GForge

GForge is a free software fork of the web-based project-management and collaboration software originally created for SourceForge, called Savane. GForge is licensed under the GNU General Public License.

GForge provides project hosting, version control (CVS and Subversion), bug-tracking, and messaging.

In February 2009 some of the developers of GForge continued development of the old open source code under the new name of FusionForge after GForge Group focused on GForge Advanced Server.

History

In 1999, VA Linux hired four developers, including Tim Perdue, to develop the SourceForge.net service to encourage Open Source development and support the Open Source developer community. SourceForge.net services were offered free of charge to any Open Source project team. Following the SourceForge launch on November 17, 1999, the free software community rapidly took advantage of SourceForge.net, and traffic and users grew very quickly.

As another competitive web service, "Server 51", was being readied for launch, VA Linux released the source code for the sourceforge.net web site on January 14, 2000 as a marketing ploy to show that SourceForge was 'more open source'. Many companies began installing and using it themselves and contacting VA Linux for professional services to set up and use the software. However, their pricing was so unrealistic, they had few customers. By 2001, the company's Linux hardware business had collapsed in the dotcom bust. The company was renamed to VA Software and called the closed codebase "SourceForge Enterprise Edition" to try to force some of the large companies to purchase licenses. This prompted objections from open source community members. VA Software continued to say that a new source code release would be made at some point, but it never was.