The machine right in front of you. When we use it here it does not really matter if it is a Windows machine, a Mac, a ChromeBook or a machine running some Linux. We don’t mean iPads and Android tablets.

(And yes I know servers, see below, are also computers just running elsewhere)

On “computers” data (files) is organized in a folder structure. To name a particular folder on your system you specify a path. In MacOS and Linux this structure starts at /. In Windows the structure has multiple starting points called drives. The only one that always exists is the C:\ drive. Network drives on Windows often have letters at the end of the alphabet like X:\. Companies and universities often advise you to store your data on a network drive that belongs to you alone.

The only folder you always have full control over. You can store your data and any programs you need, in addition to anything available to you, there. You can find your home folder at %HOMEDRIVE%%HOMEPATH% in Windows or ~ in Linux and MacOS.

The network that spans the whole globe and connects “your computer” to “the server” running “a service”.

A computer running somewhere (probably together with a lot of other computers) in a building called data center. A server provides one or more “services” available under a name like https://github.com, https://gitlab.oeaw.ac.at https://ucloud.univie.ac.at, https://www.dropbox.com, https://onedrive.live.com/ or https://drive.google.com.

The server is connected to the internet much like “your computer”.

A computer program with a web interface (most often a nice looking user interface running in your browser) running on “the server” waiting for you to communicate with it. Most of “the services” in “the cloud”/on “the internet” require you to identify yourself, to have an account.

The following diagram is a great summary of how content moves in Git, between the “working area”, which is simply the data (files) and folders making up project as they exist on your computer, the “staging area” and the “repository”, which are the permanently recorded commit snapshots.

A copy of the “repository” exists on your computer as well as on one server (or even many servers) on the internet. Git enables you to synchronize your “repository” with others. In Git everybody always works on a local copy of a project, and Git helps to keep local project copies in sync. This is why Git is sometimes called a distributed version control system.