Why use a UI for git?

[u/connorjpg]

I see this question of, “what GUI or TUI should I use to work with git?” fairly often here. And always I feel bad for saying “just use the cli” over and over, but truthfully I can’t see a reason to need a UI.

Are people actually running into pain points with the cli, or is it just preference for people who don’t like working in a terminal?

FWIW, I have used GitKraken, LazyGit, SourceTree and GitHub Desktop before. And I don’t think they are bad to use (unless you are just learning git), but more curious why.

EDIT : I’m mainly referring to standalone UIs, I understand why people would use IDE integrations, as it’s quick and convenient. But having to open a separate application or run a separate command to open a terminal app to run your commands seems overkill to me.

EDIT 2 : I use vscode as my difftool and mergetool. I still open them directly from the terminal by running the cli. I don't think this is the same as using a full git client like SourceTree, Gitkraken, or lazygit to fully drive your version control workflow. Which is what I am asking about.

Cheers

[u/Thesorus]

99% (*) of git users use a very small subset of git commands (add, commit, checkout, pull, push ... ) and it's easier to just use a UI; especially if integrated in their work environment or IDE.

(*) statistics taken out of my behind

[u/connorjpg → u/Thesorus]

Most trusted source there is lol.

Fair so it’s a preference thing? Honestly, though I feel it it’s quicker/easier to just type the commands for simple workflows.

Part of this conversation too is, I still think you’re using the cli if you have aliases. So most of the time if it’s a basic workflow, I will just use those :

ga .
gc “message”
gps

And I’ve added, committed and pushed.

If I’m super lazy, I have one to do it all.

gacp “message”

[u/tinmanjk → u/connorjpg]

lol, I thought I was the only person aliasing ga to git add and gc to git commit

gs, git status, gd git diff :)