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Chef dependency removed after agreement with ICE
- ketsa 7y agoWtf is chef...
- ginko 7y agoAll I could think of was this[1] and was wondering how a silly esoteric language can cause human rights issues. [1] https://esolangs.org/wiki/Chef https://esolangs.org/wiki/Chef
- sgift 7y ago"Chef is a company and the name of a configuration management tool written in Ruby and Erlang."[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chef_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chef_(software)
- goatinaboat 7y agoIt’s a tool for webdevs to do simple configuration of web servers without leaving their comfort zone of Ruby On Rails.
- xtracto 7y agoWhat people used in the past before Ansible was a thing.
- victorbojica 7y agoWhat is the contract about? Can't seem to find any details regarding this.
- mieseratte 7y ago> I apologize for the disruption to your workflow. I will be happy to restore the old repository and gem versions if Chef cancels their contract with the agency. Great, take something out on me because of your personal politics! I, for one, look forward to a future of navigating politicized open-source constraints of each creator. And of course, the creator of Chef-Sugar works for Google. Edit: Here's a mirror: https://gitlab.openminds.be/mirror/chef-sugar/-/branches https://gitlab.openminds.be/mirror/chef-sugar/-/branches Edit: Appears Chef itself has taken over: https://github.com/chef/chef-sugar https://github.com/chef/chef-sugar
- missosoup 7y agoIf you have a problem with FOSS and authors having ownership of their creations, feel free not to use it.
- iamtheworstdev 7y agoIt is a bit ridiculous. Are people going to start pulling things from projects because they find out that FOSS is used heavily by the intelligence community?
- onion2k 7y agoYes.
- missosoup 7y agoIt's their prerogative to do that if they so choose. If you don't like it, don't rely on it. Get commercially licensed software where this can't happen or write your own.
- ModernMech 7y agoI would if they were accepting $100,000 contracts with the NSA. Yeah.
- Crinus 7y agoIf an author of a free software believes that it is against his own morals to indirectly assist some organization that they see as immoral then, yes, they have the freedom to stop working on that software as there is no obligation on their part to continue doing so.
- iamtheworstdev 7y agoI should have clarified my point a bit. I'm not debating ones prerogative to do it. But we as nerds know the things we make can and are used by "bad"* actors but typically say it's better for the common good so we should keep it. Things like encryption, heavy math libraries in the world of nuclear physics, rocket science, VPNs, etc. So when we discover one bad person using our software and subsequently yank it, aren't we being a bit hypocritical? * I quote that because not everyone agrees that DHS and ICE are bad actors and want to avoid a political tangent
- tin-foil-hat 7y agoRelated article https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/20/chef_roasted_for_ice_dealings/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/20/chef_roasted_for_ic...
- jchanimal 7y agoBest context I could find https://twitter.com/sethvargo/status/1174451060263530502?s=21 https://twitter.com/sethvargo/status/1174451060263530502?s=2...
- lixtra 7y agoIronically it’s hosted on github owned by Microsoft which certainly works with ICE.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- dragandj 7y agoEven more ironically, it comes from a Google employee, when Google is so much widespread, that it's guaranteed to be working with morally questionable actors left and right; or (according to many people) being /the/ morally questionable actor.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- chomp 7y agoAm I missing something? It looks like a generic procurement /federal contractor company entered the contract, and not Chef. That’s like ICE buying Cisco switches from a 3rd party and getting mad at Cisco isn’t it?
- nofinator 7y agoI originally thought so too, but based on the CEO's blog post, it sounds like they are more involved with ICE for this project than simply licensing their product to an independent contractor: https://blog.chef.io/2019/09/19/chefs-position-on-customer-engagement-in-the-public-and-private-sectors/ https://blog.chef.io/2019/09/19/chefs-position-on-customer-e...
- derp_dee_derp 7y agoYes, let's get mad at the people enforcing the laws instead of the people who write the laws. Then, we can turn off our code, make a big announcement, and feel good about ourselves without making any meaningful effort to actually help. What. A. Great. Plan.
- gerbilly 7y agoYou can do both, it's not mutually exclusive.
- mateus1 7y agoThis is whataboutism. You can and you should engage politically against every level of institutions who hurt moral principles you believe in.
- yeahigotgoats 7y agona, thats just being a virtue signaling asshole.
