Tools and tips
A lot of tools we use are described in the rest of the handbook (GitLab, Google Docs , 1Password , etc.). This section is for tools that don't fit anywhere else.
Google Slides templates
Use this general GitLab branded slide template when creating slide decks for internal and external use. Make a copy of the slide deck and only edit the copy; please do not edit the template itself.
Updating your slide deck theme
Here are a few quick steps for updating your slide decks to match the most recent template:
.1In the top toolbar click
Theme which will open the Themes panel (on the right-hand side).
.1At the bottom of the Themes panel, click
Import theme..2In the Import theme dialog box type
GitLab deck template into the search field..3Find the
GitLab-Deck-Template and click the Select button in the bottom left to apply the theme to your slide deck..4Minor adjustments may be needed once the new theme is applied; the 'Layout' button in the toolbar will help you find the right slide layout for your content.
Google Forms templates
Use these Gitlab branded form templates when creating internal or external surveys or forms. Make a copy of the form and only edit the copy; do not edit the template itself.
Calendly
Calendly connects to your Google calendar so people can book a time with you without having a Google Account.
- Set up a Calendly account.
- Link it to your GitLab Google Calendar to make it possible for people to schedule a call with you.
- All meetings will have the same Google Hangouts URL on your calendar based on your @gitlab.com email handle. You can use that in the booking text above. Events on your calendar will automatically have the Google Hangouts URL added, so you can use the plus landing page to quickly jump into the call. Please note that the appointment will show up in other people's calendars with a different link, so it is essential that you set a text with the link for your time slot as specified below.
- Set up the 45 minute time slot with the following event description text (replacing XXXXX with your @gitlab.com handle):
This will be a Zoom Meeting at https://gitlab.zoom.us/XXXXX
Question? Please email me. GitLab Primer: /primer/
- If you intend to use any of the other event types, make sure to add this to their event descriptions as well.
- For people outside of GitLab Inc, send them your Calendly link that links directly to the 45 minute time slot: "Are any of the times on https://calendly.com/XXXXX/45min/ convenient for you? If so please book one, if not please let me know what times are good for you and we'll find an alternative."
- Update your availability on Calendy Event Types .
- Add your Calendly link to your Slack profile . For
Display Text, use this line:Schedule a meeting with me!so GitLabbers can schedule a 1:1 call with you in GitLab, by simply clicking your Calendly link in your Slack profile.
Keep in mind that unlike normal Google Calendar events, Calendly events are not automatically synchronized between both parties when changes are made. If an event needs to be cancelled or modified, make sure to use Calendly to do so.
Slack
Do Not Disturb Hours
Slack now supports "Do Not Disturb Hours" so you won't be pinged in the middle of the night or while you are dealing with family matters. You can set your "Do Not Disturb Hours" by clicking on the bell at the top of the left pane in the Slack app. You also have the option of snoozing for 20 minutes or up to 24 hours. Note: Do Not Disturb can be overridden in the event of an emergency. See Slack documentation for more information.
Browse Channels
You can browse all available GitLab channels by clicking on "Channels" on the left pane in the Slack app. From there, you can see every channel, who created it, and how many members there are. Every team member is automatically added to
#general, where announcements are made and information for the entire company is shared. There are also a few default channels that every new hire is added to, such as: #celebrations, #new_labbers, #questions, #random, & #thanks; these channels are optional, but we think they are a great place for team members to interact and get to know each other.
Slack Status
Slack has the functionality to set an individual status . For example, you can select away from keyboard, vacation, or working remotely. This is a great way to let your team know if you are available or not.
Slack Certification
Invite
There are multiple ways to invite people into a Slack channel. The easiest way is to use the invite command by typing
/invite @jenny. Avoid inviting people through a mention message. E.g. @jenny as it can create a message that distracts others.
Quick Switcher
Quick Switcher is a great feature to know about if you want to get productive with Slack. As the name suggests, it allows you to switch between channels and direct messages quickly. Invoke it with Cmd + k on Mac or Ctrl+ k on Windows or Linux and start typing the name of the person to chat with or the channel you are interested in. You can then navigate the suggestions with ↑ and ↓ keys and hit enter to select.
