Hi,
I'm currently in the early stages of starting a new Free Software initiative for knowledge workers. One thing that bothers me is where to host the development infrastructure. I would like to avoid self hosting at the moment for time reasons.
Until a while ago there was Gitorious, which seemed to fulfill my requirements for a Free Software hosting site since it was built on Free Software. Since its acquisition through Gitlab, that just provides an open core model, I think of it no better than of Github.
Github did a fine job in providing reliable hosting but its non-free from its base up.
GNU and nonGNU could be an option yet I think that the TOS are too harsh in demanding the software not being linked against non-free libraries or (only) run on non-free operating systems, which AFAIK would e.g. forbid to integrate Software hosted there with proprietary software like MS Outlook or builds for Android/Linux or Sailfish OS (not to speak of iOS).
I want to create 100% Free Software but not force its users to rely 100% on Free Software to run it (I would wish for that, but I also like freedom of choice for end users that are not yet ready to switch).
The software will of course be full featured without any proprietary software, integration would just enhance the experience of the users already using non-free software.
Only since i started to think about these issues e.g. bull.codes (and probably billions of other services I've never heard of) went into distinction. So where should I preferrable host a Free Software project in 2015 (and a forseeable future)?
Christian
* Christian Kalkhoff:
GNU and nonGNU could be an option yet I think that the TOS are too harsh in demanding the software not being linked against non-free libraries or (only) run on non-free operating systems, which AFAIK would e.g. forbid to integrate Software hosted there with proprietary software like MS Outlook or builds for Android/Linux or Sailfish OS (not to speak of iOS).
I suspect this could be negotiated if necessary.
There is also Alioth (from Debian), the Apache and Eclipse foundations (which are pretty heavyweight on process). And Gitlab is at least open core.
Hi Christian,
after having a similar discussion in the Austria/Switzerland/Germany country teams a (at the moment still beta) summary has been created [1]. There you can already find some pro/con arguments and some alternatives. When you and others will find other noteworthy solutions or points, please feel free to edit the wiki accordingly.
# Christian Kalkhoff [23.08.2015 @ 14:44]:
I would like to avoid self hosting at the moment for time reasons.
Fair enough. However, some people from CH had good experiences with a self-hosted GitBucket instance: https://freie.software Maybe you can use theirs or try it yourself.
Best, Max
[1] https://wiki.fsfe.org/PositionOnVCS
My two pence. Or euro cents:
Other reviews I have seen on libre planet and trisquel mailing lists:
https://snowdrift.coop/p/snowdrift/w/en/formats-repositories#fully-flo-sourc...
https://jxself.org/goodbye-gitorious.shtml
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_open-source_software_hosting_f...
With regards to funding, snowdrift.coop seems interesting proposal.
On Sun, Aug 23, 2015 at 2:44 PM, Christian Kalkhoff softmetz@fsfe.org wrote:
Hi, I'm currently in the early stages of starting a new Free Software initiative for knowledge workers. One thing that bothers me is where to host the development infrastructure. I would like to avoid self hosting at the moment for time reasons. Until a while ago there was Gitorious, which seemed to fulfill my requirements for a Free Software hosting site since it was built on Free Software. Since its acquisition through Gitlab, that just provides an open core model, I think of it no better than of Github.
There is certainly difference between software which is 90% free and software which is 0% free software.
Github did a fine job in providing reliable hosting but its non-free from its base up.
That's pretty much the same as all the software you use "as a service". That is from the routers involved to transfer packets, to the actual software running the service.
I want to create 100% Free Software but not force its users to rely 100% on Free Software to run it (I would wish for that, but I also like freedom of choice for end users that are not yet ready to switch).
I am not sure whether the same principles should be applied to services. When I download (free software) files from the internet, I don't have the requirement for all the components involved in the process (routers, screens, ...) to consist only of free software. I don't see why free software hosting should be different.
regards, Nikos
I am not sure whether the same principles should be applied to services. When I download (free software) files from the internet, I don't have the requirement for all the components involved in the process (routers, screens, ...) to consist only of free software. I don't see why free software hosting should be different.
I don't have the requirement either but it would be nice if I did. Why support by using downloadable local free software and not service free software? I could eventually use it locally.
Just as it would be nice to stop using windows after all the software used on top of it is free software and found in gnu/Linux distros.
Aiming high and stop where you can.
On Monday 24. August 2015 16.25.40 Andrés Muñiz Piniella wrote:
I am not sure whether the same principles should be applied to services. When I download (free software) files from the internet, I don't have the requirement for all the components involved in the process (routers, screens, ...) to consist only of free software. I don't see why free software hosting should be different.
I don't have the requirement either but it would be nice if I did. Why support by using downloadable local free software and not service free software? I could eventually use it locally.
That's one good reason. Another one, which you see with GitHub, is the cultivation of the idea that you have to use some proprietary service because it is the only thing providing the nice features.
While that may not be true, if people are persuaded that it is not worth their time or effort bothering to write Free Software to address the same needs, soon enough the proprietary service really will be the only thing providing those nice features.
Just as it would be nice to stop using windows after all the software used on top of it is free software and found in gnu/Linux distros.
Aiming high and stop where you can.
Quite. If people readily concede things that actually could be done using Free Software, the scope of application of Free Software is reduced, whereas we should be trying to expand it.
Paul