Move from Github to Gitlab?

[flohack]

Read also the much friendlier post here https://blog.github.com/2018-06-04-github-microsoft/ which explains a lot (to me).

BR

[AresMinos]

@flohack day 0 damage control.

[AresMinos]

@alan_g principles still do apply. You just have to compare track records with FOSS from Github and from Microsoft.

FOSS people will not embrace Microsoft and are leaving Github by the thousands.

Shall UBports stick aroung and wait to be thrown in the same bucket as Microsoft by the FOSS comunity?

Many Linux folks still say Ubuntu is a spyware years after the issue has been fixed. The name stuck. So don't expect now that everybody will be "rational" and I guarantee you UBports and Ubuntu Touch might be dismissed by some people for not taking a firm stance now.
And UBporrs will move to some other service one way or anorher because there will always be somebody new to start this discussion again, again and again.

[libremax]

@alan_g

I don't see where principles apply here: Github has never been free software, it has always been propitiatory software and infrastructure supported by investment and revenue from commercial services. Only the source of investment is changing.

I understand that some hate Microsoft, and I certainly don't love them (ask my wife!), but they have done good as well as bad. If they want to fund infrastructure for source control without asking any more in return than Github already gets then why should we care?

The choice for UBports to go on GitHub had never been publicly discussed. It doesn't mean it was a perfect solution and every one was fully comfortable with it.

Now that it's publicly discussed, whatever triggered the discussion, why not seek a better solution both in operational terms and in terms of consistency with the principles specific to free software (GitLab is an open source SAAS, it's not perfect but better than non open source SAAS like GitHub) ?

[Aury88]

@flohack said in Move from Github to Gitlab?:

Now reading that Gitlab uses Google cloud for all their services and I asking myself if Google is less evil than MS (probably not).

so is needed a google account to use gitlab or report an issue?

[hoh61]

Both, microsoft and google , are large companies which have to make money for their shareholders. And they do it the american style. Everybody shall be able to read about the odd actings in the past (or have a look in their terms and conditions!). So unless the target of both companies is still unchanged, the methods will be the same. So why trust any of them?
On the other side, which could be reliable alternatives?

[hummlbach]

@Flohack what would you think: How many people would have to spent an euro per month to get our own gitlab or whatever (just in the case gitlab isn't working at all without google even if self hosted) server?

[flohack]

@aury88 No. Their server infrastructure is rented from Microsofts Azure cloud at the moment, but they announced they will eventually move to Google´s cloud.

[flohack]

@hummlbach Its not only the money. The greatest offering if Github, Gitlab etc. is nearly no possible data loss. Their replication and backup is hard to fulfil as a small organization. Hosting your own means lot of headache, nightly calls and endless hours in front of the restore console

[mymike]

I agree with @Flohack and @alan_g : no need to move to GitLab
what can MS do to make GH worse?
and, tbh, I prefer Microsoft then Google

[A Former User]

GitPub, anyone? https://github.com/git-federation/gitpub

[Aury88]

@flohack so now I need a Microsofts Azure account and then I will need a google account in order to use Gitlab?
also are we talking about GitLab CE or GitLab EE ?
it seems you can host GitLab CE on your own server in a container, or on a cloud provider (that you choose).

[DanChapman]

@aury88 No you can either create a Gitlab account or use an existing google, twitter, github or bitbucket account to sign-up/register

[flohack]

@aury88 we want to avoid self-hosting. We are not in the position to guarantee availability and secured data when we do it our own. Thats the whole idea of a cloud service, you have 24/7 access and no need to worry about server hardware failure, ISP network headache, let alone the 200 security patches you have to do each week. If you never run servers and services your own you might think its easy nowadays. Believe me its not.

I have experience from my workplace (sudden virus alerts? Forget your day, you sit and isolate virtual machines until midnight, then try to remove the virus, then patch everything etc. ), from private projects - 1 Harddisk in RAID1 dies, but the RAID decides to get damaged and you again loose data, and the last backup is a week old.) etc etc.

The cloud should theoretically decouple all this from eventual failures and problems. And yes, those services cost a lot of money, so its only feasable when you aggregate many many users on them. And yes, this is something companies can ask money for. Because its still much cheaper as any disaster that can happen.

We are not a critical mass, have no employees and no budget to do this our own.

BR

[gsilvapt]

@flohack said in Move from Github to Gitlab?:

@aury88 we want to avoid self-hosting. We are not in the position to guarantee availability and secured data when we do it our own. Thats the whole idea of a cloud service, you have 24/7 access and no need to worry about server hardware failure, ISP network headache, let alone the 200 security patches you have to do each week. If you never run servers and services your own you might think its easy nowadays. Believe me its not.

I think we are not bringing costs to the table and, I mean. for an open source project, I'd say that is a major concern and self-hosted services like these have significant implications.

Despite not being related to the Foundation in any way other than a small contributor, I think self-hosted does not make much sense for many reasons.

[Aury88]

@flohack said in Move from Github to Gitlab?:

@aury88 we want to avoid self-hosting. ...
If you never run servers and services your own you might think its easy nowadays. Believe me its not.
...
I have experience from my workplace ....

I think you're totally misunderstanding me. I have absolutely in any way proposed or even thought UBPorts need/must doing the self-hosting . my question/answer was more to understand why you seem to be putting at the same level a service now owned by microsoft and in which therefore all the access data from now on will be collected and stored by microsoft (basicaly now you need a microsoft account to fork, put a issue, upload a code/PR, start a project etc on github, ) with another service that (optionally and only) use google services for their server infrastructure because of technical reasons that you so well explained.

[flohack]

@aury88 Its simple, I value and judge Microsoft different than you

BR

[Aury88]

@flohack said in Move from Github to Gitlab?:

aury88 Its simple, I value and judge Microsoft different than you

you are still misunderstanding me. I don't have any problem with microsoft. I use windows, I use their Bing search engine and I use many of their services( one of which I regularly use for my contributions to a project) . the point is not how I "value and judge" microsoft. the point here is why you are asking yourself "if Google is less evil than MS" when the situation doesn't seem to me properly a G vs MS thing (in the first google cloud is only one of the services you can choose, to host the code,among many other and with the ability to self hosting if you want or don't trust the others, the second is now a MS service without being able to choose not passing through MS). to me it seems more correct to ask if gitlab "is less devil than microsoft" if you want to keep the comparison to an analysis of this kind

PS:since (yet) you do not know me I ask you not to suppose or imply that you know how I value or judge microsoft or any other company/service/person . thank you

[BlueKenny]

I need some time to understand and Believe this news and it took my few seconds to move everything to GitLab

[twinkybot]

I also would like to have a commitment to move to some other Repository.
With a time schedule which sounds reasonable.
So there seems to be also some other alternatives than GitLab

My personal favorite would be https://savannah.gnu.org/ which might be out because:

We host free projects that run on free operating systems and without any proprietary software dependencies.

The others might be
https://giteo.io
or
https://gogs.io/