[HN Gopher] GitHub Enterprise is now free through Microsoft for ...
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GitHub Enterprise is now free through Microsoft for Startups
Author : i_am_not_elon
Score : 119 points
Date : 2020-02-13 18:33 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (github.blog)
(TXT) w3m dump (github.blog)
| Alupis wrote:
| It gives you a credit of $1,000 monthly for 2 years, but there's
| no real indication anywhere on Github of exactly what that pays
| for?
|
| So it's not really free.
|
| How does this compare with Gitlab and Bitbucket offerings for
| small teams?
|
| I know Bitbucket has a one-time payment option for their self-
| hosted version of $10 for 10 users. Pretty hard to beat that,
| unless you're adamant you need it hosted for you.
| eberkund wrote:
| I assume it can also be used towards their hosted CI (GitHub
| actions)
| j4yav wrote:
| GitLab's similar program can be found at
| https://about.gitlab.com/solutions/startups/
| dtrailin wrote:
| > Members of the current or two most recent YCombinator
| batches (currently s2019, w2018, and s2018)
|
| That requirement is a pretty substantial difference.
|
| (disclosure: I work for MS)
| detaro wrote:
| (and GP for Gitlab)
| nimbius wrote:
| why not a gitea or gitlab instance running on a few pi's or
| something? Why pay anything at all?
| FactolSarin wrote:
| Because if you're a startup, you probably don't want to deal
| with something like that. You want something that "just
| works."
| Alupis wrote:
| Depends how "real" of a startup you are.
|
| VC backed? Ya, you'd probably just pay someone else to
| handle it - it's not your money after all...
|
| Bootstrapping with a friend as a side gig until you have
| something viable... you're probably going to go with the
| free/cheapest option possible - scaling up as necessary and
| not a second before.
| alkonaut wrote:
| The program offers github enterprise for free. The credits
| are in addition to that and can be used to e.g buy cloud
| CI/CD time.
|
| Running your own infrastructure doesn't cost nothing.
| Alupis wrote:
| > The program offers github enterprise for free. The
| credits are in addition to that and can be used to e.g buy
| cloud CI/CD time.
|
| That's not what the Github page says.
| alkonaut wrote:
| What does it say? The article itself seems pretty clear
| that it's included in the free program
|
| > [..] we're announcing that GitHub Enterprise is now
| included in Microsoft for Startups, a free program [..]
|
| Am I reading in the wrong place? Or just reading it
| wrong?
| Alupis wrote:
| > Participants receive $1,000 of monthly credit for up to
| two years of GitHub Enterprise Cloud.
|
| They're giving select startups $1,000 monthly in free
| credits used to pay for GitHub Enterprise. That $1,000
| isn't in addition to GH Enterprise being free.
|
| It's unknown, but seems implied, if you can apply unused
| credits to their CI/CD and other offerings.
| alkonaut wrote:
| I see. So by "now included" what they mean is "now
| included in the set if things you can use the credits
| for"? That's an interesting use of the word...
| gruez wrote:
| >It gives you a credit of $1,000 monthly for 2 years, but
| there's no real indication anywhere on Github of exactly what
| that pays for?
|
| Random screenshot I was able to find on their help page. Seems
| to be that the pricing for github enterprise is around
| $21/month/user.
|
| https://help.github.com/assets/images/help/organizations/sta...
| sascha_sl wrote:
| i wouldn't be able to tell you, github enterprise invoices
| are really weird and hard to read, we had to ask for a
| correction once too because it would've never gotten past
| bookkeeping
|
| the entire enterprise feature set seems uncharacteristically
| less polished in some places, the UX is confusing throughout
| and things you'd think you could do in the enterprise
| dashboard being elsewhere in the organization settings
| thefreeman wrote:
| So basically up 47 free users for 2 years. Not bad.
| Alupis wrote:
| Is 47 users really a "startup"? If you have anywhere near
| 47 actual users, affording $1k a month is going to be
| trivial.
|
| Would be nice if you could have, say, 5 users and extend
| the 2 years by not using all $1k monthly credits, adding
| users as you grow.