- happytoexplain 7y agoThe entire concept of engaging against institutions that one feels are immoral is "being an asshole"? Or just this one? What principles are such a broad, hateful sentiment based on?
- mcphage 7y agoEngaging politically is not virtue signaling.
- eropple 7y agoIt is to nihilists. And also to those who seek to disarm others and render them unable to act for their beliefs. You see, then, the dire trouble we are in as a polity.
- marcosdumay 7y ago
- KevinEldon 7y agoThe cited contract is with C & C INTERNATIONAL COMPUTERS & CONSULTANTS, INC. who purchased $95k of Chef licenses. C & C INTERNATIONAL COMPUTERS & CONSULTANTS, INC. is listed in the contract with these business types: - Woman Owned Business - Women Owned Small Business - Economically Disadvantaged Women Owned Small Business - Minority Owned Business - Black American Owned Business - Corporate Entity Not Tax Exempt - For Profit Organization - DoT Certified Disadvantaged Business Enterprise - Small Disadvantaged Business - 8a Program Participant
- goatinaboat 7y agoAm I reading this correctly: a business owned by a black woman sold a product, and a white male has responded by sabotaging it? Not a great look, for him or his employer.
- happytoexplain 7y agoThis seems like a stretch. What does gender or race have to do with the grievance?
- goatinaboat 7y agoNormally nothing, but Google employees are usually so woke about the identity politics. So it is relevant in this context.
- notyourday 7y agoThe best part of this debacle is the author is still getting a paycheck from Google.
- dragandj 7y agoand ICE is likely using Kubernetes, too ;)
- goatinaboat 7y agoMoral of the story: do not do business with Google because you can’t tell when some random employee of theirs will decide to pull the plug on you. Or maybe you’re just collateral damage in their country’s internal political squabbles. Either way you have no recourse, because Google.
- cousin_it 7y agoCan someone explain what the guy's action accomplished? If you yank your code from the internet, and people have backups of it, and it was under the Apache license, it seems to me that people can just restore the code and keep working with it as if nothing happened. The license is perpetual, no? And that's not just a technicality - if FOSS licenses were revocable by the author at any time, only idiots would use FOSS in their business...
- Crinus 7y agoHe removed his repository because it was used by a company that he thinks it did something he disliked. I don't know why it matters, at least in the grand scheme of things. For him it probably matters due to his personal views and it'll probably matter for those who align with his views (assuming they know about that move). In any case, anyone is free to do with their code whatever they like. If you depend on anyone else's code keep in mind that you do not have control over them and any expectations you may have about their actions may not match theirs, so take that into consideration when making those dependencies.
- tdewitt 7y agoSeth is a big deal in the Chef community, so it's important to understand that. In fact, he's a big deal in the devops community. What he did was make a statement. He made it clear to the Chef _company_ that he can not,non good conscience, contribute code to organizations that he feels are working with extremely bad actors. This is his way of protesting. Chef is able to (and in fact already has) ignored him and restored a copy of his code and formed it under a new name. (Citation needed but I believe that was a statement from Seth I'm Twitter.) To everyone snubbing Seth for doing this, let's go "Nazi" with it. If Chef did a deal with the Aryan Nation and FOSS contributors pulled their core and support, would people feel the same? Probably not, right? Well, to many, what ICE is doing is _literally_ along the lines of what the Nazi party did. (I'm not asking that anyone agree with that sentiment, just that they acknowledge that it exists.) So, Seth exercised his right to free speech and right to protest by publicly pulling support for an organization that he has helped significantly. This is a loss for the Chef org and the Chef community. It has also been quite effective because this isn't the first place where I've seen this conversation and it won't be the last, in the next few days.
- huntaub 7y agoThe CEO of Chef responded to this with a blog post: https://blog.chef.io/2019/09/19/chefs-position-on-customer-engagement-in-the-public-and-private-sectors https://blog.chef.io/2019/09/19/chefs-position-on-customer-e...
- mc32 7y agoIt’s the only logical conclusion. Any other would result in inconsistencies and uneven application. One cannot continually evaluate and determine worthiness (as defined by you) of all users. Moreover this program began under the Obama admin. So the decision itself is internally inconsistent.
- happytoexplain 7y agoWhy does that make it internally inconsistent? It sounds like you're advocating for blind political loyalty.
- mcphage 7y ago> One cannot continually evaluate and determine worthiness (as defined by you) of all users. Why not? Or even, occasionally evaluate and determine worthiness?