SourceForge Allura Submitted To the Apache Software Foundation Incubator

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SourceForge Allura Submitted To the Apache Software Foundation Incubator

Posted by samzenpus on Monday June 18, 2012 @07:05AM from the widening-the-net dept.

rbowen writes "The software that powers the SourceForge developer tools (SourceForge is owned by the same corporate overlords as Slashdot) has been submitted to the Apache Software Foundation Incubator. The SourceForge Blog reads: 'By submitting Allura to the Apache Incubator, we hope to draw an even wider community of developers who can advance the feature set and tailor the framework to their needs. With the flexibility and extensibility Allura allows, developers are free to use any number of the popular source code management tools, including: Git, SVN, or Mercurial. We are indeed willing to turn our own open source platform into a tool that everyone can use and extend, and we believe Apache is the best place to steward the process.'"

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How does this affect us? by Jorl17 · 2012-06-18 07:10 · Score: 1

That's all I really want to know.

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1. Re:How does this affect us? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-06-18 07:34 · Score: 0
  
  What I'd like to know is: is Git/Github better than SourceForge?
2. Re:How does this affect us? by HarrySquatter · 2012-06-18 07:39 · Score: 2
  
  Yes.
3. Re:How does this affect us? by Jorl17 · 2012-06-18 07:54 · Score: 1
  
  I personally feel that it is.
  
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4. Re:How does this affect us? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-06-18 08:34 · Score: 0
  
  Depends whether you use git or not.
5. Re:How does this affect us? by PerfectionLost · 2012-06-18 08:41 · Score: 1
  
  Personally I find Git akin to repeatedly cutting myself. Some people are into that, but most people are not.
6. Re:How does this affect us? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-06-18 19:34 · Score: 0
  
  And some people don't read the manual before using a chainsaw. Some people are into that, but most people are not.
7. Re:How does this affect us? by sproketboy · 2012-06-19 01:37 · Score: 1
  
  Nope. Sourceforge is much better.
Desperation by Anonymous Coward · 2012-06-18 07:17 · Score: 0, Troll

More desperate scrambling for relevance from Geeknet. Sourceforge is losing out to GitHub. Slashdot is just losing. I'm glad I don't own Geeknet stock.
1. Re:Desperation by Jorl17 · 2012-06-18 07:38 · Score: 1
  
  I actually do feel that GitHub is far superior. And I mean faaaaaaaar.
  
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2. Re:Desperation by Jeng · 2012-06-18 07:53 · Score: 1
  
  Actually if you did own Geeknet stock now would be a very good time to sell if you think that the stock will tank. It is when a stock has already lost a lot of it's value that you would be glad you didn't own any, not right before it loses it's value.
  http://investors.geek.net/
  
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3. Re:Desperation by Anonymous Coward · 2012-06-18 08:09 · Score: 0
  
  Geeknet opened at over $2,500 per share (adjusted for splits) in 1999, and immediately collapsed. It's been floating around at about $20 a share for the last 10 years.
  There has never been a good time to own Geeknet stock.
4. Re:Desperation by sproketboy · 2012-06-19 01:38 · Score: 1
  
  Just shut up.
5. Re:Desperation by Jorl17 · 2012-06-19 05:18 · Score: 1
  
  My opinion is as valid as yours ( I assume you've used both too, and that you don't have prejudice against any of them). I'm not saying I'm right, I'm saying I feel that GitHub is far superior -- for my needs.
  
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the right decision by tracius01 · 2012-06-18 07:22 · Score: 2

They should have done this a long time ago.
1. Re:the right decision by makomk · 2012-06-18 07:47 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  As I recall Sourceforge did open-source the website a long time ago. Then they closed it again and stopped releasing new versions of the code.
This Should Protect SourceForge by LinuxScribe · 2012-06-18 07:24 · Score: 2

If GeekNet does opt to sell SourceForge (and /. and Freecode), then ultimately this would be a good move to keep the Allura code out in the open. In that sense, I think this is a very good plan to protect the code.
1. Re:This Should Protect SourceForge by rbowen · 2012-06-18 08:38 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  We've been talking about the incubator long before there was ever talk of selling.
  
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History repeats itself? by larry+bagina · 2012-06-18 07:29 · Score: 5, Informative

A long time ago, the sourceforge source code was open source. Then s/VA Linux/SourceForge/ and they closed up the source code. GNU forked it (savannah) while SourceForge Inc. went through any outside code contributions, requiring a copyright assignment or deleting it.

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How about... by TemporalBeing · 2012-06-18 08:12 · Score: 1

...they just start releasing the GPL version again. The removal of the GPL version is why there is Savannah, gForge, and a number of others. No need to go to the APL.

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Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
1. Re:How about... by Rob+Riggs · 2012-06-18 08:37 · Score: 1
  
  The ASF seems to have become the dumping ground of unloved commercial software.
  
