Episode 189 — Otto Richter on Codeberg  ## Metadata - Author: [[Sustain]] - Full Title: Episode 189 — Otto Richter on Codeberg - Category: #podcasts - URL: https://share.snipd.com/episode/8355f8e7-c264-4940-a451-f284a7cb1f04 ## Document Notes ## Highlights - Episode AI notes 1. Codeberg, a small nonprofit platform, embraces the changing expectations of modern users by not blocking them from using services like Tor. 2. Codeberg acknowledges the challenges of managing expectations for platform uptime and services due to limited resources and a volunteer-based system. 3. Strict guarantees are not implemented, but the core team at Codeberg ensures their best effort to keep the platform running smoothly. 4. Users may switch to Codeberg during downtime on other platforms, but they should be aware that similar issues may occur. 5. The expectations around platform availability have evolved over the years, with established platforms like Google setting high standards. 6. While established platforms have dedicated engineers for availability, new platforms like Codeberg face challenges in providing the same level of service. 7. Codeberg ensures security and availability by hosting its own server and not relying on cloud hosting for storage. ([Time 0:00:00](https://share.snipd.com/episode-takeaways/d482be16-a513-4824-b8c9-b3baa79b76be)) - Cloud Flare: How to Manage Expectations Summary: Codeburg, a small nonprofit platform, does not block users from using tools like Tor and embraces the changing expectations of modern users. With a volunteer-based system and limited resources, Codeburg cannot guarantee 24/7 monitoring, but the core team has access to machines and can reboot services. They strive to do their best without implementing strict guarantees. Codeburg acknowledges that some users may experience difficulties when alternative platforms like GitHub are down, but they are honest about potential issues with their own platform. The expectations regarding platform availability have changed over the years, with established platforms like Google setting high standards. Codeburg does not rely on cloud hosting and instead has its own server, ensuring security even if a disk is removed. Transcript: Speaker 2 It's good that you're not blocking users from using things like Tor and the like, I love that. I think it's really cool. I'm glad you mentioned cloud flare and the like, I know you've written elsewhere around varying expectations that modern users have for cloud apps for various websites. I'm curious, how do you manage expectations around the platform being up all the time and services it provides, given that you're a small nonprofit? Speaker 1 We do not have something like 24-7 monitoring. It's all based on volunteers, mainly because you guarantee something, you need a lot of money and you need, of course, to trust people. We can't just give everyone access to the service and say, okay, please fix it if you have some time. But, of course, we're keeping the core teams more, which has access to machines and is able to reboot services. We promise to do our best, but we do not implement strict guarantees. I know that for many users, this works out great, but I know that others have difficulties. So, what's really something we see often is when other alternatives are down, for example, GitHub. Many users say, okay, GitHub is down again. That's the final thing. I will move to Codeburg. We can't be happy about those users because we know if they run about this platform right now, they will probably run about Codeburg in a few weeks when we deploy regular update and maybe Some connections have been dropped, for example. Or we try to be honest about this. We also think that the expectations in this area have changed a lot recently, because 10 years ago, when most other proprietary and big platforms have evolved, the expectations have Been difficult. 10 years ago, it was quite common that someone would say, oh, look, Google is down. And, of course, it was the thing that Google is down and people said, okay, that happens not often, but it happened and it was okay. So, okay, Google is down for a moment. And other platforms like Twitter even had nicknames with the fail-whale, for example. But no, most of these platforms have established their standards. They have slightly liability engineers who are dedicated to this whole subject and having new platforms grow nowadays, not only for service, but also for open source projects who Do not have some established standards for this and that I think it's much harder to grow your platform or your project nowadays, because people are used to the availability guarantees. And just to mention this, Codeburg does not rely on cloud hosting, for example. So you can also spin up exactly the same software and host your storage on some cloud hosting. You can use Amazon Web Services for attachments, etc. But we are not doing this. We are having our own server. We know that the worst that can happen is that someone rips a disk out, but they're encrypted. So it's really nothing that can happen to us. ([Time 0:16:19](https://share.snipd.com/snip/cdd7fb73-94b2-48e1-b4d6-c20921bfdfef))