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If any Hashicorp people are reading, can you please tell your middle and senior management that this decision has deeply soured my entire DevOps cohort on conti

If any Hashicorp people are reading, can you please tell your middle and senior management that this decision has deeply soured my entire DevOps cohort on continuing to use Terraform in the future. We're already exploring alternatives. Future client projects may not use Terraform at all. Languages and frameworks must remain open or they will wither and die.

thdn 3y ago
Would you mind to share, those alternatives?
johnbellone 3y ago
Just stop using their products. Stop giving them free advertisements. Stop integrating your software and services with them. It is harsh, but they’re a public company now, not Mitchell.
- bshacklett 3y ago
  Far easier said than done.
AtNightWeCode 3y ago
The fantastic cost of running TF in the cloud is painful. Several years ago it was very clear that it would be difficult for HC to survive once they became a company registered at stock markets.
- jen20 3y ago
  > The fantastic cost of running TF in the cloud is painful. Citation needed. I don't think it costs very much at all.
WhyNotHugo 3y ago
> We're already exploring alternatives. Future client projects may not use Terraform at all. I'd wait and see what happens with OpenTerraform. If the fork gains some good momentum, it would be the easier choice. Usually, you should be okay with using the latest FLOSS version for a few weeks/months until things settle anyway.
tootie 3y ago
I'm not Hashicorp, but I mean look at Docker. They built the most valuable devops tool of the last generation and can barely muster a viable business. Why would Hashicorp give the slightest worry to losing thousands and thousands of non-paying customers? The upside is lots of money and the downside is loss of halo. Honestly, it's an unfortunate game of expectation setting. If I wrote an open letter decrying Salesforce for not open sourcing their codebase, nobody would take me seriously. But we expect better from Hashicorp for some reason.
- Matl 3y ago
  > They built the most valuable devops tool of the last generation 'They' as in Docker Inc.? They made it accessible for the masses, which counts for a lot, but they built on a lot of pre-existing Linux kernel tech that other people who envisioned containers put in place before Docker came in and seized on the opportunity. > can barely muster a viable business. They perused what proved to be the wrong business model until 2019, nowdays they're more than 'barely' viable.
  - pxc 3y ago
    > 'They' as in Docker Inc.? They made it accessible for the masses, which counts for a lot, but they built on a lot of pre-existing Linux kernel tech that other people who envisioned containers put in place before Docker came in and seized on the opportunity. 100%. Docker's UX has always been its killer feature, and it counts for a lot. That's a very real contribution. But this is absolutely still a 'shoulders of giants', 'it takes a village' situation.
- Kamq 3y ago
  > Why would Hashicorp give the slightest worry to losing thousands and thousands of non-paying customers? The photoshop effect*. That is to say, devs that are familiar with it will push their workplaces, because it's a pain to pick up yet another tool when you know one that will work. *A largely hypothesized reason photoshop was so easy to crack back in the day, was that Adobe knew that if kids grew up using photoshop, businesses wouldn't be willing to spend the money re-training their employees, and would just buy a photoshop license.
bayindirh 3y ago
As a Free Software advocate and supporter, I'm thinking about the answer to this question: - MPL is a weak-copyleft license, which allows companies to grab and run Terraform codebase, provide it as-is (as Terraform), or as white-labeled Terraform compatible feature/layer. This is alright (because license allows this). - These people also contribute their own fixes upstream, which is great, and maintain their own patches if Hashicorp decides to reject them (which is fine, too, this is how ecosystem works). But, HashiCorp says that, the thing we develop (i.e. Terraform) is used by others and generate revenue for them, this is great, but we can't generate enough revenue from it to keep the company afloat and continue providing TerraForm development, and sell it as a product at the same time. What should they do? I'd advocate AGPL, but xGPL licenses are avoided like a plague, because Free Software is not "closed forks" friendly, and companies hate to open everything like that. BSL is neither Free nor Open, which we all hate, but it allows HashiCorp to survive to a degree (this is not a fact, this is what HashiCorp is thinking). So, just because people adapted it, and HashiCorp cannot survive, should they say, we're closing shop, it's all MIT now, do whatever you want, bye!? Weak copyleft licenses are not designed for software that big. Or they assume that the developing party is untouchable. Strong copyleft solves this, but companies hate it because its unrelenting transparency. What should we do? P.S.: I neither endorse, nor support BSL, or HashiCorp's decision (or any company treads the same path). Edit: I mistyped MPL as permissive instead of weak-copyleft. Corrected, sorry.
- smarx007 3y ago
  MPL is a copyleft license, actually, just like EPL and EUPL. What it is not is a viral copyleft license. Anyone making changes to TF code and productionizing it is expected to contribute back but only the direct changes to TF itself, not the extensions around it. That's my reading of EPL/MPL/EUPL. Does that match your reading?
  - bayindirh 3y ago
    You're right. MPL is a weak-copyleft license. I mistyped it, I don't know why. Fixed my comment with a note, thanks. However, it still allows your code to be bundled inside a bigger work. The bigger work can be in any license (maybe not GPL, need to check), but MPL stays MPL. This doesn't prevent white-labeling the codebase, though. As far as I read the MPL, the contribution back part is not mandatory, but encouraged by not affecting the larger work. It keeps the MPL part open, but doesn't enforce a "send patches back" policy.
YetAnotherNick 3y ago
> Languages and frameworks must remain open or they will wither and die. Terraform is neither a language nor a framework, and I certainly don't think it will wither and die if they transition to BSL. Case in point, docker's revenue grew by 12x once they started taking control of their code and stopped caring about community. Same with postman or nginx or many other companies.
- mardifoufs 3y ago
  What? Docker is still completely open source apart from the desktop GUI. The engine and (I'm pretty sure) all components are completely free and if anything, they have pushed for the standardization of the container runtime. Buildkit is free, compose is free, no feature is paywalled apart from Mirantis-centric stuff (not part of docker inc) You can absolutely bet that they would get dropped like a rock if they moved to changing the engine's license. Even the docker desktop code wasn't ever open to begin with anyways.
  - scrum-treats 3y ago
    Didn't Docker actually try it earlier this year, e.g., https://blog.alexellis.io/docker-is-deleting-open-source-images/ https://blog.alexellis.io/docker-is-deleting-open-source-ima...?
    - flanked-evergl 3y ago
      Not sure what "it" refers to here, but what Docker did is in no way similar to what HashiCorp did.
    - mardifoufs 3y ago
      That's just hosting though iirc. Docker hub is very important, but it's not really part of Docker the software. As in, you could deploy your own container registry with 0 licensing issues. They just didn't want to pay the bandwidth costs anymore, though I think they walked back on that for open source images.