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2. Re:How about... by rbowen · 2012-06-18 08:42 · Score: 1
  
  Rob, that remark shows you to be somewhat uninformed about both SourceForge *and* Apache.
  
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  Apache guy, Open Source enthusiast, runner
3. Re:How about... by nullchar · 2012-06-18 08:58 · Score: 1
  
  Even if that's true, I say the better for it! With the Apache Software name behind a project, OSS developers are more willing to bet their time investment into an ASF project than an OSS project released directly by a commercial vendor.
4. Re:How about... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-06-18 09:14 · Score: 0
  
  And your comment helps how?
5. Re:How about... by TemporalBeing · 2012-06-18 09:25 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  The ASF seems to have become the dumping ground of unloved commercial software.
  May be, but only for project sponsors that are seeking to exit the project sponsorship.
  
  Oracle chose ASF for various legal reasons. APL was better suited to how Sun was using the OOorg code-base than GPL to start with, and Oracle realized that the community really doesn't like them, and that OOorg type software was not their strong point. ASF is a US organization, so it made it easy not just to get a tax write-off for the donation, but also easy to transfer legally as there were fewer laws to deal with.
  
  Subversion moved to ASF as well; though I don't know the reasoning there, but the community transferred and has flourished just as much as it was under tigris.org.
  
  SourceForge's though is a hub of open source software, and their website interface was originally GPL. They moved it to a pure Commercial several years back, at which point gForge, GNU Savannah, and a few others popped up and continued with the last GPL'd version. (Actually, I think gForge was around earlier, but kept in step with it.) They already provide a well respected hosting site for open source software; they've already had it under the GPL; so why hand it to ASF? Why not just put it back out under the GPL and host it again? Even going to the APL is not an issue for them hosting it on their own site, and ASF would mean an entirely different infrastructure. It makes no sense.
  
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6. Re:How about... by LingNoi · 2012-06-18 23:36 · Score: 1
  
  He's right. As an outsider looking in this move was made to stay relevant when everyone has moved on to github. The only thing sourceforge has over github is that it's open source. Everything else about it is horrible and has been for a very long time.
  Same thing with Apache which is losing out to other servers such as nginx and cherokee. All these projects as well as the sourceforge site simply stopped innovating and bloated out while the majority of people moved on.
  I just checked out a random project on sourceforge and there are 5 adverts on the page.. I mean seriously? You think people want to use this? Sorry but for 90% of us sourceforge is dead with the rest being reluctant to learn anything new.
  I'm not some kind of sourceforge hater, i used to be a subscriber and hope that it does somehow improve however you're burying your head in the sand at the moment.
7. Re:How about... by rbowen · 2012-06-20 02:36 · Score: 1
  
  It makes sense to have the code stewarded outside of SourceForge, because it ensures that the development is completely open. We (SourceForge) value our projects' ability to own their own data, even if that means that they can move it somewhere else. By having Allura completely open, and even developed outside of SourceForge itself, we ensure that this right - the right to pack up and move - is 100% protected.
  It also provides us access to innovation and ideas from outside of our own small organization, which, in turn, further benefits our projects.
  Don't tell my corporate overlords, but I consider the health of these Open Source projects to be my highest goal when I go to work in the morning. I firmly believe that if those projects are more successful, then the company will be more successful. But it's the former, not the latter, that gets me to work every morning.
  Taking Allura to the Apache Incubator is for the benefit of our projects. It gives us the opportunity to focus more sharply on the things that will make their developer experience better. And folks who haven't seen the new SourceForge, and are making their judgements based on old-style SourceForge projects that haven't upgraded, are selling everyone short.
  
  --
  Apache guy, Open Source enthusiast, runner
8. Re:How about... by TemporalBeing · 2012-06-20 05:09 · Score: 1
  
  It makes sense to have the code stewarded outside of SourceForge, because it ensures that the development is completely open. We (SourceForge) value our projects' ability to own their own data, even if that means that they can move it somewhere else. By having Allura completely open, and even developed outside of SourceForge itself, we ensure that this right - the right to pack up and move - is 100% protected.
  You do realize that SF essentially had that until they turned to a closed development model, don't you?
  
  Perhaps the bigger issue is that SF is no longer making as much money from that closed model as they were due to the maturing and backing of gForge, Savannah, and others, so now they're trying to get back in the good graces of the community. Somehow, I'm not sure it's going to work.
  
  And, BTW, I fully support Oracle moving OOorg to Apache. It was the right thing to do. But I'm still baffled at why SF needs to other than to try to save face because they use to have a fully open project that is no longer such. It's a political move for SF more than anything else, while for Oracle there was far more than politics involved - Oracle simply didn't have the capability to serve OOorg they way it should; unlike SF with Allura.
  
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Can we start to expect support for... by unixisc · 2012-06-18 20:54 · Score: 1

Once this is opened up to a larger developer community, can we start to expect support for IPv6 and Unicode?