Hide conversations with no unread activity
With lots of channels and direct messages, Slack can become overwhelming. To help keep track of activity on Slack, and to simplify the interface, consider hiding conversations with no unread activity .
Zoom
To set up a Zoom meeting, sign up for a free basic account using your GitLab email address, and share the link for your "personal meeting room" with your participants. Note that on the Basic license, meetings are capped at 100 people, and meeting durations are capped at 40 minutes. If you need to be able to organize calls longer than 40 minutes using Zoom, contact #peopleops to be granted a Pro account . By default, only Support Engineers and members of the Sales team are given Pro accounts during onboarding since their job routinely involves making video calls with (potential) customers.
To record the meeting set up cloud recording . You can also configure Zoom to save to the cloud automatically. Go to "My Meeting Settings" and find the "Recording" section, then click on "Cloud Recording". Setting the topic of the meeting is important, otherwise all meetings will be recorded with a generic name. Once recording is complete, your videos will not appear in the “Recordings” section of your Zoom account. Your recordings will automatically be saved to a folder on Google Drive under "GitLab Videos".
Our Zoom account has End-to-End Encryption enabled. This may impact performance, so if you run into any issues, let People Ops know.
If there is a meeting active, a new meeting cannot start until the host ends the meeting or all participants leave. People Ops can force end a meeting by logging into Zoom with the credentials in 1Password, going to My Meetings, finding the meeting they would like to end, then selecting "End." This will allow the next meeting to begin.
How to share a presentation in Zoom
At some point, you may need to give a slide presentation using Zoom. Ideally, you should be able to see your speaker notes while participants see your slide show. This is fairly easy to do with two monitors by using presenter view and sharing the monitor which contains the slides. If you have only one monitor, it is still possible using the following steps:
.1Open your slide deck in Google Slides. Make sure to close any other tabs you may have open. Participants will be able to see these tabs when it comes time to present.
.2Select
Presenter view. This will make your presentation take up the entire screen..3Hover near the bottom of your presentation and you will see a pop up menu. From this menu, select the
Toggle Full Screen option, third button from the right, next to settings. This will end full screen mode without leaving the presenter view..4To see your speaker notes, hover at the bottom of your presentation window again and select
Presenter View from the menu..5You will now have a presenter view pop-up window which allows you to see your speaker notes as well as advance the slides.
.6In another browser window enter the Zoom meeting room.
.7Once in the meeting, select
Share Screen from the options at the bottom of the screen..8Do not share your desktop. From the options, select the browser window containing your Google Slides deck. This will allow you to share just the browser window containing your slides.
.9If you would also like to see the Zoom chat, hover your cursor at the top of the screen containing your Zoom meeting. A menu will appear, from this menu select More > Chat.
.10Position the windows any way you need to see the presentation and speaker notes.
.11Make sure to change slides using the presenter view pop up window. This will advance the presentation for your viewers as well as advancing your speaker notes.
If you would like to practice presenting, you can do so using your own private Zoom room.
.1Open the Zoom app and click
Start with video..2Click
Record..3Repeat the steps above.
.4Stop and watch the recording. You'll see what the participants would see.
Zoom on Linux using FOSS (Firejail)
While Zoom works on Linux, the application is not free software. As a result, some might be wary of running this directly on their computer. One way of running Zoom without worrying about what it does is to use firejail .
To use Zoom with Firejail, first install Zoom or download the archive. Zoom offers standalone binaries that you can download should your distribution not have a package for Zoom. Once installed, install firejail.
Once both firejail and Zoom are installed we need two things:
.1A firejail profile for Zoom
.2A directory we can use as the home directory for Zoom, preventing it from messing with your home directory
You can use the following firejail profile and store it in
~/.config/firejail/zoom.profile:noblacklist ~/.config/zoomus.confinclude /etc/firejail/zoom.localinclude /etc/firejail/disable-common.incinclude /etc/firejail/disable-programs.incinclude /etc/firejail/disable-devel.incwhitelist ~/.zoomcaps.drop allnetfilternonewprivsnorootprotocol unix,inet,inet6,netlinkseccompprivate-tmp
Next we need a home directory for Zoom. For this example we'll use
/opt/zoom/home:sudo mkdir -p /opt/zoom/homesudo chown -R $USER /opt/zoom
With this in place we can start Zoom using firejail as follows:
firejail --quiet --profile=~/.config/firejail/zoom.profile --private=/opt/zoom/home /path/to/zoom/ZoomLauncher
Note that you must start the
ZoomLauncher binary and not the shell script wrapper called zoom.
