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Give up GitHub: The time has come

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Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#531

Post by eikenberry »

rglullis wrote: post #423
eikenberry wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a strong Free Software supporter on HN that uses Github I'll take a shot. I use Github to publicly host my projects. I use github as I want them as public as possible and that is where all the people are.. I.E. it has the lowest friction for others. The tradeoff is a bit of extra work on yourself to make sure you keep the 'git' part of your repo the central thing. Use the hosting as extras appropriately, but don't…

Hosting your projects on Github is not an issue. The issue is hosting your projects only on Github, or depending on it for anything other than visibility. I have my own gitea for private projects, but the open source one I host primarily on Gitlab. It's where I set up the CI, it's where I have pages, docs, etc. I do have a mirror on Github, but on the "Contributing" section from the README I make it clear where I pre…

My primary hosting for all my personal projects in my laptop. Github is the mirror of my local git repo.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#532

Post by rglullis »

eikenberry wrote: post #531
rglullis wrote: post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hosting your projects on Github is not an issue. The issue is hosting your projects only on Github, or depending on it for anything other than visibility. I have my own gitea for private projects, but the open source one I host primarily on Gitlab. It's where I set up the CI, it's where I have pages, docs, etc. I do have a mirror on Github, but on the "Contributing" section from the README I make it clear where I pre…

My primary hosting for all my personal projects in my laptop. Github is the mirror of my local git repo.

If you are not expecting other people to collaborate with you and if you do the same local hosting for your CI and issue tracking, etc... Fine, I guess?

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#533

Post by redeeman »

Volundr wrote: post #526
redeeman wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nobody is forcing anyone to use the code. until the time comes when a tax department gets the funny idea to use it, and forced you to use it, or people with guns come to your door and haul you away in the morning. (edit: formatting)

Do you have an example of someone being forced to incorporate GPLed code into their software at gunpoint, or is this a wildly hypothetical scenario?

of course not, but the point was about end users

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#534

Post by redeeman »

3np wrote: post #411
redeeman wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nobody is forcing anyone to use the code. until the time comes when a tax department gets the funny idea to use it, and forced you to use it, or people with guns come to your door and haul you away in the morning. (edit: formatting)

I really can't see the code being GPL being an issue in that case. What license would you have preferred?

its not about whether its a problem in real life, its about whether the end user might be forced to use a product, which IS a thing, that that is the ONLY point I made

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#535

Post by eikenberry »

rglullis wrote: post #532
eikenberry wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My primary hosting for all my personal projects in my laptop. Github is the mirror of my local git repo.

If you are not expecting other people to collaborate with you and if you do the same local hosting for your CI and issue tracking, etc... Fine, I guess?

I only worry about collaboration via github. I don't need an issue tracker or CI on my local repo. Github issues and PRs are discussions, not records. That's the point of the self contained repo commit messages.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#536

Post by keonix »

redeeman wrote: post #533
Volundr wrote: post #526

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have an example of someone being forced to incorporate GPLed code into their software at gunpoint, or is this a wildly hypothetical scenario?

of course not, but the point was about end users

GPL restricts only developers. As an end user restrictions don't even apply to you

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#537

Post by rglullis »

eikenberry wrote: post #535
rglullis wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are not expecting other people to collaborate with you and if you do the same local hosting for your CI and issue tracking, etc... Fine, I guess?

I only worry about collaboration via github. I don't need an issue tracker or CI on my local repo. Github issues and PRs are discussions, not records. That's the point of the self contained repo commit messages.

You seem to be under the impression that OP was criticizing your approach. Your usage of Github is not representative of the majority of cases. You are only in Github for visibility, and the commit history/repo hosting are already distributed, which is fine. You can move away at any time.

What OP was criticizing was these larger FOSS projects who don't seem to mind that they are doing all their work on a closed platform, and that they have a lot to lose if Github decides to pull the rug from under them.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#538

Post by BlitzGeology91 »

elcomet wrote: post #428
naikrovek wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want to know what stuff you guys are putting in public GitHub FOSS repos that you don't want replicated in any way... I also want to know why people think their code is so special that no one else could have ever come up with it independently. Each and every opponent of Copilot is the best developer ever, I guess? That said, I don't understand the choice to use GPL for any reason, so maybe I'm not equipped to under…

This is a very "american" definition of freedom, which is basically, just let me do what I want. GPL uses a different definition of freedom, which I prefer. They look at consequences of restrictions / permissions, and their implication on freedom (not just for me, but for everyone). So some restrictions can lead to actually more freedom, while some permissions can actually decrease freedom. This is similar to gun-con…

> This is a very "american" definition of freedom, which is basically, just let me do what I want.

Eh. I see what you’re saying about gun control, but the idea that “some restrictions can lead to actually more freedom, while some permissions can actually decrease freedom” is actually very American.

The free software movement says that everyone deserves software freedom. The Declaration of Independence similarly says “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” While I haven’t found a source confirming it, I think that the founders believed that the freedom of speech was one of these unalienable rights.

The GPL puts restrictions in place to make sure that downstream projects give users software freedom. The Constitution put restrictions in place to ensure that the federal (and nowadays the entire) government doesn’t interfere with our unalienable rights.

Take a look at how the first amendment is worded:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

The first amendment does not grant the freedom of speech because it doesn’t need to be granted. From the founders’ perspective, god already grants the freedom of speech to everyone forever. The key phrase here is “Congress shall make no law”. The first amendment is restricting Congress to ensure freedom.

The idea that “some permissions can actually decrease freedom” is also present in the Constitution. For example, take a look at Article I sections 8 and 9. The framers of the Constitution could have given Congress the power to pass any law. Instead, they chose to specifically enumerate what Congress can and cannot do.

Perhaps, though, most Americans don’t know much about our founding and think that freedom=just let me do what I want. I don’t know.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#539

Post by pabs3 »

natefinch wrote: post #528
pabs3 wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is copilot not the author?

Copilot is software, it can't be the author, just like the OS isn't the author when you copy and paste. Authors have to be humans.

Copy and paste doesn't really write code, just copies it from one place to another. Copilot on the other hand does generate new potentially novel code.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#540

Post by eikenberry »

rglullis wrote: post #537
eikenberry wrote: post #535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I only worry about collaboration via github. I don't need an issue tracker or CI on my local repo. Github issues and PRs are discussions, not records. That's the point of the self contained repo commit messages.

You seem to be under the impression that OP was criticizing your approach. Your usage of Github is not representative of the majority of cases. You are only in Github for visibility, and the commit history/repo hosting are already distributed, which is fine. You can move away at any time. What OP was criticizing was these larger FOSS projects who don't seem to mind that they are doing all their work on a closed platf…

I went off a bit into more personal cases in the thread. But my original post was aimed at other/larger projects. If they maintained a proper git repo and used the platform tools as secondary tools (eg. discussion oriented instead of record oriented) then they wouldn't be locked into Github. I agree that a bunch of ones don't do it correctly and put the context that should be in the repo/messages into the PRs or issues. That is a mistake. But switching from Github won't help that... they'll just do the same thing elsewhere and lock themselves into that site or tool (ie. lockin doesn't require a service, just tools that do more than manage the repo).
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