BitKeeper's open source release [LWN.net]

BitKeeper, the inspiration behind Git and Mercurial, has been released under the Apache 2.0 License. Larry McVoy is answering questions on Hacker News, posting as 'luckydude'. In one comment he says: "Git/Github has all the market share. Trying to compete with that just proved to be too hard. So rather than wait until we were about to turn out the lights, we decided to open source it while we still had money in the bank and see what happens. We've got about 2 years of money and we're trying to build up some additional stuff that we can charge for. We're also open to being doing work for pay to add whatever it is that some company wants to BK, that's more or less what we've been doing for the last 18 years. Will it work? No idea. We have a couple of years to find out. If nothing pans out, open sourcing it seemed like a better answer than selling it off." (Thanks to Josh Triplett)

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BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 10, 2016 23:14 UTC (Tue) by daniel (guest, #3181) [Link] (3 responses)

A bit late...

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 0:04 UTC (Wed) by daniel (guest, #3181) [Link]

...better late than never. Welcome back, Larry.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 1:45 UTC (Wed) by donbarry (guest, #10485) [Link] (1 responses)

McVoy doesn't specifically state that those he exiled from DVCS free/libre development by threatening their employing companies with revocation of their BK licenses can now resume such contributions (e.g., https://lwn.net/Articles/153990/). Granted, his bludgeon is now substantially smaller, but given the "mercurial" treatment of those who trusted in his good will, necessitating the hasty and inconvenient development of alternatives, many will be once bitten, twice shy as to where this effort might go under his continued direction.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 9:17 UTC (Wed) by dakas (guest, #88146) [Link]

I don't think it will work. If you have a core developing entity with a track record of not wanting to be open, you cannot really expect a community to grow and take off.

OpenDarwin finally closed shop after getting screwed over again and again and again and again by Apple. The main problem Bitkeeper is facing is that there already are high-profile technically viable solutions in its mind space around that already have working robust distributed development communities with established and accepted Free licensing schemes.

If you want to win next year's races, breeding a champion is not on the agenda.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 0:34 UTC (Wed) by aryonoco (guest, #55563) [Link] (22 responses)

"Git/Github has all the market share. Trying to compete with that just proved to be too hard"

The irony.

I'm sure Apache is better than the previous DPOL (Don't Piss Off Larry) license, but it's probably too late to bother now.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 1:02 UTC (Wed) by cesarb (subscriber, #6266) [Link] (21 responses)

> it's probably too late to bother now.

I wouldn't be so sure.

It probably won't ever get back the "distributed VCS for free software developed as text files" niche it lost to git and mercurial, but nothing prevents it from finding another niche. The binary assets thing mentioned in the Hacker News discussion might be the key to some of these niches; git is well-known for working not so well when the repository contains many large binary data files.

This release under the Apache 2.0 license will suddenly move it in people's minds out of the "historical footnote which probably died ten years ago" status, and into a "possible alternative for subversion, git, mercurial" status. Time will tell if it gets enough mindshare to survive, but at least now it has a chance.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 1:13 UTC (Wed) by geertj (guest, #4116) [Link] (12 responses)

> I wouldn't be so sure.

I second the GP, it's too little too late. It's not just about Git vs Bitkeeper. It's about the entire ecosystem around Git, notably Github. There's a very strong network effect that will make it almost impossible, IMHO, for BK to become a thing.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 9:17 UTC (Wed) by pboddie (guest, #50784) [Link] (1 responses)

It's about the entire ecosystem around Git, notably Github.

...also known as "the next BitKeeper".

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 15:35 UTC (Wed) by flussence (guest, #85566) [Link]

That's an accurate summary. Give the basics away for free, keep all the metadata proprietary and non-interoperable.

It's sad and ironic that in trying to escape that defect, Git enabled it on such a massive scale.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 11:30 UTC (Wed) by jensend (guest, #1385) [Link] (9 responses)

GitHub has become too much of a single point of failure for open source development in general, and it is far from being either technically perfect or politically neutral. More viable alternatives are sorely needed, and not all of those need to primarily use Git.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 12:18 UTC (Wed) by johannbg (guest, #65743) [Link] (7 responses)

There is no such thing as a single point of failure in DVCS hence the only way repository hosting service such as github can become a single point of failure is if individuals or companies are dumb enough to be using it for deployments without being paying for some sla/uptime guarantee from the repository hosting service provider.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 12:48 UTC (Wed) by pboddie (guest, #50784) [Link]

Well, "companies are dumb enough to be using it for deployments without being paying for some sla/uptime guarantee from the repository hosting service provider." And don't forget the uptime guarantee from all the providers between the hosting provider and the end-user. And because convenience is the primary consideration, expect blank looks and bafflement should such convenience be suspended for even a moment.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 13:39 UTC (Wed) by jezuch (subscriber, #52988) [Link] (5 responses)

> There is no such thing as a single point of failure in DVCS hence the only way repository hosting service such as github can become a single point of failure

GitHub is much more than just repository hosting service.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 13:51 UTC (Wed) by johannbg (guest, #65743) [Link] (4 responses)

I love to hear this explain what more it is in a nutshell other than a repository hosting service?

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 14:02 UTC (Wed) by farnz (subscriber, #17727) [Link] (3 responses)

Issue tracker, pull request tracker, limited online code editing, wiki and webpage hosting.

