Since its launch in 2017, Pigtail, the software delivery platform founded by AppDynamics co-founder and CEO Jyoti Bansal, has expanded from continuous code deployment to cover continuous integration, feature flags, cloud cost management, security test orchestration, chaos engineering and more. But although it has focused heavily on GitOps, it has never offered its own Git repositories. This changes today with the launch Gitness is an open source Git repository and Harness Code Repository, the hosted and managed version of Gitness.
“There hasn’t been a new release of a Git repo in almost a decade,” Bansal told me. “Now you have GitHub, GitLab, and Bitbucket from Atlassian, but that’s really it. […] If you look at any of the git repositories, whether it’s GitLab or GitHub or Bitbucket, they don’t have the only real source around anymore. We firmly believe that Git started as open source, so let’s bring the true open source spirit back to Git repos.”
Image credits: Pigtail
Bansal also said that existing Git repo services have become too complex and bloated. He noted that Gitness can run on the smallest virtual machine — or a developer’s laptop — and be set up in a few minutes. The system also integrates seamlessly with Harness’s CI/CD system and other tools.
He noted that because the company is only building this service now, Harness has been able to build in some AI functionality from the beginning. This currently includes enhanced search features, AI-powered tools for code review, and other core features of the platform.
Bansal told me that Harness started working on this project a few years ago, and most of the company’s 350 developers have already switched to the Harness Code Repository. The company already offers tools that make it easy for any company to switch to Gitness or Code Repository, and for most developers, there’s not much of a change either, since they’re probably using Git from the command line anyway. For those times when developers want to use a GUI, Harness decided to build it in a way that feels familiar (like GitHub).
![](https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/GitnessAISemanticSearch.png)
Image credits: Pigtail
“If someone is coming from GitHub to Gitness, the cognitive load of the transition will be very low,” Bansal said. “Within probably 5 to 10 minutes, people will be able to find their way.”
While Gitness provides many core features, unsurprisingly, the Harness Code Repository adds features like advanced management, policy enforcement, and additional integrations with the rest of the Harness platform. Bansal also noted that the hosted version will make it easier for companies to scale to thousands of developers.
![](https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Gitness-PipelineExecution.png)
Image credits: Pigtail
In addition to Gitness, Harness is also launching some additional modules for its overall platform. There’s the internal developer platform, based on Spotidy’s open source Backstage framework for building developer portals, and the supply chain assurance module. Both fill gaps that exist without a Harness platform.
Also new is the Harness Infrastructure as Code Management (IaCM) service. With more and more companies now defining their infrastructure as code — and often using Git to manage that code — the Harness team decided it was time to build a purpose-built service. The IaCM module expands on the standard GitOps-based method of managing this code by adding features like drift detection to see if a company’s infrastructure is starting to deviate from what was originally defined, for example. The service also enforces security and compliance standards.
“There’s really no orchestration layer on top of infrastructure as code, and that’s the big gap that we’ve been hearing about from a lot of our customers,” Bansal said.