Seems like futo.org is developing a fully offline keyboard. It is currently in a pre-alpha state and there are many bugs and missing features. It looks promising, glide/swipe typing is there by default, unlike HeliBoard where you have to import a proprietary library. They are also working on an interesting text prediction model.
Actually I seem to have been mistaken, the app does have internet access for update checks and crash reporting. They say that in the future they plan to remove that permission:
No features require the app to access network except the crash reporter and updater. The ultimate goal is for the app to not have network permission whatsoever
I used it for a day or two and do like it but had to switch to Heliboard.
I need a clipboard several times per week and Futo doesn’t have that.
It’s a project I’ll be watching.
I suspect you’re referring to the controversial FUTO Temporary License… but I don’t think that’s a black and white matter. I certainly wouldn’t call it “proprietary”, especially when the source code is fully and readily available. Maybe not fully free & open source either like in the traditional sense, sure (and to be clear I would personally rather them use a license like the GPL), but I just don’t feel that calling it “proprietary” and leaving it at that is a fair characterization. I’d recommend checking out Louis Rossman’s recent Reddit comments around this, lot of interesting points and insight IMO.
It used to when it first came out for ex. checking for updates, but this has since been removed, as evident here.
With this being said though, I think the biggest issue with FUTO Keyboard currently is that it doesn’t support Direct Boot mode, which means you still have to also use/keep another keyboard on your system. It just can’t act as a full & proper replacement yet, which is a severe issue IMO holding it back, so hope they can implement it sooner than later.
But overall I’ve been super impressed with FUTO Keyboard, been using it for a few weeks now and I think it’s by far the best privacy-respecting keyboard I’ve used. Feels almost identical to ex. GBoard/Samsung’s Keyboard minus the spyware, can’t wait to see how it further develops.
And that’s completely fair, I understand and also wish they would just use free-er licenses like the GPL. But I guess my point was I don’t think it’s fair to just blindly characterize FUTO Keyboard as “proprietary” either, I think it’s crucial to give more context. This isn’t “proprietary” in the sense that GBoard, Samsung Keyboard, etc are, FUTO Keyboard’s source code is fully and ready available, it’s license just isn’t as permissive as we’d like. I think there’s a massive difference there.
Perhaps “source-available” might be a more accurate descriptor of this app’s licensing model. They say that eventually a proper open-source license will be adopted, I have yet to see a FUTO app go forward with this transition however (correct me if I’m wrong).
Also thank you @Sharply for clarifying the keyboard’s permissions. I should have checked them myself before creating this topic, sorry for low effort.
Been testing this now. This message is written uaing the keyboard. It works pretty well and i actually like it. Adding languages is possible but have not been able to add a language model for another language. It also lacks multilanguage support which is pretty crucial for bilinguals like me.
Microsoft grants perpetual “non-commercial” access to Windows source code to its partners for “business continuity” reasons. Is source-available Windows then proprietary or not?
GPL is a super-neat copyleft FOSS license: You must disclose source to whoever you distribute the code to.
FTL inverses it: You have the source, but can only use it the way they want you to. Which sounds eerily similar to what some tech oligopoly like Microsoft would say to its partners.
Microsoft grants perpetual “non-commercial” access to Windows source code to its partners for “business continuity” reasons. Is source-available Windows then proprietary or not?
I do think this case is a bit different though, since unlike with Windows, anyone in the world can see and access the source code for these FUTO apps, whereas Microsoft keeps it locked behind closed doors to only their partners like you mention, and do as much as possible to prevent it being available to the public.
But, with that being said…
Honestly thanks for your response, you actually changed my mind on this overall and made fair points I didn’t think about. (Also thanks for your work on RethinkDNS, great app)
I guess it’s just tough because 1: FUTO wants to be able to monetize their software and 2: FUTO has claimed they want to prevent malicious clones like what’s been constantly happening to NewPipe. I don’t quite agree with them though on that point, because the key-word here is malicious, so I don’t think a license or legality will stop them…
But I can sympathize with 1. I think the biggest problem with FOSS software right now is the difficulty of making a living off of it. I wish it was easier to monetize, because I think if it was, we’d see significantly more FOSS projects than we do now. It’d be great if more people just donated to apps they like I guess…
FOSS is not a business model, but a distribution model, which is just one facet of marketing, as it were. If your business depends on some critical IP (intellectual property aka secret sauce) then of course you’d be foolish to give its source away (as in, unrestricted use), which if you don’t makes your product “proprietary”.
GPL says that the IP (as described in code) is co-owned by whoever you distributed your code to. FTL explicitly prohibits such co-ownership, for better or for worse.
You’re right about the “malicious” part, but I want to add that for FOSS, cloning / forking / theming / re-distributing is not a bug, but a feature. If you need to build “moats” around your FOSS, do it elsehwere (in services like RedHat, in quality like SQLite, in consulting like 2nd Quadrant, in complementing your other key products like Google with Chrome & Android for Search & Ads, etc). I understand that well-resourced, committed cloners (like BigTech forking FOSS databases, for example) can make life difficult, but such adversaries are also usually competent enough to build one from scratch themselves.
Donations don’t work. Company sponsorship, otoh, does; but it isn’t as prevalent. Hopefully, that changes soon.
Just wanted to make sure everyone here knows that the Futo Temporary License is on its way out. The keyboard project has been relicensed under the new Futo Source First license:
Futo’s statement on the topic may also be enlightening:
They seem to be forgetting that when people say “open source” they usually mean “Free/libre open source software”. Their license may be allow the source to be open, but it is in no way libre.
Except it is so long as you aren’t making a profit from it’s use. Remember they are a company and while the idea of FOSS is great, this is the real world and people need money to survive. Writing Open Source code is great for the people who use that code but most programmers can’t afford to live while giving away their work for free.
What FUTO didn’t (doesn’t?) understand is that open source licenses exist to protect the user’s rights, not the developer’s.
Creating their own license to protect their own rights is perfectly fine, they just can’t be calling it “open source” anymore once the terms infringe on the user’s rights (especially in a discriminatory way) for the benefit of the developers.
Open source licenses are what allowed the community to create Redict or the Linux Foundation to create Valkey when Redis went to shit for example. I suspect that the same wouldn’t happen for any of FUTO’s work due to their Source First license, which is a pretty big loss the user experiences in terms of reassurance that their software can be maintained long-term.
