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Yes, this is really sad to see that much people in the OSS scene using nonfree ways to communicate. At least, IRC had open-source servers and clients but in my

by jaemoe 6y ago

Yes, this is really sad to see that much people in the OSS scene using nonfree ways to communicate. At least, IRC had open-source servers and clients but in my opinion, it's too old nowadays.

judge2020 6y ago
OSS primarily uses a non-free way to host source code (GitHub), so it's not much different to use Discord.
- jaemoe 6y ago
  And it's sad to see.
  - snazz 6y ago
    There are at least a few different "OSS scenes" that have different priorities. More principled, idealistic developers fall under a different category than more pragmatic ones, so it should be no surprise that they use different tools.
    - frabbit 6y ago
      Using non-Free tools has been shown to be distinctly non-pragmatic under a wide variety of considerations. A better term would be something like "Tied programmers" or "Dependent progammers". Maybe "sharecropper progammers"?
      - snazz 6y ago
        "Sharecropper programmers" might be an accurate way of describing developers for Apple platforms, but that's not what is happening when people use GitHub and Discord to work on open-source software. They can easily move their Git hosting and chat to another platform—they just choose to use the popular, coincidentally non-OSS, platform for its pragmatism. A large base of existing users, easy onboarding, and good visibility makes a big difference for many OSS projects. Using a self-hosted Git hosting system and mailing list is a lot of work—and it adds a not-insignificant barrier to entry for potential contributors. What issues exist with popular, proprietary Git and chat tools that make them unsuitable for OSS development? What are some of the considerations you're thinking of where using a popular option is not pragmatic?
- rednut 6y ago
  So what if Github itself is not OSS? The technology behind is already open source and decentralized. You can switch to a Gitlab instance with just a few mouse clicks while also migrating your issues and pull requests.
  - CharlesW 6y ago
    > So what if Github itself is not OSS? The technology behind is already open source… So is much of the technology behind Discourse.[1] [1] https://discord.com/open-source https://discord.com/open-source (click on "OS Libraries")
  - thekyle 6y ago
    I don't believe issues or pull requests are part of the Git repo. If there is a way to migrate them it would involve some GitHub API which could be shut down.
    - Arnavion 6y ago
      The commits in pull requests are part of the git repo, in that they can be fetched from the repo's remote. The comments are not.
      - samoa42 6y ago
        as said; the issues are not part of the repo. as much as many projects could use a clean slate here, i dont think the burden of migranting them manually or the act of just dumping them is realistic.
dmitriid 6y ago
> Yes, this is really sad to see that much people in the OSS scene using nonfree ways to communicate. And the reasons are entirely understandable: - you don't have to run your own infrastructure - you don't have to run your own protections against fraudulent activity, DDOSes, bots etc. - you don't have to worry about availability on any number of platforms, including mobile
- detaro 6y ago
  free software as a hosted service is a thing.
  - dmitriid 6y ago
    It is a thing, is there enough of this thing? Is it free? Do these hosted services provide the infra and protection? Do these hosted services solve the issue of the dearth of clients for these services? And if you look at hosted services like IRCCloud, it turns out they are not that different from Slack/Discord: closed source, for full range of capabilities you need to use their apps.
MaxBarraclough 6y ago
> nonfree ways to communicate Does that include Hacker News?
- jaemoe 6y ago
  It does, currently waiting to be either invited to lobsters or for the registrations to open again.
  - ptman 6y ago
    Check out federating reddit -like service lemmy.ml: https://dev.lemmy.ml/ https://dev.lemmy.ml/

by jaemoe 6y ago

Yes, this is really sad to see that much people in the OSS scene using nonfree ways to communicate. At least, IRC had open-source servers and clients but in my opinion, it's too old nowadays.

judge2020 6y ago

OSS primarily uses a non-free way to host source code (GitHub), so it's not much different to use Discord.

jaemoe 6y ago
And it's sad to see.
- snazz 6y ago
  There are at least a few different "OSS scenes" that have different priorities. More principled, idealistic developers fall under a different category than more pragmatic ones, so it should be no surprise that they use different tools.
  - frabbit 6y ago
    Using non-Free tools has been shown to be distinctly non-pragmatic under a wide variety of considerations. A better term would be something like "Tied programmers" or "Dependent progammers". Maybe "sharecropper progammers"?
    - snazz 6y ago
      "Sharecropper programmers" might be an accurate way of describing developers for Apple platforms, but that's not what is happening when people use GitHub and Discord to work on open-source software. They can easily move their Git hosting and chat to another platform—they just choose to use the popular, coincidentally non-OSS, platform for its pragmatism. A large base of existing users, easy onboarding, and good visibility makes a big difference for many OSS projects. Using a self-hosted Git hosting system and mailing list is a lot of work—and it adds a not-insignificant barrier to entry for potential contributors. What issues exist with popular, proprietary Git and chat tools that make them unsuitable for OSS development? What are some of the considerations you're thinking of where using a popular option is not pragmatic?
rednut 6y ago
So what if Github itself is not OSS? The technology behind is already open source and decentralized. You can switch to a Gitlab instance with just a few mouse clicks while also migrating your issues and pull requests.
- CharlesW 6y ago
  > So what if Github itself is not OSS? The technology behind is already open source… So is much of the technology behind Discourse.[1] [1] https://discord.com/open-source https://discord.com/open-source (click on "OS Libraries")
- thekyle 6y ago
  I don't believe issues or pull requests are part of the Git repo. If there is a way to migrate them it would involve some GitHub API which could be shut down.
  - Arnavion 6y ago
    The commits in pull requests are part of the git repo, in that they can be fetched from the repo's remote. The comments are not.
    - samoa42 6y ago
      as said; the issues are not part of the repo. as much as many projects could use a clean slate here, i dont think the burden of migranting them manually or the act of just dumping them is realistic.

dmitriid 6y ago

> Yes, this is really sad to see that much people in the OSS scene using nonfree ways to communicate. And the reasons are entirely understandable: - you don't have to run your own infrastructure - you don't have to run your own protections against fraudulent activity, DDOSes, bots etc. - you don't have to worry about availability on any number of platforms, including mobile

detaro 6y ago
free software as a hosted service is a thing.
- dmitriid 6y ago
  It is a thing, is there enough of this thing? Is it free? Do these hosted services provide the infra and protection? Do these hosted services solve the issue of the dearth of clients for these services? And if you look at hosted services like IRCCloud, it turns out they are not that different from Slack/Discord: closed source, for full range of capabilities you need to use their apps.

MaxBarraclough 6y ago

> nonfree ways to communicate Does that include Hacker News?

jaemoe 6y ago
It does, currently waiting to be either invited to lobsters or for the registrations to open again.
- ptman 6y ago
  Check out federating reddit -like service lemmy.ml: https://dev.lemmy.ml/ https://dev.lemmy.ml/