thdn 3y ago

Would you mind to share, those alternatives?

johnbellone 3y ago

Just stop using their products. Stop giving them free advertisements. Stop integrating your software and services with them. It is harsh, but they’re a public company now, not Mitchell.

bshacklett 3y ago
Far easier said than done.

AtNightWeCode 3y ago

The fantastic cost of running TF in the cloud is painful. Several years ago it was very clear that it would be difficult for HC to survive once they became a company registered at stock markets.

jen20 3y ago
> The fantastic cost of running TF in the cloud is painful. Citation needed. I don't think it costs very much at all.

WhyNotHugo 3y ago

> We're already exploring alternatives. Future client projects may not use Terraform at all. I'd wait and see what happens with OpenTerraform. If the fork gains some good momentum, it would be the easier choice. Usually, you should be okay with using the latest FLOSS version for a few weeks/months until things settle anyway.

tootie 3y ago

I'm not Hashicorp, but I mean look at Docker. They built the most valuable devops tool of the last generation and can barely muster a viable business. Why would Hashicorp give the slightest worry to losing thousands and thousands of non-paying customers? The upside is lots of money and the downside is loss of halo. Honestly, it's an unfortunate game of expectation setting. If I wrote an open letter decrying Salesforce for not open sourcing their codebase, nobody would take me seriously. But we expect better from Hashicorp for some reason.

