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Aaaa then the problem is that there is no longer a free product...

I wouldn't say "free product", because this sound more like a contradiction to me. One important aspect of freedom in software use and ownership simply has to be seen in the fact, that users are able to change, debug, refine and work themselves on the computer programs they use.

That was once in the past the original motivation behind the proclamation of the GNU manifesto -- a broken printer driver, that couldn't be fixed by its owner, because the code wasn't available.

But what's perhaps more important, this kind of rather restrictive copyleft licenses really worked in practice to protect at least some extraordinary valuable software projects over decades against silently and slowly change over time in a very similar way like this particular project here in question, which now isn't seen as anything else than an arbitrary "commercial product" by some of us.

[has its value in itself]

Because I was looking for some very old postings, where I asked the author of oruxmaps about open source access to the code base, I used the archive.org wayback machine to compare the public self-presentation of this software by watching the changes on its homepage from 2012 up to now.

It's fascinating. For a very long time it looked and promised always just the same:

Always this link to the newest test/development version in larger letters than the play store and previous public variant.

And this unmistakable sentence: "OruxMaps is a FREE application [...]"

Well, the author of oruxmaps always had a slightly different understanding of the term 'FREE' than richard m. stallman, but as capable developer of his time he was at least aware, that writing brilliant software isn't just a question of successful business and therefore emphasized this little unspectacular word in his announcements, too.

I was always a bit unhappy about this situation, because otherwise I really try to use only software of this other kind of "free" open source software on my linux boxes and /e/.os driven phones, but oruxmaps and its author looked at least somehow trustworthy and acceptable as a real world compromise.

This worked for a very long time.

But it was definitely a time before some fanboys have taken over this forum, speak like the one and only voice to represent this project and refuse any other critical point of view.

Different also from those days, when oruxmaps was not only seen as a commercial offer, but more as a nice software full of features, which has its value in itself -- just like many other brilliant "free" software (e.g. the linux operating system I'm using to write this message...).

Sure, things are changing... but not always to the better...

OruxMaps IS DEAD. Sorry, ...

Yes, I have to agree and I already wanted to write a very similar final summary a few days ago.

It's a rather sad time for all of us looking for acceptable "free" (<=in the GNU sense) outdoor mapping solutions:

* Oruxmaps finally collapsed after a long process of successive enshittification.

* OsmAnd~ still doesn't support custom made offline maps in a comfortable manner and wastes too much battery while recording tracks.

* CoMaps [like so many other road and car-oriented navigation solutions for inhabitants of a flat earth] still doesn't come with hill shading and similar essential features required for adventures out in the wild.

* Trekarta had to stop the development mainly because of stupid political reasons.

etc.

But I found at least one rather new and unknown multiplatform map viewer project, that could perhaps be of interest to other ex-Oruxmap users as well: Ascend Maps. It's a really crazy project! It uses a set of extraordinary minimalist software components and Tangram-ES map rendering at its core to create a very efficient and resource saving application. It's running and looking the same on Android, iPhone, Windows, OSX, and Linux. Well, it's definitely not the perfect choice for everyone (e.g., you have to edit some important preferences by text editor in YAML config files, etc. ), but it's nevertheless a very powerful and flexible tool. I personally only have some doubts concerning actually chosen technical ingredients and development decisions, but I may be wrong in this regard.

I'm stuck with QGIS 3.28 exactly because the XYZ export is seriously broken in later versions

My personal contribution to this particular plugin is already a while ago:

https://github.com/lutraconsulting/qgis-xyz-tiles/issues/30
https://github.com/qgis/QGIS/issues/32471
https://github.com/qgis/QGIS/pull/32499

I wasted two months trying to switch to Linux. Despite really liking the Gnome workflow I eventually went back to Windows, amongst other things, because...

I only use [debian] Linux and in case of QGIS always the most recent upstream versions. It usually works more or less acceptable, but not all QGIS plugins made by various authors are of perfect quality. Often they don't play well with all releases and on all operating systems.

This is to say, it's not that opensourcing something automagically solves every problem, or grants that a project goes forward.

Sure! It's not granted. But if a project attracts competent users, there are always some of them reporting issues and others fixing one or the other bug or adding a missing feature whenever they are interested in a particular topic.

You can't enforce this kind of voluntary participation and code contribution by any form of pressure, but it's an unmistakable sign of healthy open source projects. It's a very complex dynamic system of mutual exchange, perhaps harder to cultivate and keep growing than just lonesome and silently writing code.

