[QGIS-Developer] On github, gitlab, and imperialist nations screwing us all over...

[Andreas Neumann]

Hi,

Thanks for bringing up this discussion.

My personal opinion is that we should be worried by such development and 
should have a plan B for hosting our code.

We certainly want QGIS and its source code to be available world wide, 
not just to parts of the world at the mercy of some governments and 
corporations.

But the decision to move away from github should be discussed and voted 
on by the core devs and voting members because apparently it has a lot 
of implications and a lot of work went into the CI integration 
(according to some devs).

We already have 10k € in the 2019 budget for github to gitlab (hosted or 
self hosted?) migration. This money would already be available this 
year, but first we need to have a plan and the support of the developer 
community to do this step. If this isn't enough, we can have additional 
budget in 2020.

Greetings,

Andreas


Am 01.08.19 um 09:37 schrieb Vincent Picavet (ml):
> Hi Nyall, all,
>
> On 01/08/2019 06:26, Nyall Dawson wrote:
>> Well, I've got to say upfront that we WERE warned about the dangers of
>> this happening by members of our community, and now the worst IS
>> happening and Github has started blocking access to projects from
>> certain regions.
>>
>> See https://www.linuxinsider.com/story/86154.html, but long story
>> short, GitHub is now blocking users in Crimea, Cuba, Iran, North Korea
>> and Syria from accessing its services to comply with U.S. trade
>> control laws. I'm unsure if we're directly affected yet by this, but
>> the wording on Github's notice is very vague: " GitHub MAY allow users
>> in or ordinarily resident in countries and territories subject to U.S.
>> sanctions to access CERTAIN free GitHub.com services for PERSONAL
>> COMMUNICATIONS " (emphasis added by me).
>>
>> What can/should we do in response to this?
> While the impact of this decision is still very minor for us right now,
> as you say it is a very good illustration on how putting us in a vendor
> lock-in situation is bad.
>
> I would say that it is not too late to re-work on a self-hosted GitLab
> instance, which would be more future-proof. That would need a great deal
> of efforts though, and would require specific funding for the
> forthcoming non-funny tasks.
>
> At Oslandia, we would be willing to help, if it is the path chosen by
> the community.
>
> A Git mirror would be great of course, but does not solve the full problem.
>
> And personally, this kind of attack against free information and
> knowledge is a concern, for sure.
>
> Best regards,
> Vincent
>
>> Note that it ALSO applies to gitlab.com, who are also subject to the
>> same trade laws, so moving to gitlab ISN'T a possible solution (unless
>> we self-host).
>>
>> I think at the least we could/should endorse an official, read-only
>> repo mirror which isn't affected by the trade laws, e.g.
>> https://git.osgeo.org/gitea/qgis/QGIS would be a great candidate
>> (unless osgeo is also affected by the same ruling, which they could
>> easily be, given that they are US based too) . An official mirror
>> would at least ensure that users in these regions can access the
>> existing source.
>>
>> Does this development concern anyone else?
>>
>> Nyall
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