Shush
$4.99 tool for OS X that lets you set a hotkey (e.g.
fn) to mute your microphone ("push-to-talk" or "push-to-mute"). Never again will you have to switch your window focus to Google Hangouts or Zoom to speak or mute. The icon will show the current state of your mic input (x means muted). With a right click (or your configured hotkey) you can switch from push to talk to push to mute. Don't forget to unblock your mic in Zoom/Google Hangouts immediately after joining. Be warned that page up with fn+down arrow will activate it. Use space for page down instead of fn+up arrow.
Shush alternative for Linux
If you use Linux (e.g. Arch , Ubuntu or Fedora ) you can create a system-wide keyboard shortcut to mute/unmute your mic. Please note that it only works for Linux distributions which use ALSA for sounds (most popular Linux distributions use ALSA). All you need to do is go to your desktop environment's Keyboard Settings and create a custom shortcut with the command
amixer set Capture toggle and assign a key combination of your choice (e.g. Pause Break key). Once this is done, you can mute/unmute your mic using the assigned keyboard shortcut while you're in any application. Refer to this original answer on Askubuntu to learn more.
Disabling OS X Notification Center
During a presentation or screen share, you might want to disable your notifications on OS X to prevent distractions or possible embarrassment.
The Notification Center can be quickly disabled by Option-Clicking the menu bar icon in the top right of your screen. This disables notifications until the next day. Option-Click again to re-enable immediately. Alternatively, click on the Notification Center icon, then scroll up to reveal the "Do Not Disturb" toggle.
If your laptop is a MacBook with a Touch Bar, note that you can assign a handy "Do Not Disturb" button on your Control Strip. In System Preferences, navigate to Keyboard settings and click "Customize Control Strip…" to add this.
Google Cloud Platform
Google Calendar
Sharing
We recommend you set your Google calendar access permissions to 'Make available for GitLab - See all event details'. Consider marking the following appointments as 'Private':
- Personal appointments
- Confidential & sensitive meetings with third-parties outside of GitLab
- 1-1 performance or evaluation meetings
- Meetings on organizational changes
There are several benefits and reasons to sharing your calendar with everyone at GitLab:
.1Transparency is one of our values and sharing what you work on is in line with our message of "be open about as many things as possible".
.2Due to our timezone differences, there are small windows of time where our availabilities overlap. If other members need to schedule a new meeting, seeing the details of recurring meetings (such as 1-1s) will allow for more flexibility in scheduling without needing to wait for a confirmation from the team member. This speaks to our value to be more efficient.
Modifying Events
Please click 'Guests can modify event' so people can update the time in the calendar instead of having to reach out via other channels. You can configure this to be checked by default under Event Settings .)
Managing invite responses
Add a filter to remove invites responses from your inbox with the following query:
*.ics subject:("invitation" OR "accepted" OR "rejected" OR "updated" OR "canceled event" OR "declined") when where calendar who organizer
GitLab Availability Calendar
The GitLab Availability Calendar has been deprecated to allow for GitLab to scale effectively. We have new created tools and tips for managing your time off .
GitLab Team Meetings Calendar
The GitLab Team Meetings Calendar is available to all team members and can be found in your calendars list. You can find the details for the Company Calls, Group Conversations, 101s, and other teams' meetings here, so you can attend a different team's meeting and ask questions, learn about what they're working on, and get to know the rest of the GitLab functional groups. These meetings are open to everyone in GitLab. If you are creating a new team meeting, please copy it to the GitLab Team Meetings calendar, and reach out to People Ops with any questions.
To copy an event to this calendar:
.2Find the
@group.calendar.google.com style Calendar ID under "Integrate calendar"..3Finally, invite this calendar as a guest to your existing event.
Restore Deleted Calendar Items
When you have accidentally deleted something from the Team Meetings calendar, you can recover it by:
- Go to Google Calendar and click the gear icon at the top left of your screen.
