Review Assistant vs. GitLab

Combined with Code Compare and running Review Assistant on the TFS server, it provides a good way to share code and comments amount our team. It does everything we need it to do for code reviews and has a reporting tool.

We started to use GitLab for hosting git source code repositories of our projects only but slowly we started to use it to store container images, packages, dependency proxy as well infrastucture registry and it is now well suited for Continuous Integration in our projects, It wasn't that good in Continuous Deployment before 12.0 version but after 12.0 it is amazingly good for Continuous Deployment as well since it keeps deployment information in a well organized manner which can be configure in ci yaml configuration.

Incentivized

• Review Assistant does everything that I was hoping the default Visual Studio reviews would do. The iterations through accept/reject were the key winner.
• The functionality for code reviews is great, especially the ability to comment on specific lines of code.
• You don't have to leave the IDE.

• GitLab excels in managing code versions, allowing easy tracking of changes, branch management, and merging contributions.
• It helps maintain code stability and reliability, saving time and effort in the development or research workflow.
• Powerful code review features, enabling collaboration and feedback among team members.
• Robust project management features, including issue tracking, kanban boards, and milestones.

Incentivized

• Integration with JIRA is missing.
• Ability to search, filter and order comments.
• There is no support for Visual Studio Code.

• CI variables management is sometimes hard to use, for example, with File type variables. The scope of each variable is also hard to guess.
• Access Token: there are too many types (Personal, Project, global..), and it is hard to identify the scope and where it comes from once created.
• Runners: auto-scaled runners are for the moment hard to put in place, and monitoring is not easy.

Incentivized

Gitlab is the best in its segment. They have a free version, they have open-source software, they provide a good service with their SaaS product, they are a fully-remote company since the beginning (which means they are fully distributed and have forward-thinking IMO). I would certainly recommend them to everyone.

Incentivized

I find it easy to use, I haven't had to do the integration work, so that's why it is a 9/10, cause I can't speak to how easy that part was or the initial set up, but day to day use is great!

Incentivized

At this point, I do not have much experience with Gitlab support as I have never had to engage them. They have documentation that is helpful, not quite as extensive as other documentation, but helpful nonetheless. They also seem to be relatively responsive on social media platforms (twitter) and really thrived when GitHub was acquired by Microsoft

Incentivized

Microsoft provides a handy feature for code review inside the Visual Studio IDE. Review Assistant, though providing a similar code review user experience, supports work scenarios that are not covered by the Microsoft's IDE. Moreover, the version control systems support is broader in Review Assistant.

GitLab is easily the preferred tool when it comes to versioning and source control. With other tools the UI often feels outdated and clunky leading to inefficiency and confusion. With some of the sleeker tools such as GitKraken, while the aesthetic is pleasing, the experience is plagued by a lack of support, lack of optional plugins, and a plethora of bugs that cause unnecessary legwork to resolve. GitLab is the best of both aesthetic and functionality

Incentivized

• The tool saves a huge amount of time while reviewing the code. Review Assistant supports threaded comments, so team members can discuss code without scheduled meetings.

• GitLab issue management has made release smoother, with about a factor 2 less time used by the relevant person
• The outward facing issue desk now has several hundred public issues answered, and thus alleviates the team, as users can refer to older questions
• Use of CI has made commitment of faulty code drop drastically

Incentivized