[Rush Stack](https://rushstack.io/) is an open-source collection of specialized
tooling for working with the world's largest source code repositories.

Providing support is often a challenge for open-source projects, especially when
maintainers are juggling internal investigations at work alongside their
open-source correspondence.  Yet to be successful, the Rush Stack community
needs to systematically handle questions and feedback.

Zulip makes it easy for the Rush Stack community to provide the level of support
required for mission-critical enterprise tools. “With Zulip, we have a system
that feels professional, where once a topic is opened, we can make sure that it
gets resolved,” says Rush Stack maintainer [Pete
Gonzalez](https://github.com/octogonz).


> “With Zulip, we have a system that feels professional.”
>
> — Rush Stack maintainer Pete Gonzalez


## Choosing a chat product? Focus on the features that matter.

Pete Gonzalez started researching chat platform options for the Rush Stack
community in early 2020, looking to replace Gitter. “I had worked on
[Yammer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viva_Engage), and even wrote my own
client, so I was thinking about chat apps very deeply,” Pete recalls. “Although
chat apps may seem similar, there are actually many subtle design tradeoffs
whose combination determines whether an app will work well for a particular use
case.”

Rush Stack needed a space for maintainers and community members to have serious,
long-running conversations. “Rush Stack discussions have the character of
support tickets,” Pete explains. “Someone can ask a question that might take two
years to finally solve.”

Pete identified Zulip as the best fit for the needs of the community. With
Zulip’s topic-based organization, conversations can run their course, with the
full context of the discussion easily at hand when someone has a new idea.
“Zulip gives you control,” Pete points out. “You can edit or move messages to
fix anything that might be incorrect or confusing, which is important for
long-running discussions.”


> “Zulip gives you control.”
>
> — Rush Stack maintainer Pete Gonzalez

To make the transition, Rush Stack imported the project’s full chat history from
Gitter into Zulip, making it an easily searchable resource. Enabling Zulip’s
feature for logging in with GitHub meant that users didn’t have to make new
accounts. Users could also control how their messages looked with familiar
Markdown formatting.


## “Zulip has better features for the way we use it”

Over the years, Pete had continued to keep an eye on the evolution of team chat
products. “Compared to Discord, Slack, GitHub discussions… Zulip has better
features for the way we use it,” he says.

Pete has seen open-source maintainers struggle to manage a Discord community:
“There are all these people asking questions… If an important question scrolls
out of view, how would you follow up? Maintainers end up giving up on community
management, leaving casual participants to sort things out on their own.”

Slack’s paid plans, which start at $8.75/user/month, are unaffordable for
community use. “You have to pay a lot for Slack history, and users can’t log in
with their GitHub account,” Pete says. On the free plan, communities have access
to just 90 days of message history, which is unworkable for a community with a
large knowledge base and long-running investigations.


> “Of all the apps I tested, Zulip’s approach stood out as the best fit for how
> we work.”
>
> — Rush Stack maintainer Pete Gonzalez


## Software that’s built in the open and always improving

Pete has been impressed by how Zulip handles user feedback. “I can go into the
development community to talk to them, and often the tech lead of the team will
reply,” he notes. “Even if their answer is that my request is a lower priority
right now, there is context to understand that. New features are always being
added, and with the team’s daily discussions being public, I can see what they
are working on and why. It’s a really different dynamic from trying to make
feature requests or bug reports for a closed source product with an invisible
engineering team.”


> “New features are always being added, and with the team’s daily discussions
> being public, I can see what they are working on and why.”
>
> — Rush Stack maintainer Pete Gonzalez

Pete was pleased to learn that organizations can now allow [public
access](/help/public-access-option) to channels. It lowers the bar for people to
view Zulip discussions that are linked from Rush Stack GitHub issues.

Pete has also seen Zulip’s onboarding experience transform over the past few
years. “In the past, Zulip was optimized for daily users, and so had a bit of a
learning curve for occasional Rush Stack participants. But the UX has improved a
lot in this regard. The [recent conversations](/help/recent-conversations) view
that’s been added has largely addressed the challenge for new users,” Pete says.
This view lists the topics being discussed, and is also the go-to for Pete to
check in on what’s happening.


> “The folks who make Zulip listen to customers, and the product continues to
> improve.”
>
> — Rush Stack maintainer Pete Gonzalez

---

Check out our guide on using Zulip for [open source](/for/open-source/), and
learn how Zulip [helps communities scale](/for/communities/)!
