Git Visualization

Visualizing git activity starts with collecting git events. There are many ways to do this, ranging from polling APIs to setting up an additional remote on each developer's workstation to using Github webhooks. Webhooks are the simplest to implement, so we'll start here. Their main limitation is that they only work when we have administrative access to the Github organization or repository.

Run Local Webhook Consumer

To setup a local webhook consumer, you need a functioning Docker environment. On OS X, install Docker Toolbox and start a docker-machine. You'll also need administrative access to a Github repo or organization to configure a Webhook; and you'll need to setup a Neo4J instance on GrapheneDB.

Then clone the repository and run the server:

$ git clone git@github.com:thehackerati/gitviz.git
$ cd gitviz
$ export X_HUB_SECRET=yoursecretkey
$ export GRAPHENEDB_URL=yourinstanceurl
$ export NEO4J_AUTH=yourcredentials
$ make build run
$ open http://yourdockermachineip:3000

X_HUB_SECRET is a shared secret that you will also configure when you setup the Github Webhook.

Because Github webhooks originate outside of your local network, you will probably need to expose this service to the public internet over a secure tunnel. The simplest way to do this on OS X is to use ngrok:

$ brew cask install ngrok
$ ngrok http yourdockermachineip:3000

You'll see a screen that looks like this:

ngrok by @inconshreveable                                 (Ctrl+C to quit)

Tunnel Status            online
Version                  2.0.25/2.0.25
Region                   United States (us)
Web Interface            http://127.0.0.1:4040
Forwarding               http://8530525b.ngrok.io -> yourdockermachineip:3000
Forwarding               https://8530525b.ngrok.io -> yourdockermachineip:3000

Connections              ttl     opn     rt1     rt5     p50     p90
                         0       0       0.00    0.00    0.00    0.00

Configure the Github Webhook

Github allows you to configure webhooks at the Organization and Repository level. In either case, you will need to provide the following information to send events to your local development environment:

Payload URL: http://8530525b.ngrok.io/hook  // Match ngrok forwarding
Content Type: application/json
Secret: yoursecretkey  // Match your X_HUB_SECRET environment variable

Note that your Payload URL will change each time that you restart ngrok.

You can also choose which events you want Github to send. We'll need to figure out what we need to create an engaging visualization, so for now, just send everything.

TODO

• dockerize
• ES6-ify
• add unit & integration tests
• enable auto-testing and auto-reloading of node in the container on file changes in the host
• add nginx proxy container
• add neo4j container (local dev & test only)
• run tests against clean local neo4j database
• automatically build (Travis-CI?)
• deploy (Elastic Beanstalk?)
• add other Github event handlers (repository, create, delete, pull_request, etc.)

License

Copyright (c) 2016 Hackerati. This software is licensed under the MIT License.