Compared to e.g. pushing a button in VS code and having your browser pop up with a pre-filled in github PR page? It’s clunky, but that doesn’t mean it’s not useful.
For starters it’s entirely decentralised, a single email address is all you need to commit to anything, regardless of where and how it’s hosted. There was actually an article on lobsters recently that I thought was quite neat, how the combination of a patch-based workflow and email allows for entirely offline development, something that’s simply not possible with things like github or codeberg.
The fact that you can “send” an email without actually sending it means you can queue the patch submissions up offline and then send them whenever you’re ready, along with downloading the replies.
Compared to e.g. pushing a button in VS code and having your browser pop up with a pre-filled in github PR page? It’s clunky, but that doesn’t mean it’s not useful.
For starters it’s entirely decentralised, a single email address is all you need to commit to anything, regardless of where and how it’s hosted. There was actually an article on lobsters recently that I thought was quite neat, how the combination of a patch-based workflow and email allows for entirely offline development, something that’s simply not possible with things like github or codeberg.
https://ploum.net/2026-01-31-offline-git-send-email.html
The fact that you can “send” an email without actually sending it means you can queue the patch submissions up offline and then send them whenever you’re ready, along with downloading the replies.
Ah, the process you mean. patch itself is still useful.