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charmbracelet/vhs a cli tool installs Chrome in the background without permission - is this still Open Source? (github.com)
submitted 8 hours ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) by to c/opensource@lemmy.ml
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Edit: To clarify, my question if this is still Open Source wasn't meant literal. But more like "is this software still in the spirit of Open Source?" type of question. The better question would be probably, if we should allow this behavior or not.

Also saved it on Internet Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20260902183330/https://github.com/charmbracelet/vhs/issues/438

So this issue is brought up by me over 2.5 years ago, and nothing changed since then. The issue is now the in top 3 highest upvoted Issue on this repo. At what point is it still open source, if it downloads without your permission a proprietary component that is used to run the software?

It connects to Google server and downloads Google Chrome. One user reported this process cannot be stopped with Ctrl+c (I didn't try that). It does not ask your permission to do so, and on the README nothing about this was (and still is) disclosed. All I asked is to add an information in the README, so anyone is warned and informed about this before installing. After over 2 years, none of the developers and contributors even acknowledge the issue or any comment whatsoever.

Note: vhs is a terminal application to record input and output of your terminal commands, to replay them later without video recording. Cool project and concept, but this is a no go and to me even malicious.

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[–] 7 points 5 hours ago (1 child)

Not to be an asshole but maybe this is the wrong question then.

Maybe the real question is "should we endorse this in the FOSS community" or "how do we handle things like this".

Which absolutely is a fair question.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 5 hours ago

    I don't think there are wrong questions, if they meant to be curious and no trolling. But besides that, my refined question (you reply to) is actually what you suggest. Because to me, this is not really in the spirit of Open Source. But, if you don't like this question in the form I asked, I mean your suggestion is pretty much what I question myself (and its more direct).

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