- Choose the Trash .
- Make sure you are on the correct calendar, by clicking on the name of the calendar in the left sidebar.
- Hover over the item you'd like to restore and click the arrow to "Restore".
Gmail
Filters
Apply label on mention
It might be useful to add a Gmail filter that adds a label to any GitLab notification email in which you are specifically mentioned, as opposed to a notification that you received simply because you were subscribed to the issue or merge request.
.1Search for
@your_gitlab_username..2Click the down arrow on the right side of the search field.
.3Click Create filter with this search.
.4Check Apply the label: and select a label to add, or create a new one, such as "Mentioned".
.5Check Also apply filter to matching conversations.
.6Click Create filter.
Apply label to all GitLab-generated emails
GitLab issues and merge requests can generate a lot of email notifications depending on your settings and how in-demand your attention is. It can be useful to apply a label to these generated emails and move them out of your immediate inbox.
.1Search for
from:gitlab@mg.gitlab.com..2Click the down arrow on the right side of the search field.
.3Click Create filter with this search.
.4Check Skip the Inbox (Archive it).
.6Check Also apply filter to matching conversations.
.7Click Create filter.
Advance
If you use the archive function you normally return to your overview. With auto-advance you can return to the next message. Enable "Auto-advance" in the labs section under settings. The default setting of showing the next older message is OK.
Email signature
Set up an email signature which includes your full name and job title so people can quickly know what you do.
Example
Note: You can copy and paste the template below to use it in your own signature.
John DoeFrontend Engineer | GitLab
Keyboard shortcuts
Keyboard shortcuts only work if you've turned them on in Gmail Settings.
Steps below:
- In "Settings" scroll down to the "Keyboard shortcuts" section
- Turn Keyboard shortcuts "on"
- Scroll down and Save Changes
Google Drive/Google Apps (Docs)
First, an important message - Don't use Google Drive/Apps (unless you have to)
We would be remiss if we didn't start this section off with this IMPORTANT message: Your default storage place for information that needs to persist and be available to others in the company should be ON THE WEBSITE/IN THE COMPANY HANDBOOK and not in Google Drive and Google Apps files!! This is from the top. This is how we operate, because Google Docs/Apps can only be found and contributed to by team members, and not by users, customers, advocates, future employees, Google handbook searches, or developers.
Which files and rules to using Google Drive/Apps
Having said that, there is content which doesn’t make sense to be created on the website directly (eg. large collections of data in tables, spreadsheets for calculations, etc) or for which Google Drive storage makes sense. For these, when creating or storing files in Google Drive, the web/handbook should have a link to this content and effectively be the index for finding things of relevance that are stored in the Google drive.
There are a few ways to do this to maintain proper levels of privacy:
Link from handbook but view for GitLab only
Rarely, but sometimes, it is appropriate to store files in Google Drive but NOT let those outside GitLab see it. In general, this is when there is information which we need to keep, but which we are under obligation to not share. Examples of this are:
- Any work with partner, customer, or investor information which we have not been cleared to share
- Analyst reports and related information that are not redistributable
- Customer interview videos which have not been approved for distribution
Link from handbook, everybody view, but GitLab edit only
Everything else should be viewable by the public, although not necessarily editable by them.
Examples of this content are:
- Meeting notes
- WIP mockups/graphics
Following are some tips for how to use Google Drive for the instances where it makes sense to.
Keeping it organized
It is important that we not just throw files into random or general places in the shared Google Drives. Doing so makes it harder for others to find and work with the content. Here are some guidelines to organizing the Google Drive content:
- First by department (eg. product marketing)
- then by subject (eg. analysts relations)
- then by sub-subjects as deep as necessary (eg. Gartner -> 2018 ARO MQ)
Using Google Drive
For starters, when your GitLab Google company account is created you automatically get a Google Drive 30GB storage allocation in your own "home" directory (called My Drive). You can get to it by:
.1(optional) Login to your GitLab account in your browser (if you are using Chrome)
.2Open your web browser to https://drive.google.com
.3If your not already logged in as your GitLab account (Chrome users should be) then login to Google using your GitLab account
.4This will take you to your Google Drive (called My Drive) which is like your home directory. If you create Google files using Google Apps and don't specify where to store them, they will be put in this home directory.