Matl 3y ago
> They built the most valuable devops tool of the last generation 'They' as in Docker Inc.? They made it accessible for the masses, which counts for a lot, but they built on a lot of pre-existing Linux kernel tech that other people who envisioned containers put in place before Docker came in and seized on the opportunity. > can barely muster a viable business. They perused what proved to be the wrong business model until 2019, nowdays they're more than 'barely' viable.
- pxc 3y ago
  > 'They' as in Docker Inc.? They made it accessible for the masses, which counts for a lot, but they built on a lot of pre-existing Linux kernel tech that other people who envisioned containers put in place before Docker came in and seized on the opportunity. 100%. Docker's UX has always been its killer feature, and it counts for a lot. That's a very real contribution. But this is absolutely still a 'shoulders of giants', 'it takes a village' situation.
Kamq 3y ago
> Why would Hashicorp give the slightest worry to losing thousands and thousands of non-paying customers? The photoshop effect*. That is to say, devs that are familiar with it will push their workplaces, because it's a pain to pick up yet another tool when you know one that will work. *A largely hypothesized reason photoshop was so easy to crack back in the day, was that Adobe knew that if kids grew up using photoshop, businesses wouldn't be willing to spend the money re-training their employees, and would just buy a photoshop license.

bayindirh 3y ago

As a Free Software advocate and supporter, I'm thinking about the answer to this question: - MPL is a weak-copyleft license, which allows companies to grab and run Terraform codebase, provide it as-is (as Terraform), or as white-labeled Terraform compatible feature/layer. This is alright (because license allows this). - These people also contribute their own fixes upstream, which is great, and maintain their own patches if Hashicorp decides to reject them (which is fine, too, this is how ecosystem works). But, HashiCorp says that, the thing we develop (i.e. Terraform) is used by others and generate revenue for them, this is great, but we can't generate enough revenue from it to keep the company afloat and continue providing TerraForm development, and sell it as a product at the same time. What should they do? I'd advocate AGPL, but xGPL licenses are avoided like a plague, because Free Software is not "closed forks" friendly, and companies hate to open everything like that. BSL is neither Free nor Open, which we all hate, but it allows HashiCorp to survive to a degree (this is not a fact, this is what HashiCorp is thinking). So, just because people adapted it, and HashiCorp cannot survive, should they say, we're closing shop, it's all MIT now, do whatever you want, bye!? Weak copyleft licenses are not designed for software that big. Or they assume that the developing party is untouchable. Strong copyleft solves this, but companies hate it because its unrelenting transparency. What should we do? P.S.: I neither endorse, nor support BSL, or HashiCorp's decision (or any company treads the same path). Edit: I mistyped MPL as permissive instead of weak-copyleft. Corrected, sorry.

smarx007 3y ago
MPL is a copyleft license, actually, just like EPL and EUPL. What it is not is a viral copyleft license. Anyone making changes to TF code and productionizing it is expected to contribute back but only the direct changes to TF itself, not the extensions around it. That's my reading of EPL/MPL/EUPL. Does that match your reading?
- bayindirh 3y ago
  You're right. MPL is a weak-copyleft license. I mistyped it, I don't know why. Fixed my comment with a note, thanks. However, it still allows your code to be bundled inside a bigger work. The bigger work can be in any license (maybe not GPL, need to check), but MPL stays MPL. This doesn't prevent white-labeling the codebase, though. As far as I read the MPL, the contribution back part is not mandatory, but encouraged by not affecting the larger work. It keeps the MPL part open, but doesn't enforce a "send patches back" policy.

YetAnotherNick 3y ago

> Languages and frameworks must remain open or they will wither and die. Terraform is neither a language nor a framework, and I certainly don't think it will wither and die if they transition to BSL. Case in point, docker's revenue grew by 12x once they started taking control of their code and stopped caring about community. Same with postman or nginx or many other companies.

mardifoufs 3y ago
What? Docker is still completely open source apart from the desktop GUI. The engine and (I'm pretty sure) all components are completely free and if anything, they have pushed for the standardization of the container runtime. Buildkit is free, compose is free, no feature is paywalled apart from Mirantis-centric stuff (not part of docker inc) You can absolutely bet that they would get dropped like a rock if they moved to changing the engine's license. Even the docker desktop code wasn't ever open to begin with anyways.
- scrum-treats 3y ago
  Didn't Docker actually try it earlier this year, e.g., https://blog.alexellis.io/docker-is-deleting-open-source-images/ https://blog.alexellis.io/docker-is-deleting-open-source-ima...?
  - flanked-evergl 3y ago
    Not sure what "it" refers to here, but what Docker did is in no way similar to what HashiCorp did.
  - mardifoufs 3y ago
    That's just hosting though iirc. Docker hub is very important, but it's not really part of Docker the software. As in, you could deploy your own container registry with 0 licensing issues. They just didn't want to pay the bandwidth costs anymore, though I think they walked back on that for open source images.