Sourcetree Easy Git access for Windows users

Atlassian, maker of developer and project management tools, has introduced SourceTree for Windows, client software that allows Windows users to access the Git distributed version control system from their computers. The new software displays the most important Git commands on a simple user interface. A port for Mac OS X 10.6 and later is also available.

SourceTree can also be used with Git competitors Mercurial and Subversion. The developers plan to keep the Windows release in beta state until its Mercurial support is considered complete, some time within the next few months. The software gives developers access to hosting services such as GitHub and Atlassian's BitBucket, a service that supports Mercurial and has also supported Git for some time. SourceTree can also be used "on premise", for example with Stash, a Git management software from Atlassian, or with the classic Git itself.

Many users access Git from the command line, and many development environments now offer plugins that allow users to interact with Git. Atlassian says that 70 per cent of its customers are Windows users, and that many probably aren't used to working from a command line. SourceTree may be helpful to these users, especially in view of the fact that the software supports more commands and offers more features than many IDE plugins. SourceTree is available to download free of charge.

(sno)