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FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

colatkinson.site

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Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#121

Post by nordsieck »

kjksf wrote: post #115
znpy wrote: post #114

I am afraid there's nothing people can do about this issue: according to https://github.com/osxfuse/osxfuse/blob/master/LICENSE.txt the project is BSD licensed and AFAIK closing the sources of a BSD-licensed project ("re-licensing") is allowed. Yep, he's allowed to do this and people basically have to suck it up. This couldn't have happened if the code was GPL-licensed. This might be a good occasion take a moment to…

Cursory look at recent checkins seems to indicate that he wrote all the code. As the copyright holder of the code he could re-license it the same way even if it was GPL.

> Cursory look at recent checkins seems to indicate that he wrote all the code.

1. There are github commits not by him in the project.

2. There are lots of copyright assertions scattered through the project. The first one I ran into was:

> Copyright (c) 2006-2008 Amit Singh/Google Inc.

but I'm sure there are way more than that.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#122

Post by kakwa_ »

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…

Well, in this specific case, I think the best outcome would be for Apple to merge the module in the MAC OSX kernel so it's there by default, FUSE is kind of a de-facto standard and is clearly a widely useful piece of code.

But, big picture, yes a lot of OSS projects have the same issue. Funding is clearly one aspect, but another aspect is also to work on having less "single person projects" (and I'm not talking about one time PRs but a genuine second core developer). I'm not sure how to encourage that however, maybe more commonly adding "HELP WANTED!" in the project README, maybe a button "I want to become a permanent contributor of " button in Github, I don't know. If you are alone on a project, even if funded, chances are you will loss interest after a while, leaving the project with tons of possible improvements not realized, and a on/off maintenance, having more "N>1 core developers projects" would help mitigate that.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#123

Post by aembleton »

larodi wrote: post #95

this quite reminds of the openssl saga, but on a smaller scale, with single developer more or less responsible for world's encryption for decade. it's a pity, it's a shame that companies who use FOSS benefit, but do not understand (or do, but ignore) the idea of FOSS, which is to give back to community. this also includes other FOSS companies, etc as everyone uses openssl, zlib and sqlite. to base a project on FOSS r…

Why should companies give back when the code was licenced in such a way as to not require it?

If a developer works on a project and wants commercial companies to give back then they can choose a suitable licence such as GPLv3; if they just want to get their code out there and don't really mind how it's used then BSD is more suitable.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#124

Post by progval »

znpy wrote: post #114

I am afraid there's nothing people can do about this issue: according to https://github.com/osxfuse/osxfuse/blob/master/LICENSE.txt the project is BSD licensed and AFAIK closing the sources of a BSD-licensed project ("re-licensing") is allowed. Yep, he's allowed to do this and people basically have to suck it up. This couldn't have happened if the code was GPL-licensed. This might be a good occasion take a moment to…

> I am afraid there's nothing people can do about this issue

There is: offer the maintainer a decent (probably part-time) wage for working on this while keeping it open source.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#125

Post by adrianN »

atq2119 wrote: post #63
mike_d wrote: post #13

It is buried in the footnotes of the post, but the ultimate reason behind going closed source is that Google built their enterprise GDrive syncing client for mac off a fork of osxfuse. The original author of osxfuse feels entitled to some compensation for that and is doing his damnedest to make it happen.

That's why I prefer the GPL and variants for personal projects that I don't intend to profit off monetarily. It's a conscious choice that I do want compensation, and I don't want to work for free"--but said compensation should be in code and not necessarily in money. It's why contributing to a BSD-licensed project as a hobby can feel a bit icky, and doing the same on a GPL-licensed project doesn't.

If I don't want my code to be used in a commercial setting I use AGPL. It's super-banned in every company for which I know the open source policies. It's also the most sensible open source license in today's SAAS world.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#126

Post by zem »

think of it this way - like all the other companies, he's maintained his own private fork of the open source osxfuse code. his happens to work on catalina, and he's telling those companies that if their forks do not, he's willing to sell them access to his code.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#127

Post by adrianN »

pilif wrote: post #116

Nitpick: > Now this may come as a shock to some of you, but Apple really doesn’t seem to like it when third party developers change just about anything about their UX > Deploying a kext requires it be signed using a special Kernel Extension Signing Certificate, which can only be acquired from Apple this restriction has nothing to do with them not liking people doing stuff about their UX and everything to do about the…

Forbidding users from doing dangerous stuff with the machines they own is not good imho.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#128

Post by saagarjha »

captn3m0 wrote: post #76

I had a project planned for iOS[0] that would have been so much better if it could use FUSE, but looks like it can't happen now. If someone wants to try, having a generic link between FUSE and File Providers in iOS will be a great addition. You could make a generic application that interoperates various FUSE projects against the File Provider API in iOS, so you could mount all sort of crazy stuff in iOS Files applica…

MacFUSE requires deep hooks into the kernel to work correctly. Do you think the File Provider API is sufficient for this purpose?

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#129

Post by hmottestad »

znpy wrote: post #114

I am afraid there's nothing people can do about this issue: according to https://github.com/osxfuse/osxfuse/blob/master/LICENSE.txt the project is BSD licensed and AFAIK closing the sources of a BSD-licensed project ("re-licensing") is allowed. Yep, he's allowed to do this and people basically have to suck it up. This couldn't have happened if the code was GPL-licensed. This might be a good occasion take a moment to…

There is one huge thing that can be done about this. Push the commercial users of osxfuse to penny up and share some profit. According to the article they are using osxfuse for free and not contributing any code back either.

If you use software that is dependent on osxfuse....send an email to your sales contact and let them know that they need to contribute back to the community.

Re: FUSE for macOS is no longer open source

#130

Post by tonyedgecombe »

rahuldottech wrote: post #75
hizanberg wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make it sound like there's a tonne of FOSS community on-hand just waiting for the chance to step in and create a popular fork that will lead to fragmentation, when he's effectively been the sole maintainer since 2012 [1]. It's far more likely there will no future well maintained OSS forks, he'll continue developing it as a closed-source product, allowing end-users to install it for free but any company who wants…

1. I'm sorry if I make it sound like that, definitely not my intention. I recognize that there's a serious lack of volunteers and contributors in the FOSS ecosystem. 2. When it comes to FOSS encryption software, it is important that it's audited every-so-often. Relying on closed-source frameworks makes that impossible. All FOSS software may not be scrutinized, but it's a definite advantage that it can be, when the ne…

Has FUSE for macos ever been audited?
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