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Open Source Programming

FSF Plans to Launch 'Forge', a Code-Hosting/Collaboration Platform (fsf.org) 40

Posted by EditorDavid from the sharing-the-software dept.
An anonymous reader quotes SD Times: The Free Software Foundation (FSF) announced plans to launch a public code hosting and collaboration platform ("forge") this year. Members of the FSF tech team are currently reviewing ethical web-based software that will help teams work on their projects, with features like merge requests, bug tracking, and other common tools.

"Infrastructure is very important for free software, and it's unfortunate that so much free software development currently relies on sites that don't publish their source code, and require or encourage the use of proprietary software," FSF wrote in a blog post. "Our GNU ethical repository criteria aim to set a high standard for free software code hosting, and we hope to meet that with our new forge."

As of now, the team said it has been researching a list of candidate programs and analyzing them in terms of ethical and practical criteria.
The FSF blog post adds that "We plan on contributing improvements upstream for the new forge software we choose, to boost its score on those criteria...

"We'll communicate with the upstream developers to request improvements and help clarify any questions related to the ethical repository criteria."
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FSF Plans to Launch 'Forge', a Code-Hosting/Collaboration Platform More

FSF Plans to Launch 'Forge', a Code-Hosting/Collaboration Platform

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  • Savannah [gnu.org] has been the GNU-sponsored repository for free software for a very long time. It seems very odd, to the point of disingenuity, to claim that the FSF is going to now launch a free Forge platform without discussing why Savannah's platform is inadequate or what will happen to Savannah.

    • Re: No mention of Savannah? (Score:4, Informative)

      by phantomfive ( 622387 ) on Sunday March 08, 2020 @12:15PM (#59808440) Journal
      The blog post mentions Savannah, but only to assure that Savannah will continue to operate. My guess is they are trying to convince github to support the GPL by making a direct competitor, but they don't say. That kind of strategy has worked before (for example, getting Sun to open source Java by forking OpenOffice).

      • My guess is they are trying to convince github to support the GPL

        Github already supports the GPL [github.com]

        Perhaps you mean they want Github to require exclusive use of the GPL. That is not going to happen and would not be a good thing.

        Or perhaps that Github releases its own code under the GPL. Git is already GPL. The glue code that runs the site is not open source, but that is not much code.

        • Perhaps you mean they want Github to require exclusive use of the GPL.

          I should have said 'promote' instead of 'support', that would have been more accurate.

    • GNU Savannah has deep ideological restrictions.

      Unlike SourceForge or GitHub, Savannah's focus is for hosting free software projects and has very strict hosting policies, including a ban against the use of non-free formats (such as Macromedia Flash) to ensure that only free software is hosted. When registering a project, project submitters have to state which free software license the project uses.

  • With Richard M. Stallman gone as head of the Free Software Foundation, will they be willing to compromise on his founding principles? Becoming a centralized hosting platform is a challenge. especially since it's easily abused and they'll have very few funds to protect the FSF and other members from legal challenges to the copyrights of any material hosted there.Github, gforce, and sourceforge at least have some assets and legal counsel set aside. But the FSF has always been a cash-poor non-profit.

    It also ma

    • Re: It's an interesting issue with RMS gone (Score:4, Interesting)

      by phantomfive ( 622387 ) on Sunday March 08, 2020 @12:18PM (#59808444) Journal
      In the blot post, they list what they mean by ethical. The only one that stuck out to me as obviously different was the non-discrimination clause (can't discriminate against countries or classes of users). I can't remember RMS explicitly talking like that, but on the other hand I don't think he would disagree with it, either.

      • (can't discriminate against countries or classes of users). I can't remember RMS explicitly talking like that

        RMS has long held that position and has explicitly said so.

        It first started back in the 1980s when a few projects banned the Apartheid government of South Africa from using their source code. RMS stated that the ban was a violation of the principles of free software. No GPL licensed code could have such a restriction.

        • Yeah, that is why I said, "I can't remember RMS explicitly talking like that," since in the past he has said similar things, but not in that way. In the South Africa example, he focused on "code being used for a purpose," whereas in this ethics listing, it focuses on "code used by groups of people." The difference is subtle but enough to make me wonder if someone other than RMS wrote it. But that is why I used the specific wording I did.

          Another thing: they could be annoyed that the Github licensing situa

    • With Richard M. Stallman gone as head of the Free Software Foundation, will they be willing to compromise on his founding principles?

      I hope not. Once they abandon his principles, their reason for existing disappears.

      But the FSF has always been a cash-poor non-profit.

      Then perhaps they should stick to advocacy instead of starting a repository that is almost certainly going to be a money-sink.

  • Not that I don't appreciate their efforts, but I can't find any text that makes it apparent what exactly this "new" repository is going to bring to the table that I don't already get with BitBucket, GitHub, and a Long List of Others [wikipedia.org]?

    • Bitbucket and GitHub are service as a software substitute [gnu.org], and some of GitHub's practices (such as requiring use of non-free JavaScript and taking down projects in specific countries rather than globally) earn it a big fat F on GNU's ethics report card [gnu.org]. As far as I'm aware, they do not publish the code that powers the website as free software, as one of MIcrosoft's revenue streams comes from distributing copies of the GitHub software for a fee for use in privately hosted instances and subsequently restricti

      • Your own examples point out why this effort is confusing. Gitlab already exists and has for a long time for all those too pedantic to use GitHub. Savannah exists for those who are too pedantic to even use Gitlab. What is the point of this? It seems to me like a DOA vanity project.

    • Ideological purity. If you work for an ideologically bent organization, you'll be required to use it. The FSF will be first of course, but a hand full of others may follow suit. Otherwise, it really brings nothing to the table and will most likely be about as relevant and complete as Hurd.

  • Software ideology has nothing to do with ethics. As a developer, I need to know two things: 1) Is it secure? 2) Is it reliable? Bonus #3, is it free (as in beer)?

    • If you worked for me, you would also care about having the source available. If it's not, then we have to get into issues about how we will debug issues at the boundaries between our code and theirs, what the support model is, are we an important customer to them or not, and finally, how hard will it be to design them out.

  • Frankly I don't get it. They're open source AFAICT {MIT, sure, not GPL but whatevs).
    Anyhow, a Central point of failure like GitHub goes against the whole concept of 'distributed repo' which is git's strength. Everyone should self-host something and mirror those projects they care about, to prevent the whole left pad debacle. [theregister.co.uk]

  • Will it infect downloads with adware?

  • "... are currently reviewing ethical web-based software... " Wow. Licenses can be ethical (or not) but I'm trying to envision what ethical software looks like. Can't be security or privacy - different subjects - so that's not clear

  • Finally, this will be the year of GNU/Hurd/Linux on the desktop!
  • I am so excited you guys are doing this. Frankly, I thought open source had just become a marketing ploy. Fucking go for it.
  • CoC like?

  • you google for source and forge and ... well. pretty sure everyone knows source forge and it's probably also trademarked and as such fsf might get sued just straight up for making a "forge" for hosting source.

    and remember a forgery is still forged, especially if you're buying "forged" wheels.

  • The power isn't in the forum.

    It's in the coders and content.

    This is just marketing fodder.

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