173 lines
7 KiB
Markdown
173 lines
7 KiB
Markdown
The [2018 user's survey](http://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/)
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is closed, time for a look at the results. Several of the questions were
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also on the two past surveys, so we can start to look at historical
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trends as well.
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/num_respondants.png">
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Very similar numbers of people responded in 2018 as in 2015.
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The 2013 survey remains a high water mark in participation.
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[[My thoughts on the 2015 survey|day_360__results_of_2015_user_survey]]
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participation level mostly still stand, although there has been a
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consistent downwards trend in [Debian popcon](https://qa.debian.org/popcon-graph.php?packages=git-annex&show_installed=on&want_legend=on&want_ticks=on&date_fmt=%25Y-%25m&beenhere=1)
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since 2015.
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Also interesting that several people skipped the first question on the
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survey, perhaps because it was a fairly challenging question? And later
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questions saw much higher response rates this time than in either of the
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previous surveys, thanks to improvements in the survey interface.
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## v7
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v7 unlocked files are being used by 7% of users, pretty impressive uptake
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for a feature that has only been really finished for a couple of months.
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Direct mode is still used by 7% of users, while its v7 replacement of
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adjusted unlocked branches is only used by 1% so far. That's still some
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decent progress toward eliminating the need for direct mode.
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## command line vs assistant
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/command_line_vs_assistant.png">
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Well that's plain enough isn't it? Although note that I myself have
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the assistant running in some repos all the time, but would of course
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vote "command line" since I interact with that much more.
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Also notice that people who apparently don't use git-annex
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but wanted to fill out the survey anyway was the same for 2013-2015,
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but has now declined.
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## operating system
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/operating_system.png">
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Android users have more or less gone away since I deprecated the app.
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I hope the termux integration brings some back.
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## how git-annex is installed
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/how_installed.png">
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Good to see the increase in using git-annex packages from the OS
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or a third-party package manager.
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## missing/incomplete ports
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/missing_ports.png">
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Good improvement here since 2015 with 60% now satisfied with available
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ports.
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Worth noting that in 2013, 6% wanted a way to use git-annex on
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Synology NAS. That is possible now via the standalone linux tarball.
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This year, 2% wanted "Synology NAS (app store package)".
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Also honorable mention to the anonymous person who rewrote
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git-annex in another language. You should release the code!
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## number of repositories
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/number_of_repositories.png">
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Increasingly users seem to have just a couple repositories or a large
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number, with the middle ground shrinking. A few percent have 200+
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repositories now. The sense is of a split between causual users who
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perhaps clone one repository to a few places, and power users who
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are adding new repositories over time.
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## data stored in git-annex
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/size_of_annex.png">
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Increasing growth in the high end with many users storing dozens of terabytes
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of data in git-annex and a couple storing more than 64 terabytes.
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And a bit of growth in the low end storing under 100 gb.
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The total data stored in git-annex looks to be around 650-1300 terabytes
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now. It was around 150-300 terabytes in 2013. That doesn't count redundant
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data. And it could be off slightly if shared repositories were reported by
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multiple users.
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(Compare with the Internet Archive, which was 15000 terabytes in 2016
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but I think they keep two copies of everything, so call it 7000
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terabytes of unique data.)
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## git level
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/git_level.png">
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The same question was asked in the [git surveys](https://git.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/GitSurvey2016)
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so I have included those in the graph for comparison.
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git-annex users trend more experienced than git users,
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which is not surprising. You have to know some stuff about
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git to understand why you'd want to use git-annex.
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Notice that git knowledge level is generally going up over time in both
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surveys.
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## happyness with the software
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/happyness.png">
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A similar question on the git survey included for comparison.
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There's a bimodal distribution to git-annex user's happyness,
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with more unhappy with it than with git, but also more so happy
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they gravitate toward extreme praise.
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There seem to be more unhappy users in 2018 than in 2015 though.
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The 2018 results are very close to the 2013 results.
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## blocking problems
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Notably 15% of users now find git-annex too hard to use, up from 5% in
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2015. Which seems to correlate with some users being more unhappy with it.
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I don't think git-annex has gotten any harder to use, so this must
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reflect a change in expectations and/or demographics. (2013 had similar
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numbers to 2018.)
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Very few complain about the documentation now, down to 3% from 13% in 2015,
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but 12% want to see more tutorials showing how to tie the features
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together.
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And a staggering 21% picked a write-in, "no issues personally, but people
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don't see (or realize they need) the immense benefits it provides".
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Need to find better ways to market git-annex, essentially.
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## size of group using git-annex together
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A similar distribution to 2015. One person said they're using git-annex in
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a group of 50+, and 5 reported groups larger than 10 people.
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## scientific data
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A new high of 11% of respondants are using git-annex to store scientific data.
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(Other kinds of data it's used for seem more or less the same.)
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Part of that growth is because of the companion
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[2018 git-annex scientific data survey](http://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018_science/)
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which was promoted in some scientific communities, and
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so brought more scientists to the main survey.
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<img src="https://git-annex-survey.branchable.com/polls/2018/graphs/field_of_science.png">
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The use for neuroscience is no surprise, but so much use for astronomy and
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physics is. And "other" in that pie chart includes statistics,
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social sciences, mathematics, education, linguistics, biomedical
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engineering, EE, and physiology -- wow!
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## survey reach
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All participants in the science survey did go on to answer at least part of
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the main survey. So 37% of respondants to the main survey are scientists.
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A full 27% of survey respondants have their name on the thanks
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page, many for financial support. Which is really great, but also speaks to
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the fraction of the git-annex user base who saw the survey,
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because I really doubt that a quarter of the users of *any* free software
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are financially supporting it.
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As with any online survey, the results are skewed by who bothers to answer it.
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Still, a lot of useful information to mull over.
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