Still looking for a good locally deployable github alternative that has decent issue tracker (i.e. youtrack/jira/tfs level of customization and planinng support) AND pull request support. Are there any? Is this it?
I was introduced to the concept of integrated defect and issue tracking inside a source control system by IBM CMVC [1]. I'm certain there are even earlier tools that implemented this concept.
If you have a large, distributed team, say more than a couple dozen developers, then a tightly-interwoven defect and issue tracker that disrupts the workflow of the developers as little as possible enables some support organization models that are otherwise very unwieldy. Even with just plain text defect and issue fields, it was pretty remarkable how much sideband material via email was avoided.
Most of the satisfaction with this tooling depended upon (as usual) how management dictated it be used. Developers who had to use these features didn't universally love it though, even with developer-savvy/friendly management. Generally, modulo adverse management interference, if you did a lot of maintenance work on a code base, I can reasonably predict that you would tend to either like the integration, benignly tolerate it, or come to like it; it did save a lot of time, especially for those who automated parts of the related workflow.
This stemmed from being able to start with an issue that simply described the support ticket, evolve it to a defect that identified change sets that encompassed the suspected cause, check out, branch, check in code only related to the specific defect, including ancillary/utility/harness/test code specific to just the defect. It made it easier to "break off" a chunk of code for a specific defect, if someone put in the work to identify those pieces of code and properly used the integrated defect/issue features.
I personally like this kind of integration, and furthermore want regression testing support tied into it, but that's only because I'm really lazy and my memory leaks like a sieve, so getting back into the zone for a specific issue I worked on even only N weeks/months ago, locating all the relevant chunks of code needed, is terribly tedious for me.
In the "enterprise", my experience is that incentives/expertise fight hard against successful integrations of 'best of breed' products. In large organizations, features for developers are (at least minor) headaches for the build team, so they don't get rolled out.
Github has raised the bar on what to expect from an integrated SCM, and others have followed suit, so I don't much value added by specialist vendors. I kind of think of it like car radios; you used to have to replace the factory system with a third party product, now almost no one does. The deck that comes with the car is plenty good enough, plus it has the integration with the steering wheel, etc.
