I started my business 17 years ago, with a simple mission: spread the use of Git into large enterprises worldwide. The goal was simple and challenging: convincing large companies to trust Git and fill the gaps separating them from migrating from their legacy systems.

The first product that came out of it was, not surprisingly, Git Enterprise. You can still access its official launch YouTube video (https://youtu.be/unJxlD2aopY), which attracted over 5k views and interest.
Since then, my blog has been called GitEnterprise. My mission to work with large companies intensified, and I successfully reached my first client, who agreed to abandon Subversion, which was the de facto standard at that time, and adopt Git after seeing my product.

I didn’t know that Google had started with a similar idea for a different purpose: making Git suitable for large enterprises to cooperate on developing the Android Operating System. The Google project was called Gerrit Code Review, inspired by the Gerrit Ritvield Code Review tool built by Guido Van Rossum after he joined Google.

I donated all the code of GitEnterprise to the Gerrit Code Review project and joined the endeavour under the leadership of Shawn Pearce, the Gerrit project founder. Inspired by the new partnership, I also changed the name of my company to GerritForge to represent its new mission.

Fast forward to today, and a lot has changed. Gerrit is a complex ecosystem comprising a central Gerrit with its core plugins and a constellation of 200+ plugins created by a universe of over 800 contributors. GerritForge has also grown and started expanding to new countries, opening an HQ in Sunnyvale, California. After the passing of Shawn Pearce in 2018, who died from lung cancer, we also took over the management of the global community events and local meetups, to serve the need of coordinating and fostering collaboration amongst contributors and users worldwide. We owe it to honour Shawn’s legacy to make his project successful. He used to call Gerrit Code Review his “130% Google side-project”, as it was more of a mission than a $DAY_JOB for him.

The 100% pure Open-Source model I adopted over 17 years ago must be upgraded to tackle the new challenges of managing and supporting a larger organization and community, and ensuring that it will continue to innovate and evolve in the years to come.

Re-licensing GerritForge plugins

GerritForge has helped many organizations worldwide get the most out of Gerrit Code Review and benefit from a 100% Open-Source business model while relying on rock-solid Enterprise Support with quality gates, longer-term maintenance, and strict SLAs.

However, the marketplace is evolving, and fewer companies are willing to invest in pure 100% Open-Source communities. On the other hand, the recent threats from Cybercriminals targeting the supply chain have driven Enterprises to request a higher level of software and supplier certification, which may interfere with a 100% pure Open-Source contribution model.

After exploring many other options, including joining software foundations or traditional contracting, I have decided to switch from a pure Apache 2.0 Open-Source to a mixed Open-Core contribution model for creating a rock-solid Gerrit distribution that can satisfy the more stringent requirements of certification and compliance.

I have called this new software Gerrit Enterprise to avoid confusion with the Gerrit core, which remains 100% Open-Source.

GerritForge confirms its commitment to the Gerrit core and core-plugins Open-Source contributions under the current AOSP Apache 2.0 license. Some of the plugins developed almost exclusively by GerritForge will continue to be developed as a Commercial Product with a new software licensing model.

To explain the re-licensing policy with a formula:
Gerrit Enterprise [Commercial Product] = Gerrit Core [Open-Source Apache 2.0] + GerritForge plugins [Commercial Product].

The licensing model we have chosen is called “Business Software License”, aka BSL.

What is BSL, and what does it mean

The term BSL or “BSL license” was used for the first time by Cockroach Labs (the creators of CockroachDB) back in 2019. “BSL license” most commonly refers to the Business Source License. This source-available license allows for public viewing and non-production use of source code but restricts commercial or production use unless a specific “additional use grant” is provided by the licensor. After a predetermined period, the BSL automatically converts to a fully Open-Source license. This model balances software developers’ need for revenue with the benefits of Open-Source, making software source-available while ensuring it eventually becomes Open-Source.

