Useful GitHub Commit Emoji
Friday, October 10 2014

Uncategorized

For a while now users of GitHub have been able to include emoji pretty much anywhere. The problem? There are nearly 1000 to choose from, so which ones are actually useful for commits?

Naturally, the answer is “it’s up to you.” If you think your commit needs a :cow: in it, then go right ahead — I promise I won’t judge (just kidding, I will, and hard). I have traditionally been very skeptical of any sorts of sigils in software development, but anything can be good in moderation. Here are a few emoji I’ve identified as being practical for tagging commits, along with what they should be used for:

:apple: For anything OSX-specific that is not in an OSX-specific project (otherwise there will be apples everywhere)
:confounded: Tag commits that leave trouble issues unresolved or are attempts to resolve a troubling issue
:exclamation: Highlights the importance of a commit, generally negative
:gift: A release commit
:lipstick: Typos, rewording, or general polishing
:memo: Documentation-specific changes
:new: For highlighting a new feature
:penguin: For anything Linux-specific that is not in a Linux-specific project (otherwise we’ll have Happy Feet 3 on our hands)
:poop: You’re not proud of this code, and you should feel bad
:racehorse: Indicates that the commit is related to accomplishing some part of a sprint in agile development
:star: A milestone commit