I don't agree with those messages here in this thread, that more or less just suggest: buy the commercial product!

Once upon a time Oruxmap was available to everybody in two versions: a free one and a paid one to support the development willingly.

When the free variant didn't receive updates for quite a while, the author argued, that he isn't able to provide a give-away variant anymore, because Google doesn't allow free distribution beside the commercial one on their marked store. In the meanwhile it even got further and this 'beta' version is understood by many users [or at least some loud peer leaders here in the forum] as just a limited demo version and appetizer for buying the commercial offer.

Well -- because it's just one of this very common closed source apps, that isn't protected by a more restrictive license (like the GPL) preventing this kind of change, it's completely up to the author and his arbitrary decisions to make leave access available or enforce an utterly changed new business plan.

As ordinary user, we can't do much more than express our feelings about this steady slow and silent changes. Nevertheless, they are significant, and I personally would prefer, when the author and entrepreneur would at least communicate this kind of decisions and consequences for the user community in a more open and fair manner.

I'm well aware about the difficulties to make a living from free software development. Nevertheless, I spend already decades of my life in this alternative software circles myself -- don't use any commercial or unfree closed source software on my Linux machines and even my mobile phone is based on degoogled /e/ (https://e.foundation/), where you don't have access to products of the play store but gain much more security and privacy freedom in return. Instead of just consuming ready-made software products I always try to justify my use of all these free gifts by participating In many open development projects and community activities -- for example as OSM-mapper, rewriting parts the QGIS-xyz-export-plugin to produce maps for Orux, etc.

Many projects were looking for solutions, how to make consumers happy, which only want to buy easily usable software somewhere in a trustworthy online shop, and those others, which are more interested in security and privacy preserving open source software and public access. For example OsmAnd~ is selling the advanced edition commercially on the play store, but the same software is also still available for free without any restrictions on FDroid. Only a comparable small community of people is using the latter one, but this scene is rather close related to those open source developers, which wrote many of those very valuable code libraries, that in fact any mapping app nowadays is based on. So it's a more fair exchange in return to those non-profit developers and their alternative software communities than just an utterly stupid irrational choice.

I'm very skeptical about the commercial success of Orux e.g. on the iPhone. In the meanwhile it's a rather old-fashioned looking app that honestly isn't super easy to use, and beside the help by the community here in the forum it's just a one-man show with insufficient documentation. Sure, It has it's very important unique qualities (for example: It's using less power than all other open source alternatives), but it's nothing that couldn't be quickly replaced by other more open apps, if users have to react to those subsequent commercialization changes made by its author.

Because it's still strictly closed software I can't do much more than openly express my opinion and skepticism about its future. But perhaps it's anyway too late for a change. Oruxmaps could definitely have become the most well known and feature full free android mapping app if it had opened its development earlier. In the meanwhile there are already a few open source alternatives available, that look much more modern and promising in this respect.

Although I personally don't believe in its commercial success, I still wish its author good luck on his efforts. Nevertheless, if he refuse to listen to us, I'll take another way and search for alternatives, that better suit my needs.

It's really disappointing how oruxmaps is slowly changing for the worse!

For a long time, it was a really nice and powerful alternative to all the commercial products—not a completely free, open-source, and strictly privacy-compliant project, as I personally prefer, but still somehow acceptable—but now this seems to be more of a nostalgic sentiment from the past...

Please distribute free beta updates of oruxmaps by utilizing a custom f-droid repository as distribution channel.
This would make it much more comfortable to frequently follow updates and always use, test and report issues related to the most recent version.

Although the main f-droid distribution channel is strictly reserved for open source apps, users are able to add arbitrary other repositories, which may host closed source apks. Setting up these custom repos and signing the apps isn't very complicated. It could be also an attractive solution to work around some limitations of the commercial app stores.

I personally would still prefer a real open source or at least 'open core' edition of oruxmaps, because I otherwise use nearly exclusive degoogled and transparent free software on my mobile phone. Oruxmaps is really an exception in this respect, because I really like it and there are hardly similar powerful more open alternatives available.

Although I understand the economic reasons behind the closed source decision, I'm always rather unhappy about the strict split of both worlds. The majority of users doesn't care if the source is available anyway, but for the alternative side and interested contributors it's more or less a strict no-go. IMHO it also affects the popularity of oruxmaps as an interesting competitor to the more well known marked leaders in engaged navigation circles (OSM contributors etc.) and opinion maker peer groups in a significant negative way as well. I personally would therefore highly appreciate any effort to make the app more open and transparent.