Plus the core of hosting a repository for you.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 18:38 UTC (Wed) by JoeF (guest, #4486) [Link] (1 responses)

Yup.
Whenever Github is down, twitter overflows with comments like these:
"GitHub is down, showing us how programmers designed a single point of failure into their workflows. Well done, everybody."
""I couldn't do my assignment because GitHub is down" will be the next "my dog ate my homework"."
"1. looks up decentralized git workflow tools to use while github is down
2. finds https://github.com/cjb/GitTorrent
3. oh wait"
Etc. etc.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 12, 2016 13:25 UTC (Thu) by Lennie (subscriber, #49641) [Link]

Come on people, I wouldn't say Github is a single point of failure. It's only that if you look at network effect.

If you want to replace it for all the other reasons, it already exists. For example Gitlab is open source works in a very similar way to Github and you can do your own free installation behind a firewall if you need it.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 15, 2016 6:33 UTC (Sun) by gps (subscriber, #45638) [Link]

Github is also a code review tool and, most importantly, a social network. It is more important than Linkedin or Twitter to many users.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 13, 2016 0:56 UTC (Fri) by nevyn (guest, #33129) [Link]

https://pagure.io/ is the obvious open source alternative, and does the two main things I like github for (hosted git repo. and managed pull requests).

But network effects are hugely in favour of using github, until it does something that forces people to move.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 5:08 UTC (Wed) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link] (7 responses)

> "distributed VCS for software developed as text files" niche

You just reminded me of that guy; he was very surprised to hear that no one uses Microsoft Word to write code.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 5:23 UTC (Wed) by linuxrocks123 (guest, #34648) [Link] (5 responses)

Someone just emailed me all their course programming assignments as one big long Microsoft Word document. Sigh.

Additionally, while (almost) no one writes software in Microsoft Word, many people sure as heck do in Microsoft Excel ;)

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 5:25 UTC (Wed) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link] (4 responses)

> many people sure as heck do in Microsoft Excel ;)

Very true! So, how's version control there? Genuine question.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 9:03 UTC (Wed) by matthias (subscriber, #94967) [Link]

You could ask Randall ;)

http://xkcd.com/1667/

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 11:30 UTC (Wed) by ceplm (subscriber, #41334) [Link] (2 responses)

OOCalc/LibreOfficeCalc has versions.

version control for spreadsheets

Posted May 12, 2016 1:03 UTC (Thu) by pjm (guest, #2080) [Link] (1 responses)

> OOCalc/LibreOfficeCalc has versions.

Versions as such are easy (e.g. put the binary file into git), but I think the question is more about how practical diff, merge, blame, bisect etc. are, if you can comment on how any of those compare to using git with line-based, plain-text source code; or more generally how the workflows might be expected to compare.

version control for spreadsheets

Posted May 12, 2016 6:03 UTC (Thu) by ceplm (subscriber, #41334) [Link]

Certainly. I spent yesterday evening in the lovely arms of git rebase -i dealing with a 60-commits-branch, so I know that LibreOffice versions are not the thing (although, do you really want to spent whole evening in the lovely embrace of git rebase -i?). I was just saying there is something.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 6:56 UTC (Wed) by pwfxq (subscriber, #84695) [Link]

> You just reminded me of that guy; he was very surprised to hear that no one uses Microsoft Word to write code.

There was an assembler (Maxam) for the Amstrad CPC 8-bit micro that used a word processor (Protext) as the editor.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 5:56 UTC (Wed) by rsidd (guest, #2582) [Link] (6 responses)

Browsing the Hacker News thread, I came across this gem by Matt Mackall on the naming of mercurial

Shortly before the first release, I read an article about the ongoing Bitkeeper debacle that described Larry McVoy as mercurial (in the sense of 'fickle'). Given the multiple meanings, the convenient abbreviation, and the good fit with my pre-existing naming scheme (see my email address), it clicked instantly. Mercurial is thus named in Larry's honor. I do not know if the same is true of Git.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 7:33 UTC (Wed) by ledow (guest, #11753) [Link]

Oh, that's got to be quote of the week in the next weekly edition, even if it is old.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 8:35 UTC (Wed) by lyda (subscriber, #7429) [Link]

Now that's an amusing anecdote right there.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 8:39 UTC (Wed) by cjwatson (subscriber, #7322) [Link] (2 responses)

Sadly from the point of view of humour value, the lore I remember is that, if Git was ever intended to refer to a person (which I think Linus always denied, except for quipping that it referred to himself), it was Tridge. At the time Linus seemed a lot more annoyed with Tridge for losing kernel access to BK than with Larry for having it be at BitMover's discretion to begin with.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 9:45 UTC (Wed) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link] (1 responses)

Linus's favourite book as a teenager was Stranger in a Strange Land. Does this have some connection with the name 'git'?

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 9:59 UTC (Wed) by gowen (guest, #23914) [Link]

More likely that "git" (and in some places "get"[1]) is UK English slang for a troublesome or annoying person. Not as strong as a***ole, but sort-of along those lines.

[1] cf: "I'm So Tired" (c. Lennon/McCartney 1968)

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 13:39 UTC (Wed) by karim (subscriber, #114) [Link]

That's awesome. I was wondering where he got the name all this time.

BitKeeper's open source release

Posted May 11, 2016 15:27 UTC (Wed) by SEJeff (guest, #51588) [Link]

This is so ironic. If they hadn't been such jerks when Tridge was trying to reverse engineer their protocol to write an open source client, git would simply never have existed in the first place. Hindsight is always 20/20 however.