This is great for storing your own working files. As already stated, this should never be the final resting place for shared files that are meant to be used by the rest of the company (or beyond).
Existing GitLab Google Drive repositories
There are a few Google Drive repositories of GitLab shared files (there might be more, please add if not listed here):
- GitLab Marketing Drive - This houses all shared files from the entire Marketing organization. The best practice is for sub-organizations to have their own directory inside this space (eg. Product Marketing ).
- Sales Drive - This houses all the shared files from the Sales organization. The best practice is for some sub-organizations to have their own directory inside this space (eg. Customer Success ).
How do you use these? You don't have to remember these URL's. To add these links to your Google Drive My Drive directory, do the following:
.1Make sure you are logged into your GitLab account in Google Drive in your browser
.2Open the link of interest (from above) to go to that directory
.3Find the directory path across the top (under the "Search Drive" field)
.4Find the name of directory in that path that you want to add to your drive (eg. Sales)
.5Click on the down arrow next to it
.6From the resulting pop-up menu, select "Add to My Drive"
.7From now on you can get to that directory by first going to your drive ( https://drive.google.com ) and then opening that link
Adding Google Drive to your Mac
To really make your Google Drive easier to access, you can have your Google Drive show up on your Mac Finder as a regular drive. With this it is easier to store and view files such as videos, analyst reports (PDFs), etc.
Here's how to do this:
.1Make sure you are logged into your GitLab account in Google Drive in your browser
.2Go to your Google Drive ( https://drive.google.com )
.3Click on the "Settings" icon (Gear) to the right of the search field
.4From the resulting menu, select "Download Drive File Stream for Mac"
.5It might pull up a new page/tab and use your personal login. If it does this you won't see "Download & install Drive File Stream" on the page. Switch to your GitLab account.
.6Download and install
Hangouts
Computers with older CPUs (pre-2016/Skylake) may be missing hardware acceleration for VP9 . In Chrome, this can cause excessive CPU due to use of the codec. On MacOS switching to Safari or using h264ify ( Chrome Web Store ) solves this since it will use h264 that is hardware accelerated.
To check the status of acceleration on Chrome, see the "Video Encode" option in about://gpu.
Hangouts on air
Hangouts on Air probably only works with a maximum of 15 people for scheduled calls (same limit as normal Google Hangouts).
Potential problem 1: even when I logged in as GitLab and got the bar below the call, I could not switch it to on-air! I did notice that the time was not properly set (anymore?). I did a test event before and that seemed to work OK. I'll try one more time to see if it works.
Potential problem 2: the video showed up as listed by default
Go to My live events on YouTube and switch to the GitLab account on the top right (you need to be a manager of our YouTube channel).
Go to => life streaming => events and create a new one with the attributes:
- type => quick (using Google Hangouts on Air)
- advanced: promotions: disable both checkboxes
- time needs to be set correctly
The view on watch page URL only allows for people to watch it. Window that pops up when you press the start hangout on air button has the proper URL that you can send to other people and/or add it to the calendar invite, it is structured like: https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_/ytl/LONGHASH . When people join the event they have to accept a warning .
Completed live events will show the video and you can click the image to view it. You can use actions to make it public here.
BTW Trying to set this up via Google+ via Hangouts on Air instead of via YouTube doesn't seem to connect to the right YouTube channel, even if you selected the right account on the top right.
Grammarly
Grammarly is a good tool for those who want to feel more comfortable drafting written communication in English (American or British). There is a free and premium version.
Warning: Grammarly has a contextual spelling and grammar check. Grammarly will have access to everything you type, they have had a security problem .
Gravatar
Link your GitLab email address to an easily recognizable photo of yourself on Gravatar . It is company policy to use a photo, and not an avatar, a stock photo, or something with sunglasses for any of your GitLab accounts, as we have a lot of GitLabbers and our brains are comfortable with recognizing people; let's use them.
Appear.in
Appear.in allows you to instantly create a free video chat room for up to 8 participants with no login and no installation. It also offers a free reliable mobile video conference app.
