Talking with developers & AI

Ticket / issue — A single unit of work tracked in a tool (GitHub Issues, Jira, Linear). Often has a number (#142) you can reference in chat or commits.

Repo (repository) — The folder of code + history stored in Git, usually on GitHub/GitLab. “Clone the repo” = copy it to your machine.

Branch — A parallel line of changes. main is usually the shared, stable line; feature branches are where you experiment before merging.

PR (pull request) / MR (merge request) — A proposal to merge one branch into another, with discussion and review.

Commit — A saved snapshot of changes with a message. History is a chain of commits.

Merge — Combine one branch’s commits into another.

Staging / production — Staging = environment for testing that behaves like real users; production = what customers actually hit.

Scope — What’s in or out for a piece of work (“out of scope” = we’re not doing that now).

RFC / spec — Written proposal or requirements before building. Helps align people and AI on the same picture.

MVP — Minimum viable product: the smallest version that proves the idea, not every dream feature.

Tech debt — Shortcuts taken earlier that will cost time to fix later — not shameful, but should be visible.

Blocker — Something stopping progress until resolved.

LGTM — “Looks good to me” — informal approval.

Rubber ducking — Explaining a problem out loud (to a person or AI) until you see the flaw in your own reasoning.