Websites using Rawgit

Okay, let s break down RawGit. It s important to note that RawGit has been officially shut down since October 2019. It no longer exists. This means there is no revenue, no active customer base, and therefore, no customer care details to discuss. However, we can discuss what it was, why it shut down, and suitable alternatives.

RawGit: What It Was (Now Defunct)

RawGit was a free service that served raw files directly from GitHub, GitLab, and Bitbucket repositories. It allowed developers to bypass the HTML view of a repository and directly access files like JavaScript, CSS, images, and other assets. Think of it as a CDN (Content Delivery Network) specifically for serving raw files from Git repos.

How it worked:

You would provide a URL to a raw file in a Git repository (e.g., a JavaScript file on GitHub), and RawGit would generate a new URL that you could use in your web projects. This meant you could:

• Embed files directly: Include JavaScript or CSS from your repo into a website without needing to host the files elsewhere.
• Quickly prototype: Easily share and test code by quickly referencing files.
• Bypass limitations: Avoid potential issues with GitHub s own raw file viewing which sometimes could introduce headers that caused conflicts.

Why it Shut Down

RawGit was a free, community-maintained service. It shut down for a few key reasons:

• Lack of Sustainable Funding: It was challenging to maintain the infrastructure needed to operate a service with high bandwidth requirements for free.
• Maintenance Burden: Maintaining a reliable service of this type, with the changing nature of Git platform APIs, required significant ongoing effort.
• Alternatives Emerged: As the service grew old, similar alternatives with better capabilities became available.
• Security Concerns: Serving files directly from repositories without careful handling can introduce potential security risks if not managed well by the user.

Revenue (When Active, None)

RawGit was entirely free and did not generate revenue. It was funded by a mix of user donations and the efforts of its maintainers. This reliance on goodwill proved unsustainable in the long run.

Alternatives to RawGit

Since RawGit is defunct, you need to look at alternative solutions. Here are the most popular:

1. jsDelivr:

   • Overview: A free, open-source CDN that serves files from npm, GitHub, and other sources. It s designed for high performance and is a popular choice for JavaScript libraries and other assets.
   • Pricing: Free.
   • Pros: Fast, reliable, supports versioning, global CDN.
   • Cons: You need to structure your project in a way that can be consumed by jsDelivr.
   • Customer Care: Community support, limited direct customer care.

2. UNPKG:

   • Overview: A fast, global CDN for everything on npm. It s incredibly easy to use and is specifically tailored for JavaScript packages.
   • Pricing: Free.
   • Pros: Simple to use, good performance, directly fetches from npm.
   • Cons: Primarily designed for npm packages, less flexible if you need to serve assets from custom folders in a git repo.
   • Customer Care: Community support.

3. GitHub Pages:

   • Overview: A static site hosting service directly integrated with GitHub. While primarily used to host websites, you can access raw files if they are part of your GitHub Pages site structure.
   • Pricing: Free for public repositories, paid for private repositories.
   • Pros: Integrated with GitHub, good performance, easy to configure.
   • Cons: Requires structuring your content in a way that GitHub pages understands. Not designed explicitly for raw file access, but works as a workaround.
   • Customer Care: GitHub Support for issues with GitHub Pages itself.

4. GitLab Pages:

   • Overview: Similar to GitHub Pages, but for GitLab repositories. Can also be used for serving static assets from git repositories.
   • Pricing: Free for public and private repositories.
   • Pros: Integrated with GitLab, free for private repos.
   • Cons: Requires structuring your content in a way that GitLab pages understands. Not designed explicitly for raw file access, but works as a workaround.
   • Customer Care: GitLab support for issues with GitLab Pages itself.

5. Your Own CDN (e.g., AWS CloudFront, Cloudflare CDN):

   • Overview: Setting up a more professional CDN gives you full control and can offer very high performance. However, it requires more technical knowledge and setup.
   • Pricing: Variable, depending on your chosen provider and usage.
   • Pros: Full control, highly configurable, high performance, good support.
   • Cons: More complex to set up, can be costly if not configured correctly.
   • Customer Care: Depends on the provider chosen.

Pricing Comparison:

• jsDelivr, UNPKG: Free.
• GitHub Pages: Free for public repos, paid for private repos.
• GitLab Pages: Free for public and private repos.
• Your Own CDN: Variable, depending on the provider and usage.

Customer Care (When RawGit was active - Minimal)

RawGit had minimal customer care when it was active. It was primarily a self-service tool, and support was limited to community forums or direct communication with the maintainers, when they were available. There was no dedicated customer care team. Since it s defunct, there s no customer care to discuss.

Key Takeaways

• RawGit is no longer available.
• You must use an alternative service if you require the functionality it provided.
• jsDelivr and UNPKG are popular, free alternatives.
• GitHub Pages and GitLab Pages are good options if you need to host assets alongside a static site.
• Setting up your own CDN gives you more control but is more complex and often more costly.

When choosing an alternative, consider your needs, budget, technical comfort level, and how you plan to structure your assets. If you need to serve from Git repositories, jsDelivr is often the closest equivalent to what RawGit offered.