One Tab
Quitter
Quitter (Free) will switch off apps for you after some period of inactivity. Consider using this to hide Slack after a while to reduce your urge to check new messages all the time.
TripMode
TripMode ($7.99) lets you control which apps can use the internet. Especially useful when you're working on a cellular/metered connection.
ShareX
ShareX (Free / Windows only) is the ultimate screen capture toolbox for Windows, which includes many different options to record your screen and automate your workflow with automatic uploading, resizing and much more.
Teampaper Snap
Teampaper Snap (Free / Mac only) is the ultimate screen capture tool for Mac to voice your thoughts on anything you can see on a screen.
Clocker
Clocker (Free / macOS Only) adds a clean and distraction free world clock to your menu bar so you can check on your fellow teammates across different timezones.
Status Clock (UTC)
Status Clock is a free, easy tool to place a second clock into the macOS Menu Bar, e.g. for showing the UTC time. Perfect for anyone doing sysadmin work or tasks that require referencing UTC (or any secondary timezone).
Bear
Bear (Free) is a clean writing tool for notes and long-form writing. Ulysses $5/month is also a great choice.
Loom
Loom (Free) is a handy Chrome plugin tool for video walkthroughs. Nice tool for demo recordings and internal/external documentation.
WorkFrom
WorkFrom is a crowd-sourced resource of coffee shops and other such places that are remote-work friendly.
Google Analytics
Google Analytics (GA) is an essential tool for making data-driven decisions. It receives data from both about.gitlab.com and docs.gitlab.com websites. Read through the Online Marketing Handbook for more information on GA.
For example, you can look at the GA data to analyze how visited is a certain page, in a period of your choice. You can also look at the GA referrals data to understand where the users are coming from and where they go when they leave a certain page.
To see the data for a specific page:
- Open GA , and expand Behavior on the sidebar
- Click Site content > All pages
- On the top-right, adjust the period of time you'd like to analyze
- On the middle of the page, look for a search bar and paste the URL you'd like to analyze (without
https://) and click on the magnifier button to search:
Note that you can use the search tool with:
- A full URL, which will return results for that specific URL
- Part of an URL, e.g.,
/2017/, which will return the results for all the blog posts published on 2017 - The higher directory on the file tree, which will return the results for a range of URLs in that tree. E.g.,
docs.gitlab.com/ee/ci/will return the results for all the range of pages contained in the/ci/directory
- GA will output the data about the page (or range of pages) you searched for, including pageviews, unique pageviews, and other data:
To find the referrals for a certain page, continue from the steps above.
- Click on one of the website links to look at the data for a page of your choice
- Just above the graph, click Navigation summary
- GA will output the referrals, including Previous Page Path and Next Page Path:
Check which process occupies a given port
When the GitLab Development Kit cannot start using the
./run command and Unicorn terminates because port 3000 is already in use, you will have to check what process is using it. Running sudo lsof -i -n -P | grep TCP | grep 3000 will yield the offender so this process can be killed. It might be wise to alias this command in your .bash_profile or equivalent for your shell.
Shell aliases
Use command aliases in your shell to speed up your workflow. Take a look at these aliases and others in Sid's dotfiles project . For example, by adding the following to your
.bash_profile or equivalent for your shell, you can just type s to checkout the master branch of this website, pull the latest changes, and open the repository in Sublime Text:alias gco='git checkout'alias gl='git pull --prune'alias gca='git commit -a'alias gp='git push origin HEAD'alias www='cd ~/Dropbox/Repos/www-gitlab-com/source'alias s='www;subl .;gco master;gl'
After editing, you can just type gca to commit all of your changes, followed by gp to push them to the remote branch.
Display current git branch in the console
By adding the below mentioned lines in your
.bash_profile or any equivalent for your shell, you will be able to view the git branch that you are using currently. If you are not inside a git repository, it only displays the username and the current directory.git_branch() { git branch 2> /dev/null | sed -e '/^[^*]/d' -e 's/* \(.*\)/(\1)/'}export PS1="\u@\[\033[32m\]\w\[\033[33m\]\$(git_branch)\[\033[00m\]\$ "
Doing the following, makes the changes to get reflected in you current terminal:
source ~/.bashrc
Sublime text
Putting the following in Preferences.sublime-settings - User will among other things ensure that if you open the www-gitlab-com website you're not opening the output files by accident:
{ "font_size": 18, "spell_check": true, "translate_tabs_to_spaces": true, "trim_trailing_white_space_on_save": true, "folder_exclude_patterns": ["public"]}
Simplenote
Simplenote is a free, open source note taking app which is cross platform, and syncs across all devices.