In a nutshell, the GerritForge plugins released under BSL will have more restrictions compared to the current Apache 2.0 Open-Source:

• The requirement to receive a formal BSL License by GerritForge.
• The Software License will be FREE of charge for small businesses, non-profit organizations, and non-productive environments.
• Does not allow bundling, reselling, or reusing in other products and services without the written consent of GerritForge
• All contributors to the plugins under BSL will have to sign a specific CLA with GerritForge
• The source code cannot be modified, fully or in part, or reused in source or binary form in any other Open-Source project before the expiration of the BSL

After 5 years of the GerritForge’s plugins released date under BSL, the code will be automatically released as Apache 2.0 to the Gerrit-Review main repository.

The BSL model allows us to continue to develop our plugins in the Open and support the current versions under Apache 2.0, but it will ensure that we are in control of the way the software is certified, distributed, and guaranteed to all the users who benefit from it.

This initiative fosters a virtuous cycle of mutual benefit. The support from companies adopting Gerrit and GerritForge plugins will directly fuel the community, allowing us to reinvest in core software development, key summits, and local meetups, ensuring the ecosystem thrives.

Which GerritForge plugins are going to be under BSL?

The plugins chosen to be converted to a BSL license are the ones that are developed and maintained by GerritForge for at least 80% of the code in the past 24 months.

Also, GerritForge has decided to leave as Open-Source under the Apache 2.0 license the ones that are widely used by the community or reused in other projects.

The major plugins involved in the re-licensing as BSL are:

• Gerrit Multi-Site, with its associated components, Kafka/Kinesis/PubSub brokers, Zookeeper/DynamoDb refdb, Healthcheck-Enterprise, and Websession broker
• Pull-replication plugin
• GitHub and Virtualhost plugins, which are the basis of GerritHub.io
• Cache-Chroniclemap lib module
• Gerrit and Git analytics, including git-repo-metrics
• AWS deployment for Gerrit
• Other minor plugins may be added at a later time

The re-licensing means that the new development will happen on the GerritForge organisation (https://github.com/gerritforge) on GitHub and GerritHub (https://review.gerrithub.io), and the current master branch will be deprecated on Gerrit-Review.

What happens to the current GerritForge plugins on the stable branches?

GerritForge confirms its commitment to continue supporting all the existing plugins, either from GerritForge or other contributors, on the stable and supported non-EOL versions (see https://www.gerritcodereview.com/support.html#supported-versions) on the current Google-owned Gerrit-Review site.

What happens to the current GerritForge plugins on the unsupported EOL branches?

The policy about EOL branches has not changed on GerritForge plugins; the current community support policy (https://www.gerritcodereview.com/support.html#community-support) will continue to be in force.

What if I am using those plugins in production now?

The current version of the plugins you have installed in your production environment will continue to work and be under Apache 2.0 on the Gerrit-Review site.
Once you upgrade to the newer version of Gerrit Code Review (e.g., Gerrit v3.13 or later), you must contact GerritForge (www.gerritforge.com/contact) to obtain a license key before proceeding with the upgrade in production.

What if I am a GerritForge customer and want to upgrade to a new BSL version?

All GerritForge customers have automatic access to the BSL version of the plugins under support. Their Gerrit Enterprise Support contracts and associated policies have not changed.
The BSL will not have any impact on their budget or the service they receive today.

What if I have both Open-Source and BSL commercial plugins from GerritForge installed?

You need to obtain a BSL license for the ones released by GerritForge, and you can use them alongside any other Open-Source plugin.
The Open-Source plugins are released under the Apache 2.0 license and hosted on Gerrit-Review, and are not subject to any BSL license.

Questions or Concerns?

I am happy to address your concerns and answer any questions you may have about the move we are making for GerritForge; feel free to ask questions on this blog post or get in touch with me through https://gerritforge.com/contact.

Our goal is to continue to exist and support the Gerrit Code Review community, today and for the foreseeable future. GerritForge BSL will allow us to continue to innovate and bring even more contributions and features to Gerrit core and its plugins.

Thank you for supporting us in the past and in the near future!

---

Luca Milanesio
GerritForge co-Founder and CEO
Gerrit Code Review Maintainer & Release Manager
Member of the Gerrit Code Review Engineering Steering Committee