In 2013, GIMP’s developers pulled the GIMP Windows downloads from SourceForge. GIMP is a popular open-source image editor - it’s basically the open-source community’s answer to Photoshop. RELATED: Why We Hate Recommending Software Downloads To Our Readers The installer does not install any spyware and clearly offers you a choice whether to install the offered software.”Ĭhrome blocked us from downloading FileZilla from SourceForge’s website, warning that it “may harm your browsing experience.” FIleZilla was an early participant, and FileZilla’s developer responded to concerns: Some projects have chosen to jump onboard the DevShare train on their own, and that’s their own choice. Over the years, more projects have moved to other repository-hosting services like GitHub. SourceForge built up a lot of goodwill in the past, being a centralized place for downloading open-source software and hosting software repositories.

RELATED: Yes, Every Freeware Download Site is Serving Crapware (Here's the Proof) Yes, SourceForge Is One of the Bad Download Websites If you absolutely have to download something from SourceForge, be extra careful. Many open-source projects now host their installers elsewhere, and the versions on SourceForge may include junkware. Since 2013, SourceForge has been bundling junkware along with their installers - sometimes without a developer’s permission.ĭon’t download software from SourceForge if you can help it. “SourceForge are (sic) abusing the trust that we and our users had put into their service in the past,” according to the GIMP project. SourceForge isn’t behaving badly anymore. We’re leaving the rest of this article here for historical reference, but our criticism is outdated. SourceForge was sold to a new company that immediately stopped the DevShare program in 2016. This article had the headline “ Warning: Don’t Download Software From SourceForge If You Can Help It” when we published it back in 2015.

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