Spectacle App
Spectacle is a free, open source windows resizing and arrangement tool for Macs and is amazing for productivity – particularly if you use multiple displays. Once you use this you'll never go back! Consider donating if you love it.
MobileDay
If you install MobileDay (Free) on your phone and give it access to your Google Calendar it can dial into conference calls for you. It is very good at detecting the number and password from the calendar invite.
Keeping You Awake
Keeping You Awake (Free & Open Source) is a macOS utility application that can prevent your Mac from entering sleep mode for a predefined duration or as long as it is activated.
SessionBox (Chrome, Firefox 51+, Opera)
SessionBox is a browser extension that helps you deal with multiple sessions. It binds a particular session to a tab. This is particularly useful for testing with different users in the same browser.
Enable screen lock on your mac menu bar
.1Open up the
Keychain Access application.2In the menu bar (next to the apple logo), click on
Keychain Access.3Click on
Preferences.4Check the box
Show keychain status in menu bar.5The lock icon should now show up on your menu bar
You can lock your screen by clicking the lock icon on the menu bar and clicking
Lock Screen
Visual help to differentiate between GitLab servers
If you are working on multiple GitLab instances and want to have a visual differentiation, you can change the default Application theme to a different color.
How to change your username at GitLab.com
- Starting point: let's say your username is
old-maryand you want it to be justmary. - Note: each GitLab account is tracked by an userID, which is a number stored in a database. If we change the username, the userID does not change. And all the permissions, issues, MRs, and relevant stuff within GitLab are related to your userID, not with your username.
- Note: if you are not a GitLab Team member, the same process applies except your e-mail ( STEP 2 ), which will be different (will not be @gitlab.com email), so you can replace it with your own email account.
STEP 1: Request your new username
- Access the username you want to request via
https://gitlab.com/mary. - Check its activity and projects to see if he/she is an inactive user according to the handbook .
- Send your request to
support@gitlab.com, explaining the reasons why you need that username. - There's no guarantee that the username will be available for you. Please check the handbook guidelines for dormant usernames .
STEP 2: Create a new account with your new username
- If support replies to you telling that the username is free to use, create a new GitLab.com account with it. Use a personal email to register your new account and choose one that has not been used with your old GitLab account.
- Navigate to your Profile Settings > Emails , and add a new email. ⭐️ Trick ⭐️ If your email at GitLab is
mary@gitlab.com, add the new email asmary+something@gitlab.com: this is a Gmail trick ! All your emails sent to this alias will end up in your GitLab email account. 😃 - Navigate to https://gitlab.com/profile/notifications and choose the notifications email:
mary+something@gitlab.com. - Open your old account in one browser and the new one in another browser (e.g., Chrome and Firefox, or Chrome and Safari) - log in to both accounts at the same time.
STEP 3: Let's have some fun (kidding, this is critical!)
- Navigate to https://gitlab.com/profile/account in both your accounts.
- Look for your username. This operation has to be done quickly, otherwise you are risking to loose your awesome new username to someone else quicker than you. We need to swap the usernames between both accounts, so you'll keep all your history, your privileges, issues, and MRs assigned to you, etc.
- If you work with 2 monitors, open each browser on one monitor. If you don't, open them side by side, so that you can keep an eye on both at the same time.
- Rename your new username
maryto something likemary-1and DO NOT click update username yet. Rename your old usernameold-maryto your new usernamemaryand DO NOT update that either. Just leave them typed into the boxes. - Make sure you did the previous step right!
