FAQ

Here are answers to some common questions regarding the site & its content.

What is a “FOSS Project”?

While assessing a piece of code against the free software or open source definitions is (usually) relatively simple, what FOSS means for a project is much more abstract & undefined. Projects & companies are quick to label themselves as “open source” or “FOSS” overall, but in many cases they may not provide the freedoms that the folks in the community expect when being advertised under those terms.

On this website, we try to somewhat assess projects overall, looking at a range of factors which include licensing, marketing, distribution, revenue means & funding, in an attempt to document and display factors which FOSS users may want to consider. This is with the goal to improve transparency as per our aims, often being a place to highlight things which projects may not want to advertise themselves.

Do you have any authority to be assessing projects like this?

No, not really! This website was not created by an official from the OSI or Free Software Foundation at all. I understand that assessing projects with categories, as we do, may come across somewhat authoritative but it seems to be the best way to quickly relay a broad view of a project relative to FOSS values while also forcing us to think about & develop the idea of what makes a “FOSS project”.

At the end of the day, our categorisation is built from a particular viewpoint and will naturally contain opinion, but this has developed from the insight of observing transparency issues in the FOSS world for years, and something intended to be developed further with community input.

We respect that not everyone will align to the choices of categorisation & information relayed, but we hope this still helps inform FOSS users about the things they care about.

I’m seeing projects marked as “FOSS”, but they have tagged issues!?

The issues used to tag projects don’t always result in a non-FOSS categorisation. Sometimes they’re just there to inform about a potential future issue or a factor which has often correlated to FOSS-based transparency issues. For example, the “Copyleft License with CLA” may be assigned but, by itself, will not result in a non-FOSS status as the impact really depends on the project’s future plans & intents. It could however result in a non-FOSS categorisation if there are any particular transparency issues regarding the CLA, such as specifically misleading users regarding its intent.

What about “Delayed Open Source”?

Some licenses, such as the “Business Source License” and the “Functional Source License”, provide code with (non-FOSS) limitations, but switch to a FOSS license after a number of years. While this means that old code will be FOSS, projects are not usually advertising their old base under their name, they’re advertising the current project form and its latest features.

These licenses are used with the specific intent of hindering the chance of forks succeeding to prevent competitive use, which may be fair if that’s their wish or need, but is specifically against the idea of rights provided in FOSS, those same rights which have built the reputation of these definitions, those same rights which others are providing software under. While years-old versions could be used as a basis of a fork, in the software landscape where software moves fast this can significantly increase the scope & effort for a point-in-time fork in the event, for example, the original authors start making user-unfriendly changes.

Attempting to assess “Delayed Open Source” would also raise a whole other category of questioning in regards to what kind of delay is reasonable (relative to project size/scope/requirements etc…), when at the end of the day that has usually been chosen by the author as a time that can effectively hinder competitive forking as mentioned above. Therefore, in the scope of this site, projects with “Delayed Open Source” licenses are not considered FOSS.

Some may not be happy that we do consider FOSS value in “open core” projects due to frequent bad practices in that landscape, but we attempt to set a relatively high bar for “open core” projects otherwise they will be categorised as having issues.

Do you think software should only be FOSS?

No! Aside from ensuring compliance with other software licenses, authors have the right to publish their efforts how they wish. FOSS does not work for everyone, and giving away the required freedoms & rights to users can present issues or risks in many cases, especially when in combination with many types of business model.

This site is focused on FOSS because this is a specific area which many users care about.

Who created this site?

This was was created by Dan Brown in June of 2025, and the origins of the site can be read here. It’s hoped that over time community involvement will grow so that it can be managed & maintained by a wider community group.