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Git itself is open source; if Github would to away without warning, you could host your repo anywhere that supports git, or host it yourself. There would be pr

Git itself is open source; if Github would to away without warning, you could host your repo anywhere that supports git, or host it yourself. There would be problems, however, with issues, comments, wikis, etc. as well as all kinds of package managers that rely on github.

tomjakubowski 9y ago
What are the most used package / dependency management tools which rely on GitHub? Many can install packages from there, or from any Git URL, but they tend to have centralized stores as well, right? One example that comes to mind is Cargo. At least a couple years ago, the package index (but not packages themselves) for crates.io was stored in a Git repo hosted on GitHub. But (without checking, on a phone) I’m fairly certain crates.io doesn’t/didn’t rely on any GitHub APIs, just Git operations, so it would be easy to recover if GitHub just disappeared. Rust’s CI operation, on the other hand, is somewhat tightly coupled with GitHub. Last time I checked, the software powering bors only support GitHub’s APIs; support for competing APIs like Gitlab were open tickets. But I’m sure in an emergency the team would be able to put together support for another project host.
- deleted 9y ago
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- steveklabnik 9y ago
  The index is on GitHub, but only the index. You can mirror it and Cargo knows how to work with the mirror. http://www.integer32.com/2016/10/08/bare-minimum-crates-io-mirror-plus-one.html http://www.integer32.com/2016/10/08/bare-minimum-crates-io-m...
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ajdlinux 9y ago
What I'm more interested in is how GitHub has reduced friction in developer workflows, as the Thank You GitHub statement discusses, and how fragmentation of the git hosting ecosystem would change that. Right now, if I want to fix a bug in a GitHub hosted project, I log in to my existing GitHub account, report an issue, fork the repo, do the fix, submit a PR. If I have to use GitLab or Bitbucket, as I learned a couple of days ago when I had to submit a PR to a GitLab project, it adds a certain amount of friction (signing up for accounts, learning where all the right buttons are, etc) that I don't have when I'm using GitHub as the dominant platform which everyone else uses. If GitHub were to go away, would we end up with a single dominant new player that in turn provides a low friction workflow that everyone's used to, or would we have a more fragmented ecosystem? Furthermore, GitHub has played a large role in cementing the role of Git itself as the community's preferred VCS - much to the detriment of competitors like Mercurial, it must be said. If GitHub goes away, how sticky is Git itself?

tomjakubowski 9y ago

What are the most used package / dependency management tools which rely on GitHub? Many can install packages from there, or from any Git URL, but they tend to have centralized stores as well, right? One example that comes to mind is Cargo. At least a couple years ago, the package index (but not packages themselves) for crates.io was stored in a Git repo hosted on GitHub. But (without checking, on a phone) I’m fairly certain crates.io doesn’t/didn’t rely on any GitHub APIs, just Git operations, so it would be easy to recover if GitHub just disappeared. Rust’s CI operation, on the other hand, is somewhat tightly coupled with GitHub. Last time I checked, the software powering bors only support GitHub’s APIs; support for competing APIs like Gitlab were open tickets. But I’m sure in an emergency the team would be able to put together support for another project host.

deleted 9y ago
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steveklabnik 9y ago
The index is on GitHub, but only the index. You can mirror it and Cargo knows how to work with the mirror. http://www.integer32.com/2016/10/08/bare-minimum-crates-io-mirror-plus-one.html http://www.integer32.com/2016/10/08/bare-minimum-crates-io-m...
- deleted 9y ago
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ajdlinux 9y ago

What I'm more interested in is how GitHub has reduced friction in developer workflows, as the Thank You GitHub statement discusses, and how fragmentation of the git hosting ecosystem would change that. Right now, if I want to fix a bug in a GitHub hosted project, I log in to my existing GitHub account, report an issue, fork the repo, do the fix, submit a PR. If I have to use GitLab or Bitbucket, as I learned a couple of days ago when I had to submit a PR to a GitLab project, it adds a certain amount of friction (signing up for accounts, learning where all the right buttons are, etc) that I don't have when I'm using GitHub as the dominant platform which everyone else uses. If GitHub were to go away, would we end up with a single dominant new player that in turn provides a low friction workflow that everyone's used to, or would we have a more fragmented ecosystem? Furthermore, GitHub has played a large role in cementing the role of Git itself as the community's preferred VCS - much to the detriment of competitors like Mercurial, it must be said. If GitHub goes away, how sticky is Git itself?