- ⚠️ CRITICAL ⚠️ Update the first one (
marytomary-1). Immediately, click update on the other one (old-marytomary). - Immediately, rename the
mary-1to your old oneold-maryand click update username again. - Ta-Da! 🙌
STEP 4: Move your projects (or not)
- Now, if you have any personal projects, you might want to import them to your new account (the one that has your old username now). To do that, in your new account (the one with the old username), click Create a New Project, give it the very same name as the original one, click Git - add repo by url, and paste the
https://url of your project there. To make things easier, make sure all the projects you want to import are set topublicview. You can make them private afterwards. - If you have GitLab Pages projects with the default GitLab.io url, you will need to import them to you new account, then make a change to trigger a build and redeploy your site. They will be affected only if you're using a CNAME with a subdomain instead of an A record . This won't affect Pages projects that use custom domains, as they all point to the same Pages server IP via
Arecord. Your groups won't be affected either, as they operate under their own namespace. Add both users as members of your groups and nothing changes.
That's it! Don't forget to update your username on the team page and on the Marketing Handbook , in case you're a Marketing Team member.
How to create gifs
Long haul flights
Note: you have to pay for these items yourself.
- Quiet comfort 35 Bose over ear noise canceling headphones
- Shaped sleep mask (so it doesn't touch your dyed out eyes)
- Custom molded ear plugs (can be up to $200 hearing aid store but are usable in many situations, there are also DYI kits but Sid has not tried that)
- Melatonin (possible unsafe during pregnancy and breast-feeding)
- Sleeping pills (over the counter is fine)
Count handbook pages
find source/handbook -type f | xargs wc -wIt was 901267 words on 2018-11-01, 2002 pages according to Wordcounter , and that is not counting the images.
Webex
If people want to use Webex instead of Zoom consider installing their native client under WebEx Productivity Tools . With the in-browser plugin the screen sharing sometimes doesn't work.
Alfred
£19 tool for OS X is an application launcher on steroids. With the (paid) Powerpack , it's the best companion for developers, enabling automation and also a fantastic clipboard history.
This feature is nicely integrated with many tools, and for example will forget passwords copied from 1password after they have been pasted. Using either the free or paid version you can also create custom web searches that will allow you to quickly search GitLab documentation and the handbook.
Simply create two custom web searches and input the URLs below as the search URL for each.
JetBrains
We have a central account for managing licenses of JetBrains' products like RubyMine or GoLand. If you want to use one of their products, please write a mail to
jetbrains@gitlab.com and you will receive a link with which you can redeem your license. Make sure to use your company email address when creating your Jetbrains account. If at some point in the future you do not want to use the product anymore, please notify us via jetbrains@gitlab.com, so that we can assign the license to someone else.2FA debugging
If 2FA stops working unexpectedly (no new phone or computer) it's usually because of improperly configured date & time on either device. Make sure that "Automatic Date & Time" is enabled on both devices. If they're already enabled try toggling them off and on again to force an update. If this doesn't work, request that PeopleOps reset your 2FA setting.
Links for finding the settings:
- iOS: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203483
- macOS: https://support.apple.com/kb/PH25523?locale=en_US
- Linux (using systemd): https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/systemd-timesyncd
For Android there's no definitive link, since most vendors have different UIs for their settings. But in the Settings-app, look for "Date & Time" and there should be a "Automatic Date & Time" toggle.
Brain.fm
Brain.fm (free trial) provides music specially designed to help you focus, relax, meditate, recharge, sleep (great for plane rides). It's not just music though. They use scientifically validated brainwave manipulations to get results. It is AMAZING and really does work. Make sure to use with headphones, and give it 10-15 minutes for your brain to get used to it. ($6.95/$15.99/$47.40 per month/quarter/year)
Do NOT Use
Flash: Due to security flaws, we strongly recommend not using Adobe Flash. Certainly do not install it on your local machine. But even the Google Chrome plugin that let's you see embedded Flash content in websites can pose a security hazard. If you have not already, go to your Chrome Flash Settings and disable Flash. For further context, note that Google Chrome is removing Flash support soon , and while the plugin is better than a local install of Flash , it still leaves vulnerabilities for zero-day attacks .
GitLabber's Setups
The Pomodoro Technique
Using this time management method is a great way to define time into "work" & "break" intervals that boost productivity. In brief; A 30 minute block of time is divided into a 25 minute work session, followed by a 5 minute break session. Repeat this twice an hour till the day is done & marvel at how much you've finished.