First, they restricted code search without logging in so I’m using sourcegraph But now, I cant even view discussions or wiki without logging in.
It was a nice run
I moved all my open source projects to Gitlab the day Microsoft announced they were acquiring Github.
(I wish in retrospect I’d taken the time to research and decide on the right host. I likely would have gone to Codeberg instead of Gitlab had I done so. But Gitlab’s still better than Github. And I don’t really know for sure that Codeberg was even around back when Microsoft acquired Github.)
My first impression of gitlab was offputting because I was using hardened firefox and couldnt get past through cloudflare so I ended up using github. It was also better ui wise but now its just a mess
Edit: slowly i’m starting to move everything to codeberg
I’m OOTL. Why is Codeberg better than GitLab?
- It is FOSS while GitLab EE is not.
- It supports a lot of atifact repository formats while GitLab only docker registry.
- It is a non-commercial project.
- It supports a lot of atifact repository formats while GitLab only docker registry.
not true https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/user/packages/package_registry/supported_package_managers.html
that said, I hate gitlab and their commercial choices, they must die
Thank you I missed when they added this. I only track a very old FR for rpm support and was sure that situation is similar with other repos. However gitea/forgejo supports more formats including rpm.
Codeberg is ran by a German nonprofit. GitLab is publically-traded on NASDAQ.
I’m not really sure it is. I just wish I’d shopped around before jumping to Gitlab, really.
It kindof feels like Gitlab’s aims are more commercial and Codeberg’s are more in line with the FOSS movement, but that’s just a vague sense I have based on things I’ve seen but no longer remember specifically.
CalcProgrammer1’s response to my post seems pretty informative and apropos, though.
The landscape is changing so fast thanks to LLMs, everything is becoming gated behind logins. Thanks ChatGPT.
I still left my old and unmaintained projects on GitHub but I moved all my active projects to GitLab and any new projects go there too. I have them auto mirrored back to GitHub though as the more mirrors the better. I also recently set up a Codeberg mirror for some of my projects, though GitLab’s CI is what is keeping me on GitLab even though they nerfed the shit out of it and made it basically a requirement to host your own runners even for FOSS projects a year or two back. Still hate them for that and if Codeberg gets a solid CI option, leaving GitLab would make me happy. They too have seen quite a lot of enshittification in the years since Microsoft bought GitHub.
nerfed the shit out of it and made it basically a requirement to host your own runners even for FOSS projects a year or two back.
Did they just reduce quotas (minutes?, cache storage?) or did they remove features? I’ve always used self-hosted runner
Drastically nerfed the quotas. FOSS projects with a valid license used to have GitLab Premium access to shared runners and now even FOSS projects with a valid license get a rather useless 400 minutes. They also require new accounts to add CC info just to use that paltry sum which means FOSS projects can’t rely on CI passing on forks to ensure a merge request passes the checks before merging, as even if you have project specific runners set up forks don’t use them and neither to MRs.
I wish companies didn’t offer what they can’t support from the beginning rather than this embrace, extend, extinguish shit. I guess in GitLab’s case there was no extend, it was just embrace FOSS projects and let them set up CI pipelines and get projects depending on the shared CI runners as part of merge request workflow for a few years and then extinguish by yoinking that access away and fucking over everyone’s workflow, leaving us scrambling to set up project side runners and ruining checks on MRs.
They also require new accounts to add CC
just FYI you can still register w/o a cc but the option is hidden, only reachable via ‘sign in’ and then ‘register’: https://gitlab.com/users/sign_up
that said they’re shit and need to die
I’m honestly blown away by whomever finds this surprising. This is Microsoft we’re talking about. Everything they touch turns into this. Taking what is not theirs, using it for profit, and not even giving credit where credit is due.
The writing was on the wall when they established a generative AI using everyone’s code and of course without asking anyone for permission.
What are good alternatives to GitHub except selfhosting? I only know gitlab.com. Anything else?
Codeberg
Sourcehut
codeberg
SSH + an HTTP server can work if you are going barebones
I would say bitbucket except I don’t recommend bitbucket.
Hold up, are you sure you can’t view Discussions or Wiki? Which sites can you not view them?
I’m fine viewing them for public repos that I usually visit.
Asking to make sure that Github is not slowly rolling out this lockdown.
Most probably. I was viewing discussions about podman, I could view them if directily opened from a link but it required login when navigated to linked pages and wiki
You don’t need the question mark. If something is for-profit (or can be used for profit) then sooner or later it will be enshittified.
They have teams of people whose entire job is figuring out ways to wring a few more cents from somebody. Put them at the helm of a company that’s stood for 1000 years and they’ll be thrilled at how easy it will be to use that name to sell plastic dogshit at a premium price.
Compared to Gitlab, it definitely is shit already. And that has nothing to do with the artificial restrictions. God I hate this website. I appreciate their service, but the UI is genuinely trash.
I’m not a developer so I’m not very familiar with this world. But it kind of amazes me that the code for so many open source projects are hosted by Microsoft. Isn’t there a FOSS alternative? edit: seems Gitlab is an alternative. Then the question is, why are people using microsoft products?
Github started independently and was amazing service(and still is except now its going downhill) but Microsoft acquired it it 2018
The power of git ( the backbone of github ) comes in that you can easily take a repository and move it to a different server. Its like, 3 commands? ( git vlone, git add remote, git push ). So if people would leave github, nothing is lost :)
Github is designed to centralize git (as the word “hub” suggests). You can still migrate away code, issues and wikis, but contributors, followers, wiki editors, issue subscribers, visibility in general and github stars are locked in. Discoverability matters to projects trying to attract contributors.
So you lose nothing, gotcha
Agreed there, but its still a source control platform. Its still git. I’d argue the code is the most important part and followers, subscribers and stars (whatever those may do) are a secundairy functionality that a developer doesnt necesarily care about. The most important part is the git repo and everything linked with it imo
What about the time they fired their artists and then immediately wrote a blog post congratulating themselves for making AI art from a model trained on the ex-employees’ art. Inspiring.
I don’t really feel like self-hosting a Git instance is a good idea for me personally, but I’ve been really happy with Gitlab for around 8 years now
The final strawberry for me was forcing people to have 2fa.
Why? That’s a good thing.
