Why It Matters
If your business has custom software, your development team almost certainly uses Git. It is the industry standard, and for good reason: it prevents code loss, enables collaboration, and provides the history needed to understand how and why the codebase evolved. For a business owner, the practical implication is that your code history lives in a Git repository, and that repository is one of your most important digital assets. You should have access to it, it should be backed up, and it should be part of any handover if you change development teams. This is especially relevant if you commission custom software, where continuity of access matters long after the initial build.
Example
Your development team uses Git with Bitbucket to manage your application’s code. Every time a developer makes a change, they commit it to Git with a description of what they did and why. When a customer reports a bug that appeared after last week’s update, the team uses Git to compare the current code with the previous version, identify the exact lines that changed, and pinpoint the cause. The fix is committed, reviewed, and deployed. It all stays in the same Git history. Browse the glossary for related definitions.
