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Does this EURA works to effectively kill handy macOS CI service like CircleCI and force users to use VM rental service like this?

Hamuko 6y ago
I don't see why you couldn't run a CI server as long as you don't let the clients access the machine.
- eberkund 6y ago
  Circle CI does let clients access the machine IIRC you can SSH into the host if the job fails and tinker around to debug issues.
- fomine3 6y ago
  It's reasonable to think running CI service is similar to just running httpd. But what divides? Anyway CI service runs Apple software like Xcode. Even httpd uses Apple's TCP stack.
ben509 6y ago
If you ran a webserver hosting Great Cat Pictures on some Macs, for instance, your customers might pay a subscription fee to access your site, meaning they are paying for you to do processing and storage on their behalf. So that's an example that's clearly not leasing or subletting the devices. Likewise, you might read it that Circle is simply providing a service to users, and the users are paying a fee for the service. But a CI service will set up your dev account, your container image, to run your jobs. It'll even let you shell in, and it tears it all down when you're done. And it really starts to look like leasing when they also charge for time used on various hosts. (IIRC, Circle charges for this a bit obliquely as max parallelism.) If it went to court, Circle might argue the hosts can only be used within their larger CI system, that they don't guarantee a particular task will complete on a given host, and that they're not providing other requirements for virtual hosts, e.g. dedicated routing or names. And then Apple's lawyers might counter all that. So this is where I think lawyers would start digging through case law to figure out where providing a service ends and leasing begins.
tootie 6y ago
I've done iOS builds using Github actions. The build minutes cost 10x as much as Linux. Anyone out there offering MacOS in the cloud is doing the same thing. Just racking Mac Minis. It means you can't slice CPUs or memory like a VM so it's less efficient and more expensive.

Hamuko 6y ago

I don't see why you couldn't run a CI server as long as you don't let the clients access the machine.

eberkund 6y ago
Circle CI does let clients access the machine IIRC you can SSH into the host if the job fails and tinker around to debug issues.
fomine3 6y ago
It's reasonable to think running CI service is similar to just running httpd. But what divides? Anyway CI service runs Apple software like Xcode. Even httpd uses Apple's TCP stack.

ben509 6y ago

If you ran a webserver hosting Great Cat Pictures on some Macs, for instance, your customers might pay a subscription fee to access your site, meaning they are paying for you to do processing and storage on their behalf. So that's an example that's clearly not leasing or subletting the devices. Likewise, you might read it that Circle is simply providing a service to users, and the users are paying a fee for the service. But a CI service will set up your dev account, your container image, to run your jobs. It'll even let you shell in, and it tears it all down when you're done. And it really starts to look like leasing when they also charge for time used on various hosts. (IIRC, Circle charges for this a bit obliquely as max parallelism.) If it went to court, Circle might argue the hosts can only be used within their larger CI system, that they don't guarantee a particular task will complete on a given host, and that they're not providing other requirements for virtual hosts, e.g. dedicated routing or names. And then Apple's lawyers might counter all that. So this is where I think lawyers would start digging through case law to figure out where providing a service ends and leasing begins.

tootie 6y ago

I've done iOS builds using Github actions. The build minutes cost 10x as much as Linux. Anyone out there offering MacOS in the cloud is doing the same thing. Just racking Mac Minis. It means you can't slice CPUs or memory like a VM so it's less efficient and more expensive.