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We can for sure understand that one is not available all time. Everyone has a life, and sometimes need many weeks away, etc. This is not the reason of the fork

We can for sure understand that one is not available all time. Everyone has a life, and sometimes need many weeks away, etc. This is not the reason of the fork. The reason is that he refuses to give more people write access to the project to keep it going. Before the first time he went AFK, he even removed write access from the 2 or 3 other people that had it.

Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
That's his prerogative. Learn patience. Not all PRs have to be merged on your schedule. As a FOSS maintainer myself this sort of behavior sickens me and reeks of entitlement. Gogs is worse off for your involvement.
- Mithaldu 10y ago
  Forking when you're unhappy about something and can't come to an agreement is EXACTLY what OSS is about. Saying this as another OSS maintainer.
  - Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
    I would completely understand and agree if they had a rational reason for forking, but they don't. I have a very low opinion of unwarranted forks.
    - akerl_ 10y ago
      Why does somebody forking need to justify that their fork is warranted based on your standards?
      - Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
        They don't, but I'm free to express my distate for them if they do. That goes for much in life. Forking is not a decision to be taken lightly. Even the most just fork will fracture the community and weaken the software's development. Contributors are now being asked to take sides and both sides are getting fewer contributions. The stress this puts on the original maintainers is also non-trivial. Look at ffmpeg/libav. It forked for similar reasons on the surface, but in reality it was to forcibly take control of the vernerable project over petty disagreements. For years the users and developers suffered alike as libav was shipped by default in Debian due to politics and received subpar workmanship and more security vulnerabilities that were fixed on slower schedules, all while taking contributors and users away from ffmpeg. After nearly a decade libav is finally dead in the water and ffmpeg is becoming the default on Debian again, but not after lots and lots of damage to the project. On the other hand, you have examples like nodejs/iojs, where there were much more tangible reasons and alternative solutions were explored longer and more earnestly, and they regretfully were forced to fork for the good of the ecosystem. And they were right, eventually the two projects merged together under better oversight. But the gitea folks do not have nearly as much clout behind their efforts IMO, and as a result their move to fork is extremely harmful to gogs development.
- irishsultan 10y ago
  It's his prerogative to do that, it's theirs to fork the project.
- sdesol 10y ago
  > Not all PRs have to be merged on your schedule Considering how fast GitLab is moving, if Gogs/Gitea wants to remain relevant, they really have to move at a much faster pace than they use to. Judging by Unknwon's comment in this issue https://github.com/gogits/gogs/issues/1304 https://github.com/gogits/gogs/issues/1304 it seems like Gogs is driven by a passion and it doesn't matter at the end if he is the only user. As he puts it > Gogs isn't a business, making it is what I love to do I'm not sure if his stance has changed, since this issue was from July. I'm also not sure, if he fully realizes he is sitting on a potential golden goose. The market for Git hosting in Enterprise is still very much up for grabs.
  - Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
    Your mindset is totally whack. Gogs does not have to compete with GitLab, it can fill its own niche. Who are you to tell him how to use his "golden goose"? Why does it need to be a business? Jesus christ.
    - xj9 10y ago
      yes, but it can, and if people want it to, it should. besides, why wouldn't you want it to be a business? businesses make money, which can pay for development of new features and better support for users. sounds like a win to me.
    - irishsultan 10y ago
      So gogs can be that and gitea can be something else, why are you still thinking that they don't have a good reason for their fork if they have different ideas about which niche they want to serve.
      - Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
        Because gogs will suffer for it and that's a hell of a way to thank the project that you took the first 95% of your work from. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13297748 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13297748
- madeofpalk 10y ago
  > That's his prerogative Sure. 100%. It's up to him for how he wants to run an OSS project. In the same way, if people in the community have different ideas they're more than welcome to fork. If you don't want that to happen, either listen more to the community or don't open source a project.
sangnoir 10y ago
> This is not the reason of the fork. The reason is that he refuses to give more people write access to the project to keep it going Others don't need write access "to keep the project going" unless they intend to ship releases without him/her- they can make PRs and the maintainer will merge them when they are back. Perhaps the Gitea committers want a more predictable release cadence? I agree that a fork is probably the best solution here, due to the impedance mismatch, the forkers don't seem to be fans of the BDFL model. Additionally, "community" is a much wider term than how you used it, it's not just other contributors but also includes users and bug reporters. I wish Gitea the best of luck, but I'll remain a Gogs user.

Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago

That's his prerogative. Learn patience. Not all PRs have to be merged on your schedule. As a FOSS maintainer myself this sort of behavior sickens me and reeks of entitlement. Gogs is worse off for your involvement.

Mithaldu 10y ago
Forking when you're unhappy about something and can't come to an agreement is EXACTLY what OSS is about. Saying this as another OSS maintainer.
- Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
  I would completely understand and agree if they had a rational reason for forking, but they don't. I have a very low opinion of unwarranted forks.
  - akerl_ 10y ago
    Why does somebody forking need to justify that their fork is warranted based on your standards?
    - Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
      They don't, but I'm free to express my distate for them if they do. That goes for much in life. Forking is not a decision to be taken lightly. Even the most just fork will fracture the community and weaken the software's development. Contributors are now being asked to take sides and both sides are getting fewer contributions. The stress this puts on the original maintainers is also non-trivial. Look at ffmpeg/libav. It forked for similar reasons on the surface, but in reality it was to forcibly take control of the vernerable project over petty disagreements. For years the users and developers suffered alike as libav was shipped by default in Debian due to politics and received subpar workmanship and more security vulnerabilities that were fixed on slower schedules, all while taking contributors and users away from ffmpeg. After nearly a decade libav is finally dead in the water and ffmpeg is becoming the default on Debian again, but not after lots and lots of damage to the project. On the other hand, you have examples like nodejs/iojs, where there were much more tangible reasons and alternative solutions were explored longer and more earnestly, and they regretfully were forced to fork for the good of the ecosystem. And they were right, eventually the two projects merged together under better oversight. But the gitea folks do not have nearly as much clout behind their efforts IMO, and as a result their move to fork is extremely harmful to gogs development.
irishsultan 10y ago
It's his prerogative to do that, it's theirs to fork the project.
sdesol 10y ago
> Not all PRs have to be merged on your schedule Considering how fast GitLab is moving, if Gogs/Gitea wants to remain relevant, they really have to move at a much faster pace than they use to. Judging by Unknwon's comment in this issue https://github.com/gogits/gogs/issues/1304 https://github.com/gogits/gogs/issues/1304 it seems like Gogs is driven by a passion and it doesn't matter at the end if he is the only user. As he puts it > Gogs isn't a business, making it is what I love to do I'm not sure if his stance has changed, since this issue was from July. I'm also not sure, if he fully realizes he is sitting on a potential golden goose. The market for Git hosting in Enterprise is still very much up for grabs.
- Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
  Your mindset is totally whack. Gogs does not have to compete with GitLab, it can fill its own niche. Who are you to tell him how to use his "golden goose"? Why does it need to be a business? Jesus christ.
  - xj9 10y ago
    yes, but it can, and if people want it to, it should. besides, why wouldn't you want it to be a business? businesses make money, which can pay for development of new features and better support for users. sounds like a win to me.
  - irishsultan 10y ago
    So gogs can be that and gitea can be something else, why are you still thinking that they don't have a good reason for their fork if they have different ideas about which niche they want to serve.
    - Sir_Cmpwn 10y ago
      Because gogs will suffer for it and that's a hell of a way to thank the project that you took the first 95% of your work from. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13297748 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13297748
madeofpalk 10y ago
> That's his prerogative Sure. 100%. It's up to him for how he wants to run an OSS project. In the same way, if people in the community have different ideas they're more than welcome to fork. If you don't want that to happen, either listen more to the community or don't open source a project.

sangnoir 10y ago

> This is not the reason of the fork. The reason is that he refuses to give more people write access to the project to keep it going Others don't need write access "to keep the project going" unless they intend to ship releases without him/her- they can make PRs and the maintainer will merge them when they are back. Perhaps the Gitea committers want a more predictable release cadence? I agree that a fork is probably the best solution here, due to the impedance mismatch, the forkers don't seem to be fans of the BDFL model. Additionally, "community" is a much wider term than how you used it, it's not just other contributors but also includes users and bug reporters. I wish Gitea the best of luck, but I'll remain a Gogs user.