Gitter, an Instant Messaging Service for GitHub Users

Often, collaboration on GitHub is restricted to either email and issues or solely issues. While both are very sufficient means of communication, they are not suitable for rapid back-and-forth communication in a chat-like style. Such sentences as "My branch is stable, can I deploy it?" don't need fully-fledged issues nor emails to be sent back and forth, but they are important nonetheless. We do have Google Hangouts and other messaging services, but they're all integrated with larger things and are slower and more general than they could be. Wouldn't it be great if there was a chat service that behaved a lot like GitHub but was more for private chat for the smaller but still important things?

Enter Gitter (currently in beta)

It Integrates

While it is an external messaging service, Gitter integrates very effectively with all sorts of services, including GitHub, BitBucket, Heroku, Jenkins, Travis, Trello, Huboard, and Sprintly. Gitter rooms are built on a per-repository or per-user basis (You can create non-associated rooms if you need to), so keeping chat separated between your projects is very easy. If you need to, you can very easily switch between projects quickly and efficiently.

For example, I'm working on a project with some folks who have integrations with both Heroku and Travis CI, and so every time a commit is pushed, a deploy is performed, or the build status changes, a little notification is displayed in the chat window (Most of this is configurable). This enables fast realization of problems without ever having to leave the Gitter window.

It's Beautiful

Gitter supports GitHub flavored markdown, which means that writing messages in it is just like writing messages on GitHub issues. It supports editing in both "chat mode," where shorter and rapid-fire messages are sent using Enter or Return, and "compose mode," where longer messages are sent using Ctrl+Enter or Return.

On top of that, Gitter has a very beautiful and simple modern design. It's very easy to get started, and it's easy to join and use rooms. Everything flows nicely and everything is where I would expect it to be.

Would I Recommend It?

Absolutely. Not a doubt in my mind. I'd highly recommend that you try it out and use it. It's very helpful.