List of open source iOS apps | Hacker News Reader

List of open source iOS apps

github.com

168 pointsbdz26 comments

Does anyone know if any of these is a particularly good example of good iOS coding/testing practices? (Not denigrating any of them! Just want to know which would be the best examples to learn from.)

My colleague Orta is writing an open source book on the subject: https://github.com/orta/pragmatic-testing

Check out the firefox-iOS project https://github.com/mozilla/firefox-ios

We have lots of tests. Many of them in different styles. Both UI tests and unit tests.

I'm in the process of writing tests using the new XCUI testing framework. You can see a PR I have open here. https://github.com/mozilla/firefox-ios/pull/1998

I like this idea, but it probably could use better filtering and admission guidelines to be more useful.

I also am not a big fan of editing a massive JSON file manually to add new projects! I wanted to add my HealthKit app that does nothing but allow manual tracking of periods, but I gave up: https://github.com/jc4p/abby-healthkit

This was really helpful for finding a libre password manager that works with KeePass files. The App store results were very unhelpful in this regard.

It's always hard to find FOSS on a more walled platform. One of the ones I wish it was easier to find, was open source UWP apps. They're out there, but a lot of Microsoft types aren't super used to open sourcing, so they're harder to find. I'd love to see a list of those.

This is cool. I'm in the middle of learning Swift, but I couldn't figure out an app I really cared to make. Maybe I can contribute to one of these projects instead to develop of my Swift knowledge. Will browse thoroughly.

I'd love to see similar lists for other platforms like Android

There is an Android app repo for FOSS apps. https://f-droid.org/

Probably not as easy to go over, but there are so many to begin with.

I wish f-droid had ratings or download popularity or anything really.

Screenshots of the app activities would be nice too.

Issue regarding that topic: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroidclient/issues/15

One issue requesting such features: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/fdroidclient/issues/396

Nice list. Thanks.

Isn't the whole idea of "Open Source iOS apps" an oxymoron?

Why would it be?

Not really? Apple has opened up sideloading source based applications, and you still benefit from having the source available to you if you installed one of these apps from the store. What you can't have is GPL'd apps in the app store.

You can (and do) have GPL apps in the app store, it's just a violation of the license.

It's OK for a copyright holder to dual-license and release their own GPLed code as an app in the App Store. Otherwise, you're correct.

http://www.fsf.org/news/2010-05-app-store-compliance

If you put the entire source code inside the .ipa, would that be acceptable for app store distribution if you are not the original copyright holder? The user gets the full source code and can rebuild the app themselves?

No, the problem is that the TOS that App Store users must agree to before downloading the app conflicts with the GPL.

See http://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/more-about-the-app-store-... for more detail.

How is that different from running GPL programs on Windows? You need to accept the EULA to run windows, which limits how you can use the application as well. Every GPL program must link to kernel32.dll, which has usage restrictions covered by the EULA? And to even install/download/copy the software, you will need to interact with built-in Windows software like IE or exporer.exe or cmd.exe or a third party program that also links kernel32.dll.

It feels wrong to deny users access to GPL software because of terms of service applying to the underlying OS. As long as the software itself is available in source form under the GPL (either packaged inside the .ipa, and/or with a link to a page where you can download the source under GPL with no EULA attached) should afford the user all the freedoms of the GPL.

But I guess smarter people than me have decided this is unacceptable, so users can't be allowed the convenience of pre-compiled iOS GPL software?

If iOS appstore license only covered Apple software, then we would not be in this situation. The problem is that appstore license cover all software it distribute, and thus goes beyond that of some system library like kernel32.dll.

Both versions of the GPL have an exception to their copyleft, commonly called the system library exception. If the GPL-incompatible libraries you want to use meet the criteria for a system library, then you don't have to do anything special to use them; the requirement to distribute source code for the whole program does not include those libraries, even if you distribute a linked executable containing them.

- https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#SystemLibraryExcep...

It's a shame the app store isn't considered a system library :-/

If appstore was part of every app and the appstore license only covered the appstore part and not the whole app, then that would be an improvement.

But I think it would be easier just to not have apps covered under the appstore license, and only add such license to their own DRM. How effective the legal DRM would be in that case could be discussed, but it would likely identical to consoles and tivo which are both gplv2 compatible. It seems unnecessary when looking at other products with DRM to have a license that cover every program running on them.

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