137
    Includes many features, including ci
  • 113
    Nice UI
  • 84
    Good integration with gitlabci
  • 57
    Simple setup
  • 35
    Has an official mobile app
  • 34
    Free private repository
  • 31
    Continuous Integration
  • 23
    Open source, great ui (like github)
  • 18
    Slack Integration
  • 15
    Full CI flow
  • 11
    Free and unlimited private git repos
  • 10
    All in one (Git, CI, Agile..)
  • 10
    User, group, and project access management is simple
  • 8
    Intuitive UI
  • 8
    Built-in CI
  • 6
    Full DevOps suite with Git
  • 6
    Both public and private Repositories
  • 5
    Integrated Docker Registry
  • 5
    So easy to use
  • 5
    CI
  • 5
    Build/pipeline definition alongside code
  • 5
    It's powerful source code management tool
  • 4
    Dockerized
  • 4
    It's fully integrated
  • 4
    On-premises
  • 4
    Security and Stable
  • 4
    Unlimited free repos & collaborators
  • 4
    Not Microsoft Owned
  • 4
    Excellent
  • 4
    Issue system
  • 4
    Mattermost Chat client
  • 3
    Great for team collaboration
  • 3
    Free private repos
  • 3
    Because is the best remote host for git repositories
  • 3
    Built-in Docker Registry
  • 3
    Opensource
  • 3
    Low maintenance cost due omnibus-deployment
  • 3
    I like the its runners and executors feature
  • 2
    Beautiful
  • 2
    Groups of groups
  • 2
    Multilingual interface
  • 2
    Powerful software planning and maintaining tools
  • 2
    Review Apps feature
  • 2
    Kubernetes integration with GitLab CI
  • 2
    One-click install through DigitalOcean
  • 2
    Powerful Continuous Integration System
  • 2
    It includes everything I need, all packaged with docker
  • 2
    The dashboard with deployed environments
  • 2
    HipChat intergration
  • 2
    Many private repo
  • 2
    Kubernetes Integration
  • 2
    Published IP list for whitelisting (gl-infra#434)
  • 2
    Wounderful
  • 2
    Native CI
  • 1
    Supports Radius/Ldap & Browser Code Edits
    Be the first to leave a pro

    Sign up to add or upvote prosMake informed product decisions

    Cons of GitLab
    Cons of Sonatype Nexus
    • 28
      Slow ui performance
    • 9
      Introduce breaking bugs every release
    • 6
      Insecure (no published IP list for whitelisting)
    • 2
      Built-in Docker Registry
    • 1
      Review Apps feature
      Be the first to leave a con

      Sign up to add or upvote consMake informed product decisions

      What is GitLab?

      GitLab offers git repository management, code reviews, issue tracking, activity feeds and wikis. Enterprises install GitLab on-premise and connect it with LDAP and Active Directory servers for secure authentication and authorization. A single GitLab server can handle more than 25,000 users but it is also possible to create a high availability setup with multiple active servers.

      What is Sonatype Nexus?

      It is an open source repository that supports many artifact formats, including Docker, Java™ and npm. With the Nexus tool integration, pipelines in your toolchain can publish and retrieve versioned apps and their dependencies

      Need advice about which tool to choose?Ask the StackShare community!

      What companies use GitLab?
      What companies use Sonatype Nexus?
      Manage your open source components, licenses, and vulnerabilities
      Learn More

      Sign up to get full access to all the companiesMake informed product decisions

      What tools integrate with GitLab?
      What tools integrate with Sonatype Nexus?

      Sign up to get full access to all the tool integrationsMake informed product decisions

      Blog Posts

      What are some alternatives to GitLab and Sonatype Nexus?
      GitHub
      GitHub is the best place to share code with friends, co-workers, classmates, and complete strangers. Over three million people use GitHub to build amazing things together.
      Bitbucket
      Bitbucket gives teams one place to plan projects, collaborate on code, test and deploy, all with free private Git repositories. Teams choose Bitbucket because it has a superior Jira integration, built-in CI/CD, & is free for up to 5 users.
      Jenkins
      In a nutshell Jenkins CI is the leading open-source continuous integration server. Built with Java, it provides over 300 plugins to support building and testing virtually any project.
      Gogs
      The goal of this project is to make the easiest, fastest and most painless way to set up a self-hosted Git service. With Go, this can be done in independent binary distribution across ALL platforms that Go supports, including Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows.
      Git
      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.
      See all alternatives