The world of open-source software thrives on collaboration, and for years, GitHub has been a dominant force in hosting these projects. However, the landscape is shifting, with some prominent projects seeking alternatives that better align with their core values. One such significant move is the Zig programming language’s decision to migrate its main repository from GitHub to Codeberg. This article delves into the motivations behind Zig’s bold transition, explores what Codeberg offers as a Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) forge, and examines the broader implications for the open-source ecosystem.
The Driving Force: Why Zig Left GitHub
On November 26, 2025, the Zig project officially announced the migration of its primary repository, ziglang/zig, making its GitHub counterpart read-only and establishing https://codeberg.org/ziglang/zig.git as the canonical origin. This wasn’t a decision made lightly, but rather a culmination of growing concerns.
One of the primary drivers was a perceived decline in GitHub’s service quality and an increasing sense of bloat following its acquisition by Microsoft. Andrew Kelley, the creator of Zig, noted issues with sluggishness and broken features that once performed reliably. More critically, the project expressed deep dissatisfaction with GitHub Actions, describing its performance and reliability as “vibe-scheduling” that led to significant CI system backlogs.
Beyond technical frustrations, a strong philosophical divergence played a pivotal role. The Zig project maintains a strict “no LLM / no AI policy,” which clashed directly with GitHub’s aggressive integration and promotion of AI features like Copilot and its “file an issue with Copilot” functionality. This push raised concerns about violations of their policy and the overall direction of the platform. Furthermore, the project noted concerns regarding data privacy and the implications of the CLOUD Act for US-hosted platforms. The move represents a clear statement in favor of community control and FOSS principles, prioritizing these over the conveniences offered by a proprietary, commercially driven platform.
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Codeberg: A Haven for FOSS
Codeberg emerges as a compelling alternative for projects like Zig, embodying the very principles many open-source communities champion. It is a community-driven, non-profit Git hosting platform operated by Codeberg e.V., a registered non-profit association based in Germany. Its mission is to build and maintain a free collaboration platform for creating, archiving, and preserving code, explicitly avoiding dependencies on commercial, external, or proprietary services.
Codeberg is built upon Forgejo , a fork of Gitea, which itself is an open-source, self-hosted Git service. Forgejo was created in October 2022 under the umbrella of Codeberg e.V. after Gitea’s governance shifted towards a for-profit company, solidifying Codeberg’s commitment to exclusively free software and public interest. This foundation allows Codeberg to offer a comprehensive suite of collaboration tools, including:
- Git Repositories : Standard Git hosting with all expected functionalities.
- Issue Tracking : Robust systems for managing bugs and feature requests.
- Code Review : Tools for collaborative code inspection and feedback.
- Project Wikis : Integrated documentation capabilities.
- Codeberg Pages : Static website hosting directly from repositories, similar to GitHub Pages.
- CI/CD : Through Woodpecker CI or Forgejo Actions, offering continuous integration and delivery pipelines.
Crucially, Codeberg’s terms of service strictly enforce its FOSS ethos, generally permitting only open-source projects. This dedication to FOSS, coupled with its non-commercial, privacy-friendly approach, makes it an attractive destination for projects prioritizing ethical hosting over commercial offerings.
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Navigating the Migration: Strategy and Technicalities
Migrating a project as significant as Zig, with thousands of issues and pull requests, presents considerable challenges. The Zig team opted for a pragmatic migration strategy to minimize disruption. Instead of attempting a full transfer of all historical issues and pull requests, they decided to leave existing GitHub issues and pull requests open and unmigrated, treating them as “copy-on-write”. This means that while contributors can no longer open new issues or pull requests on GitHub, existing ones remain accessible for reference. To ensure clarity, new issue numbering on Codeberg commenced at 30000, preventing any ambiguity with past GitHub issue IDs.
From a technical standpoint, migrating Git repositories themselves is relatively straightforward due to Git’s distributed nature. A simple git clone --mirror and git push --mirror can transfer the core repository history. However, the real complexity lies in moving associated data like issues, pull requests, wikis, and release artifacts. Codeberg, leveraging Forgejo’s capabilities, provides built-in migration tools that can facilitate the transfer of repositories, including issues, labels, milestones, and comments from platforms like GitHub. For a project with a large history, careful planning for data integrity and comprehensive testing are essential.
Another critical aspect of such a migration is reconfiguring Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipelines. Projects heavily reliant on GitHub Actions, like Zig was, need to adapt their workflows to Codeberg’s CI solutions, such as Woodpecker CI or Forgejo Actions. This often involves rewriting YAML configurations and integrating with new service hooks and build environments. The Zig team also addressed financial aspects by moving their GitHub Sponsors income to Every.org, a non-profit platform, further aligning their funding with their FOSS principles.
Photo by Erik Mclean on Unsplash
Impact and the Future of Open Source Hosting
Zig’s migration to Codeberg sends a powerful message to the open-source community. It highlights a growing desire among FOSS projects for hosting platforms that are not only technically capable but also philosophically aligned with their values. This move could inspire other projects to re-evaluate their hosting choices, potentially leading to a more decentralized and diverse ecosystem of code collaboration platforms.
For Zig, the benefits include greater autonomy, reduced exposure to perceived corporate influence, and a hosting environment dedicated solely to free software. For Codeberg, gaining a high-profile project like Zig is a significant validation of its mission and capabilities, potentially attracting more contributors and projects to its platform.
However, such a transition is not without its challenges. The initial friction for contributors accustomed to GitHub’s ubiquitous interface and ecosystem is a natural hurdle. The availability of free CI/CD resources on platforms like Codeberg, while present, might be more limited than GitHub’s extensive offerings, requiring projects to potentially invest more in self-hosted runners or optimize their workflows. Nevertheless, the long-term gains in terms of community governance, ethical alignment, and data sovereignty may outweigh these initial difficulties.
The migration of the Zig repository to Codeberg underscores a critical juncture in open-source development. As commercial platforms increasingly integrate proprietary features and AI tools, projects deeply committed to FOSS principles are actively seeking alternatives. This shift could herald a new era of distributed and community-centric code hosting, reinforcing the core tenets of free and open-source software for generations to come.
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- Reddit (2022). A blog post by Codeberg (a non profit open source github alternative) on why it got started.
- Reddit (2022). Anybody tried this? codeberg.org: free non-profit gitea-based github alternative including pages.
- Codeberg (n.d.). Codeberg Pages.
- YouTube (2024). Community-led GitHub alternative | Codeberg in a nutshell.
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- Hacker News (2023). Codeberg – Fast open source alternative to GitHub.
- GitHub (n.d.). Writing Issues with Copilot and Other LLMs · ziglang/zig Wiki.
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