Open source versus Microsoft: The new rebellion begins

This page summarizes the projects mentioned and recommended in the original post on news.ycombinator.com

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  • pylance-release

    Documentation and issues for Pylance

  • One of the things that comes to mind here is the fact that the default Python extension for VS Code is, perhaps surprisingly to many, not open source. https://github.com/microsoft/pylance-release

    While it's possible to fork VS Code, it is not possible to fork VS Code and provide a seamless onramp towards a Python editing experience that is fully open source, because users are used to the nuances of the closed-source Pylance experience in VS Code proper. You could use the minified/compiled Pylance plugin in your fork, but you'd have no way to expand its capabilities to new hooks your fork provides. Microsoft's development process would always be able to move faster than a fork, because it could coordinate VS Code internal API development with its internal Pylance team, and could become incompatible with forks at any time.

    It's worth re-reading the quote from J Allard in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis... with this modern example in mind.

    (Also worth mentioning https://github.com/detachhead/basedpyright?tab=readme-ov-fil... which is a heroic effort to derisk this, but it's an uphill battle for sure!)

  • basedpyright

    pyright fork with various type checking improvements, improved vscode support and pylance features built into the language server

  • One of the things that comes to mind here is the fact that the default Python extension for VS Code is, perhaps surprisingly to many, not open source. https://github.com/microsoft/pylance-release

    While it's possible to fork VS Code, it is not possible to fork VS Code and provide a seamless onramp towards a Python editing experience that is fully open source, because users are used to the nuances of the closed-source Pylance experience in VS Code proper. You could use the minified/compiled Pylance plugin in your fork, but you'd have no way to expand its capabilities to new hooks your fork provides. Microsoft's development process would always be able to move faster than a fork, because it could coordinate VS Code internal API development with its internal Pylance team, and could become incompatible with forks at any time.

    It's worth re-reading the quote from J Allard in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis... with this modern example in mind.

    (Also worth mentioning https://github.com/detachhead/basedpyright?tab=readme-ov-fil... which is a heroic effort to derisk this, but it's an uphill battle for sure!)

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    The modern identity platform for B2B SaaS. The APIs are flexible and easy-to-use, supporting authentication, user identity, and complex enterprise features like SSO and SCIM provisioning.

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NOTE: The number of mentions on this list indicates mentions on common posts plus user suggested alternatives. Hence, a higher number means a more popular project.

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