From eee4f0c70af6f2a49fabb730df761baa6475db22 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Pim Kunis Date: Sun, 27 Aug 2023 15:08:37 +0200 Subject: [PATCH] add update about opentf --- .../2023-08-17-hashicorp-license-change.md | 45 +++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 45 insertions(+) create mode 100644 jekyll/_posts/hashicorp-license-change/2023-08-17-hashicorp-license-change.md diff --git a/jekyll/_posts/hashicorp-license-change/2023-08-17-hashicorp-license-change.md b/jekyll/_posts/hashicorp-license-change/2023-08-17-hashicorp-license-change.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e9e3024 --- /dev/null +++ b/jekyll/_posts/hashicorp-license-change/2023-08-17-hashicorp-license-change.md @@ -0,0 +1,45 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Hashicorp's License Change and my Home Lab - Update +date: 2023-08-17 18:15:00 Europe/Amsterdam +categories: hashicorp terraform vault nomad +--- + +_See the [Update](#update) at the end of the article._ + +Already a week ago, Hashicorp [announced](https://www.hashicorp.com/blog/hashicorp-adopts-business-source-license) it would change the license on almost all its projects. +Unlike [their previous license](https://github.com/hashicorp/terraform/commit/ab411a1952f5b28e6c4bd73071194761da36a83f), which was the Mozilla Public License 2.0, their new license is no longer truly open source. +It is called the Business Source License™ and restricts use of their software for competitors. +In their own words: +> Vendors who provide competitive services built on our community products will no longer be able to incorporate future releases, bug fixes, or security patches contributed to our products. + +I found [a great article](https://meshedinsights.com/2021/02/02/rights-ratchet/) by MeshedInsights that names this behaviour the "rights ratchet model". +They define a script start-ups use to garner the interest of open source enthusiasts but eventually turn their back on them for profit. +The reason why Hashicorp can do this, is because contributors signed a copyright license agreement (CLA). +This agreement transfers the copyright of contributors' code to Hashicorp, allowing them to change the license if they want to. + +I find this action really regrettable because I like their products. +This sort of action was also why I wanted to avoid using an Elastic stack, which also had their [license changed](https://www.elastic.co/pricing/faq/licensing).[^elastic] +These companies do not respect their contributors and the software stack beneath they built their product on, which is actually open source (Golang, Linux, etc.). + +# Impact on my Home Lab + +I am using Terraform in my home lab to manage several important things: +- Libvirt virtual machines +- PowerDNS records +- Elasticsearch configuration + +With Hashicorp's anti open source move, I intend to move away from Terraform in the future. +While I will not use Hashicorp's products for new personal projects, I will leave my current setup as-is for some time because there is no real need to quickly migrate. + +I might also investigate some of Terraform's competitors, like Pulumi. +Hopefully there is a project that respects open source which I can use in the future. + +# Update + +A promising fork of Terraform has been announced called [OpenTF](https://opentf.org/announcement). +They intend to take part of the Cloud Native Computing Foundation, which I think is a good effort because Terraform is so important for modern cloud infrastructures. + +# Footnotes + +[^elastic]: While I am still using Elasticsearch, I don't use the rest of the Elastic stack in order to prevent a vendor lock-in.