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Abstract vs Plant performance

almost 6 years ago from , UX Designer

Hi guys! I've been using Abstract for some time and though I generally like it - I've been really struggling with its performance. Opening files & committing always take lot's of time which is annoying. But the real bummer is that it makes my sketch soooooo slow. I suppose this is not only my issue, as similar problems were described here: https://blog.prototypr.io/abstract-vs-kactus-vs-plant-a-guide-of-version-control-solutions-for-sketch-7da0a8ab5105

So I'm really tempted to switch to Plant...if it makes any difference... Can anyone share their experience working with it especially on huge files? Thanks!

12 comments

  • Ravi Shanker, almost 6 years ago

    My main project file (500+ artboards) has been on Plant since the 1st beta. Performance has generally been good. Since it's just a plugin within Sketch, there haven't been any slowdowns w.r.t performance.

    My org is evaluating Abstract & I'm really loving the branching & collaboration features. Haven't really noticed slowdown yet but Sketch did crash a few times.

    We also tried Kactus but the JSON garbage it threw up on our 1000+ sketch files took ages to clean up. Also, the main reason we wanted to work with Kactus was it support for Gitlab (which we run & maintain in-house) but Kactus wouldn't work unless you also buy the Github Enterprise Plan.

    We also tried out Folio for Mac. Had two big advantages

    • Worked with our in-house GitLab instance
    • Support for other file formats, mainly PSD & AI

    The app is pretty good but have to keep switch to it to perform any actions rather than being able to trigger it from within Sketch/PS/AI. Previews are rendered using the native mac interface, don't think it takes advantage of Sketch's JSON file format for rendering individual artboards. Collaboration & conflict resolution is not possible with Folio

    4 points
  • Martin Tsiu, almost 6 years ago

    I gave up Plant because I think it lacks of project managing.

    I gave up Kactus because it would generate many json files(to me,these are garbage,they made my repo dirty!Maybe I should ignore these files).

    I'm using Abstract now,but it can not rely on Github repo,that's a problem.

    4 points
    • Tim Kjær LangeTim Kjær Lange, almost 6 years ago

      I'm leaning towards Kactus in my team.

      The main reason why I want to avoid Abstract is contingency. I'm sure Abstract is a great company that'll be here in hundred years, but what happens in the off chance that they fold?

      I tried out Kactus and I know it has to do some magic to show the visual diffs, but what I like about it is that it depends on git, so I'll still have a working repo if Kactus goes belly up.

      What was your experience with Kactus in general?

      1 point
    • Aaron WadeAaron Wade, almost 6 years ago

      Your last point resonates with me in such a huge way. Not being able to push our designs to a remote (our dev team’s origin) sucks.

      Hopefully Abstract has this on the roadmap.

      1 point
    • Mathieu Dutour, over 5 years ago

      I gave up Kactus because it would generate many json files(to me,these are garbage,they made my repo dirty!Maybe I should ignore these files).

      The JSON files aren't garbage, they are the actual files that are version controlled ;) git doesn't understand a "sketch" file, so it needs text files to work its magic. That what Kactus is doing: transforming a sketch file into text files and vice versa

      0 points
  • Account deleted almost 6 years ago

    Plant is a weird workaround relies on manual manipulation of the versions works only for dribble works. Abstract is actual versioning tool can be used complex projects.

    3 points
  • ahder junior, almost 6 years ago

    absolutely abstract. abstract provide a good UX and easy to use. and also highly structured app for versioning.

    1 point
  • Kevin Tufts, over 4 years ago

    A few members of my design org has been using Abstract to manage our Design System. We have been experiencing major performance issues with large libs.

    Just recently, another design org within my company has started evaluating Folio.

    I love the Git style branch/commit/merge functionality within Abstract but the performance issues have really caused us to look elsewhere.

    Does anyone have comments on Folio's performance VS Abstract?

    0 points
  • Alexandru NăstaseAlexandru Năstase, over 5 years ago

    Been using Abstract, no problems at all, not even with performance or errors. The only downfall is that is Sketch Only.

    0 points
  • Ktrn DsrsKtrn Dsrs, almost 6 years ago

    I personally think about giving a try to this with our professional business Github account at my job:

    kactus.io

    0 points