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An Apparent Exodus Continues At OwnCloud

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  • #11
    Originally posted by torsionbar28 View Post

    Woah, slow down there son. A phobia is an irrational fear. Microsoft has a long and consistent track record of buying out rising stars in the software market, for the express purpose of burying their product and quashing competition. Both the US Justice Dept, and the European Union have sued Microsoft for this anti-competitive behavior. OwnCloud is a rising star, and Microsoft is Microsoft, so this buy-out speculation is based on fact, not fear.
    Like for example skype.

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    • #12
      Originally posted by whoops View Post
      I admit, I'm not familiar with the OwnCloud codebase, so it could be largely crap and me completely unaware of it, but I've been using it for years and have found it to be reliable, stable, and reasonably fast.
      The issues I talk about are behind the scenes.
      If it ran like crap none would use it at all, but good software is a bit more involved than just "running fine".
      "just running fine" is ok if the webapplication will never interact with outside world, OwnCloud does interact with the internet, so it should put some effort to avoid becoming PwnCloud.

      Security issues abund, and none is really tackling them because average users like you don't care.

      I've also used syncthing, and while it did what it claimed to, it can't house my Calendar, Contacts, share files publicly over http, sync only specific subfolders, etc, etc. So unless your needs are very specific, it's not really a viable replacement.
      Depends from the needs. If the user only cares about performance and easy configuration, OwnCloud wins.

      If the user needs to run the "server" part on a weak device, or actually cares about security... he must use other programs as OwnCloud does not cut it.

      -Synchthing for files (can sync whatever, what's that about "not syncing only specific subfolders"?)
      -calendar and contacts can go on any decent CalDAV protocol server program like say radicale http://radicale.org/
      -sharing files can be done by the average ftp server, sharing (read-only, with or without passwords) a specific folder inside the shared folder of Synchthing. Web browsers can usually browse ftp and provide a dropbox-like GUI for free.

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      • #13
        Originally posted by boffo View Post

        Like for example skype.
        Exactly. PC World just did an article highlighting the sad sad state of Skype on Linux. This is typical Microsoft MO. They "support" a non Windows platform, but with a buggy out-of-date implementation, and missing features, so that the only way to have the full proper experience is on a Windows OS. Everyone else gets a degraded experience. But they can claim they "support" Mac and Linux, on paper anyways.

        http://www.pcworld.com/article/30523...s-neglect.html

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        • #14
          Originally posted by boffo View Post
          Like for example skype.
          addendum to torsionbar28's statement:
          skype on Android is trash, utter, flamboyant trash rivaling Facebook's official app or Messenger.

          No wonder that skype got nuked by WatsApp that is still pretty crappy by modern standards.

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          • #15
            Originally posted by asdfblah View Post
            I hope ownCloud gets rewritten in a sane and more performant language.
            While I would myself prefer Python I think about any reasonable modern language would be an improvement - the current PHP OwnCloud code just doesn't seem very robust.

            I think that even being able to write apps for the OwnCloud API would be step in the right direction & possible way to incrementally replace the PHP code with something more sane.

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            • #16
              Originally posted by starshipeleven View Post
              -Synchthing for files (can sync whatever, what's that about "not syncing only specific subfolders"?)
              -calendar and contacts can go on any decent CalDAV protocol server program like say radicale http://radicale.org/
              -sharing files can be done by the average ftp server, sharing (read-only, with or without passwords) a specific folder inside the shared folder of Synchthing. Web browsers can usually browse ftp and provide a dropbox-like GUI for free.
              I am using both owncloud and syncthing on my mini-server.
              Your suggestions are only good if you are always on your own full-blown desktop computer:
              - You cannot access your files easily without having syncthing installed and setup to synchronize everything
              - Accessing them via FTP leaves you without instantaneous PDF-previews (OC uses pdf.js), video and image previews, etc.
              - Sharing via FTP is even worse: Can you easily setup a share, view who you shared it with and automatically restrict each share to an expiry date and an individual password?
              - If you can because you created the best FTP client ever, can you do these things from your mobile phone?
              - Does FTP automatically create zip archives if you want do download a folder with all files in it?
              - Can you look up your calendar events from an airport terminal? No, you cannot install your favorite PIM client there.

              I do not want to call your suggestions bad, they sure have their point!
              But the above are examples of why Owncloud exists and why so many people love it despite its flaws.

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              • #17
                Originally posted by torsionbar28 View Post

                Exactly. PC World just did an article highlighting the sad sad state of Skype on Linux. This is typical Microsoft MO. They "support" a non Windows platform, but with a buggy out-of-date implementation, and missing features, so that the only way to have the full proper experience is on a Windows OS. Everyone else gets a degraded experience. But they can claim they "support" Mac and Linux, on paper anyways.

                http://www.pcworld.com/article/30523...s-neglect.html
                Because Skype4Linux was such a great application and was kept so well maintained before Microsoft took the company over. Oh wait... what's that? Skype4Linux was abandoned well before Microsoft took over and the last release had been years before, and they finally made another release AFTER Microsoft bought them out.

                Further this premise is nonsense, "Microsoft bought out skype so obviously they're going to buy out OwnCloud"... I'm sorry but that doesn't follow. Skype was a strategic acquisition that was misguided but understandable on Microsoft's part, because at the time it was the big popular messenger everyone was using and so they wanted to integrate it, and because Skype is a shitty company and nothing ever came of SkypeKit, a buyout was necessary in order to do so.

                On the other hand, OwnCloud provides no strategic value to Microsoft as they already dominate the relevant market through Exchange so they have no reason to touch it.

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                • #18
                  Originally posted by starshipeleven View Post
                  -sharing files can be done by the average ftp server, sharing (read-only, with or without passwords) a specific folder inside the shared folder of Synchthing. Web browsers can usually browse ftp and provide a dropbox-like GUI for free.
                  Unfortunately, that doesn't cover intranets and document management usecases. Things like versioning, tagging, indexing, metadata extraction and so forth really call for something more than FTP or even NFS. OwnCloud can be more than a personal filesharing application.

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                  • #19
                    Originally posted by edgmnt View Post
                    Unfortunately, that doesn't cover intranets and document management usecases. Things like versioning, tagging, indexing, metadata extraction and so forth really call for something more than FTP or even NFS. OwnCloud can be more than a personal filesharing application.
                    Syncthing does that, I talked about it 2 lines above ftp. ftp is just for the "public file sharing" part that Synchthing does not have.

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                    • #20
                      starshipeleven, you should stop spreading FUD.
                      ownCloud started as a proof of concept and the original goals were more to have something to show than having something robust, but a lot has changed over the past couple of years and the code looks much better, is documented, tested on large installations, etc. That's more than what can be said about syncthing which is still young, unproven and limited in features.
                      Writing something in go doesn't magically make it better or safer. PHP has evolved a lot and is just fine for a project like ownCloud. The performance issues some people are having are rarely related to the language itself.
                      Code is actually reviewed by security consultants and there is a bounty programme. If there are so many issues with it, then you must be at the top of the leaderboard on hackerone.

                      So, keep using syncthing, promote it if that makes you feel better about your choices, but stop talking nonsense about things you know nothing about.

                      Back to the subject at hand, a few people have left ownCloud Inc and will work on a new project which will be announced June 1st. I'm thinking it must be a fork, maybe one backed by a foundation this time.

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