| TAForObvReasons wrote:
| It's targeted towards funded startups that are just
| picking up:
|
| > Designed for: "Funded: Product Market Fit"
|
| > The qualified offer is designed to help companies that
| are focused on growth, so it's less applicable for
| consultancies and small businesses.
|
| It's not designed for smaller bootstrapped businesses and
| other scenarios that would involve 5 users for extended
| periods of time
|
| https://startups.microsoft.com/en-us/benefits/
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| If you can't afford to start paying after 2 years, it's
| time to give up or pivot. This is very generous of MS/GH
| to offer until you've got traction.
| Alupis wrote:
| > If you can't afford to start paying after 2 years, it's
| time to give up or pivot
|
| That's kind of extremist, isn't it?
|
| Plenty of startups are bootstrapped, one or two people,
| and can survive just fine using basic tooling. The free
| offerings from Gitlab and Bitbucket (which include
| private repos) are just fine for a lot of startups.
|
| Not all startups are your VC backed unicorns.
|
| > This is very generous of MS/GH to offer
|
| Is it? It's really just an attempt to lock you into a
| proprietary system that you cannot export your data out
| of nor easily move off of down the road.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| No, I don't believe it's extremist to start paying for a
| commercial offering after a 2 year trial period. If you
| can make due with a free competing product, go for it.
|
| If you're not making enough in 2 years to pay for basic
| biz expenses, you're a hobby and you shouldn't expect
| enterprise features (SSO for example) for free in
| perpetuity.
| BeeOnRope wrote:
| You are misrepresenting their argument. He didn't say
| paying for a commercial offering after two years is
| extremist. Rather, they said your position that "if you
| can't pay for a commerical offering in two years, it's
| time to give up or pivot".
|
| I also find that second position extremist.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Time is valuable, but I suppose we all value it
| differently. I concede being an extremist in this regard.
| Time is the ultimate non renewable resource.
| aroch wrote:
| You might also pay for stuff like LFS and packages.
|
| But if I had to guess, $1000 is probably in the 95th+
| percentile of spending for teams <20 (or any sufficiently
| small group) -> thus this is letting startups spend on
| Github resources without worrying about running out of
| credits for two years
| yhoiseth wrote:
| Kinda funny that they market their enterprise plan to startups.
| bigmit37 wrote:
| Would companies have to worry about their proprietary code being
| seen and used in a not-so-obvious way?
|
| If some start up is working on some novel ML algorithms, that has
| some nice demos out in the public showcasing their work, I wonder
| if these bigger companies would take a peek at the source code
| and use some ideas from the algos for their ml products. This
| would prevent start-up from expanding into other areas.
| amsully wrote:
| Startups requiring compliance documentation from GitHub were
| forced to upgrade to GH Enterprise. Many competitors provide this
| for free or a fraction of the price. An industry based on an open
| source language will naturally have a race to the bottom in terms
| of price.
|
| GitHub's CLI is a move to get people off the open source solution
| by obfuscation.
| virtue3 wrote:
| > GitHub's CLI is a move to get people off the open source
| solution by obfuscation.
|
| The "hub" project they have (which I haven't heard of anyone
| using) is like that yes.
|
| The CLI is not https://github.com/cli/cli From their own docs:
| "While both tools bring GitHub to the terminal, hub behaves as
| a proxy to git and gh is a standalone tool."
| chungy wrote:
| The CLI is itself open source. Surely it can't be a huge
| barrier for competing software (GitLab, Gitea, etc) to
| implement its API.
| rahuldottech wrote:
| How can you say that? It's definitely a significant barrier.
|
| "Open source" is often used to appear more "friendly" to
| outsiders. Something can be open source and still be used to
| lock people into a particular environment. Case in point:
| Chromium, Android, etc.
| dublinben wrote:
| It's still an open point of contention whether an API can be
| copyrighted. There's obvious benefits to GitHub to encourage
| the use of a 'gh' command over the 'git' command.
