GitLab: projects and other admin tools

Author: ben

en/book/04-git-server/chapter4.asc

@@ -679,18 +679,35 @@ These range from ``Guest'' (issues and chat only) to ``Owner'' (full control of
 The types of permissions are too numerous to list here, but GitLab has a helpful link on the administration screen.
 
 ===== Projects
-* Visibility levels
-* Labels
+
+A GitLab project roughly corresponds to a single git repository.
+Every project belongs to a single namespace, either a user or a group.
+If the project belongs to a user, the owner of the project has direct control over who has access to the project; if the project belongs to a group, the group's user-level permissions will also take effect.
+
+Every project has a visibility level, which controls who has read access to that project's pages and repository.
+If a project is _Private_, the project's owner must explicitly grant access to specific users.
+An _Internal_ project is visible to any logged-in user, and a _Public_ project is visible to anyone.
+Note that this controls both git "fetch" access as well as access to the web UI for that project.
+
+Projects can also have labels, which can help organize projects across namespaces.
+The projects dashboard page can filter the displayed repositories by one or more labels.
+This is helpful if you have a large number of projects in different groups, but that relate in some way.
 
 ===== Other Tools
-* Hooks
-* Logs
-* Messages
+
+GitLab includes support for *Hooks*, both at a project or system level.
+For either of these, the GitLab server will perform an HTTP POST with some descriptive JSON whenever relevant events occur.
+This is a great way to connect your git repositories and GitLab instance to the rest of your development automation, such as CI servers, chat rooms, or deployment tools.
+
+The *Message* feature is useful to broadcast information about the system to all users.
+A maximum of one message is visible at any given time, and every message has a window of time during which it is visible to any user (including anonymous ones).
 
 [[gitlab_message]]
 .How a message is displayed.
 image::images/gitlab-broadcast.png[How a message is displayed.]
 
+This is typically used for system status information (_"The server will be undergoing maintenance…"_), but administrative users have full control over the content and color scheme.
+
 ==== Basic Operation
 
 * Creating a project
@@ -705,8 +722,6 @@ image::images/gitlab-broadcast.png[How a message is displayed.]
 * Issues
 * The Wall
 
-==== Summary
-
 === Gerrit
 
 === Other Hosting Options