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FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

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Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#101

Post by sterlind »

f1refly wrote: post #84
pjmlp wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This will keep going on, until FOSS community accepts that beyond university projects, someone pumping up their CVs, having a company sponsorship, or being able to pimp it up with some kind of subscription/consulting, there is little to no money to be made and everyone has bills to pay.

No, this wouldn't have been a problem if the software had been gpl licensed, as the companies would've been forced to give back whatever they changed themselfes, potentially helping him out a lot

If it were GPL-licensed, they'd have to give back the whole Happy meal, not just the FUSE fries. Perhaps you're thinking about LGPL, or a linking exception of some kind?

Alternatively, he totally could have gone and dual-licensed GPL and a permissive commercial license as a monetization strategy, like the author pointed out.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#103

Post by RVuRnvbM2e »

hapless wrote: post #65

The heart of the matter is that a fairly small number of people on a proprietary UNIX are mad that they have to pay money to continue to be free riders on the Free Software movement. Mr Fleischer has done a huge amount of unpaid work so a narrow segment of wealthy software workers can avoid the choice between paying for proprietary software and supporting Free Software, after spending thousands of dollars on a MacOS…

HN's obsession with Apple means you're getting down voted. But you're not wrong.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#104

Post by hjmallon »

rossmohax wrote: post #85

Reading the article I cant understand, how is it possible for other companies distribute patched version of FUSE module, if they don't have certificate to sign it?

You can always build and sign something with your own cert (if you have a kext cert in this case)

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#105

Post by lloeki »

eecc wrote: post #51
Epskampie wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they allow one blessed developer to have a cert, only for historical reasons, leading to exactly this situation. That doesn’t seem like something to cheer about to me. Like it said in the article, a fork is impossible because they won’t get a cert. Also, my complaint is mostly that apple keeps changing their API’s, as you can also read in the article. All together this kind of stuff makes life needlessly hard o…

Uh no. There’s nothing that says Apple only allows 1 kext developer. The article only says that getting the dev cert is such a significant pain in the ass that only one has ever gone through the effort. Anyone motivated enough to fork MacFuse can apply. On a tangent: wouldn’t it be nice if all packages were signed? It would do the community a great service if an organization like Brew negotiated an agreement and impl…

> The article only says that getting the dev cert is such a significant pain in the ass that only one has ever gone through the effort. Anyone motivated enough to fork MacFuse can apply.

I've been there. It's not just "a royal pain".

I implemented a clean-room Xbox One controller kext to expose it as HID Class gamepad in macOS some years ago†. I paid the Apple dev license on my own dime, and applied multiple times for the dev cert to be upgraded to kext dev. I was rejected each time, the answers each time being entirely tone deaf. Apparently I'm not notable enough, not commercial enough, not big company enough to get either a kext dev cert or an exception in the kext whitelist as others did.

https://github.com/lloeki/xbox_one_controller/issues/2#issue...

† that was before they went bluetooth HID compliant, and anyway, even the new ones on USB are not exposed as USB HID.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#106

Post by int_19h »

eecc wrote: post #51
Epskampie wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they allow one blessed developer to have a cert, only for historical reasons, leading to exactly this situation. That doesn’t seem like something to cheer about to me. Like it said in the article, a fork is impossible because they won’t get a cert. Also, my complaint is mostly that apple keeps changing their API’s, as you can also read in the article. All together this kind of stuff makes life needlessly hard o…

Uh no. There’s nothing that says Apple only allows 1 kext developer. The article only says that getting the dev cert is such a significant pain in the ass that only one has ever gone through the effort. Anyone motivated enough to fork MacFuse can apply. On a tangent: wouldn’t it be nice if all packages were signed? It would do the community a great service if an organization like Brew negotiated an agreement and impl…

The discussion on GitHub strongly implies that it's more than effort, and that random people don't just get certificates regardless of effort, because Apple is being cagey and reluctant to issue them even to large and prominent companies. I wonder what the specifics of that are...

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#107

Post by quotemstr »

f1refly wrote: post #90
quotemstr wrote: post #11

When a FOSS project closes itself off this way, the proper response is to treat it as abandoned and continue development from the last-good version with source available. In particular, MacPorts should not be distributing the binary-only versions. Total disengagement.

It's not FOSS, it's just OSS. If it where free software, this whole drama wouldn't have happened.

Permissively-licensed software is still free software.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#108

Post by enitihas »

saagarjha wrote: post #52
Epskampie wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

apple kept changing/breaking Api’s to try to kill vlc so that they could try make money of the paid version of the QuickTime player which then existed. I must admit it was just comments made by VLC devs, so it’s anecdotal.

VLC is on Apple’s “must not break list” and gets special checkfixes in the OS, FWIW.

Source?

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#109

Post by hannob »

pjmlp wrote: post #69
hizanberg wrote: post #23

Likely the best outcome for the project barring company sponsorship that pays him to continue working on it as OSS. He's been the sole maintainer on the project since 2012 [1] and has never been compensated for it, he says it will always be free to end users but wants companies that are financially benefiting from it to help sponsor continued development [2]: > I will never ask end users for financial support. FUSE w…

This will keep going on, until FOSS community accepts that beyond university projects, someone pumping up their CVs, having a company sponsorship, or being able to pimp it up with some kind of subscription/consulting, there is little to no money to be made and everyone has bills to pay.

I'm really curious, what do you want the FOSS community exactly to accept and what would the outcome be?

There are some FOSS business models. Sometimes they work. Sometimes they don't. Overall there's more FOSS than ever before, it's an amazingly successful concept. It doesn't always work, some projects and companies fail or decide to stop being FOSS. That doesn't change the fact that it's an amazingly successful concept.

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