| lwb wrote:
| Interesting, it looks like Microsoft has finally realized how
| unpopular they are among SV style startups. I've never been a fan
| of Windows but if there are enough perks in the program I would
| seriously consider using a Microsoft stack for a future startup.
| Ididntdothis wrote:
| Dealing with MS licensing used to be a PITA but maybe it's
| better now with Azure.
| hastes wrote:
| I use Azure at work, honestly the Kuberentes/Docker support is
| pretty awesome. Not to mention the fact that they only run
| garbage collection after 28 days so if you accidentally destroy
| a production bucket with user images in it, support can easily
| get it back to you. (Yes this happened before)
| narenkeshav wrote:
| Thank you, I am happy with GitLab.
| TicklishTiger wrote:
| I would not use GitHub these days.
|
| On GitLab, you can decide to download all your data anytime and
| put it into a selfhosted GitLab instance.
|
| Why would I want to give that up and put my balls into the hands
| of Microsoft?
| decebalus1 wrote:
| Don't worry, soon you'll probably be able to put your balls in
| the hands of Google. Git is distributed by definition. If you
| really want to be free, stop using external centralized sc
| services.
| zelly wrote:
| I think it's pretty hilarious that some companies are opting to
| allow another company (Microsoft, no less) to see the source of
| their proprietary code. It's like putting a giant sign outside
| your building that says "We're not working on anything
| interesting".
| vapemaster wrote:
| Seems a bit alarmist..
| WorldMaker wrote:
| This article is specifically about free access to `GitHub
| Enterprise` the self-hosted GitHub instances.
| moondev wrote:
| I would love to run this in my homelab with a few users, is there
| a path for that or do I need a registered company?
| [deleted]
| Alupis wrote:
| You'd need to buy their self-hosted Enterprise version, which
| is certainly more expensive than Gitlab and Bitbucket offerings
| for self-hosted small team versions.
|
| This offering is specifically for Enterprise Cloud, which they
| host.
| divbzero wrote:
| I think the answer is "yes" a registered company is required.
|
| The FAQs for Microsoft for Startups [1] state the following:
|
| - You must be engaged in development of a software-based
| product or service that will form a core piece of you current
| or intended business - this software must be owned, not
| licensed.
|
| - You cannot have received more than $10,000 of free Azure in
| the past.
|
| - Your headquarters must reside in the countries covered by our
| Azure global infrastructure.
|
| - You must be a privately held company.
|
| - You must operate a public website on your own domain.
|
| - Your contact email address domain must match your public
| website.
|
| - Your funding information must be verifiable.
|
| The FAQs also add that:
|
| > The qualified offer is designed to help companies that are
| focused on growth, so it's less applicable for consultancies
| and small businesses. If you are a small business or
| consultancy you can get started with a free trial.
|
| [1]: https://startups.microsoft.com/en-us/benefits/#faq
| xrd wrote:
| Having played a lot with gitlab and really happy with it, I'm
| confused as to why I would look at GitHub.
|
| This looks like it is free as in price, but not free forever and
| not free of red tape.
| guptaneil wrote:
| Interesting that it's explicitly limited to B2B startups.
|
| Is there a feeling that B2C isn't a "real" business? Or maybe
| because B2B startups are more likely to be acquired by larger
| companies, thus absorbing Microsoft's stack?
| awad wrote:
| I suspect it's because Microsoft's core DNA is B2B so they're
| able to justify an accelerator and the subsequent resource pull
| for it by going that route. Your latter suspicion is also not
| unfounded either I'd bet.
| dhdhehzhzhe wrote:
| Ah the GitLab astroturfers are here
| zelly wrote:
| Lots of github employees on this site.
|
| It's ok, you just work there. No need to get angry.
| reificator wrote:
| I mean, I use gitlab, gitea, github, and bitbucket all fairly
| regularly for different projects, and I haven't seen anything
| out of the gitlab posts here that I think is wrong.
|
| People disagreeing with you and/or opposing the free offerings
| of a company known for embrace/extend/extinguish does not mean
| they're astroturfing.
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