this post was submitted on 19 Mar 2026
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Today we’re announcing that OpenAI will acquire Astral⁠, bringing powerful open source developer tools into our Codex ecosystem.

Astral has built some of the most widely used open source Python tools, helping developers move faster with modern tooling like uv, Ruff, and ty. These tools power millions of developer workflows and have become part of the foundation of modern Python development. As part of our developer-first philosophy, after closing OpenAI plans to support Astral’s open source products. By bringing Astral’s tooling and engineering expertise to OpenAI, we will accelerate our work on Codex and expand what AI can do across the software development lifecycle.

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but why would the vibe-coding future that Sam wants to shove up our arses need these tools?

[–] fubarx@lemmy.world 5 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

uv ---- fork ---> wx

(although zx is easier to type)

[–] prenatal_confusion@feddit.org 1 points 14 hours ago

Oh look at the fancy qwerty user over here ...

[–] loweffortname@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

This does suck, but there's time. I doubt the actual legal hand over has happened yet, and OpenAI is (likely, I don't actually know) an absolute mess, HR/structure-wise, internally. If the aquisitions I've been a part of in the past are any indication, there's a 1-2 year ramp before things really start to go to shit within Astral (assuming there isn't an immediate massive exodous of talent). Or I'm totally wrong!

[–] Narann@jlai.lu 3 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

Is there any example of such move that does not ends with enshittyfication?

Off the top of my head, no. I'm just pointing out that there's time to respond before things get shitty. This isn't Redis rug-pulling their license. The community can be considered. Thoughtful.

[–] 30p87@feddit.org 2 points 22 hours ago

Guess I'll need another python lsp server. Luckily, I use pacman to handle python packages

[–] beeng@discuss.tchncs.de 4 points 1 day ago

Bit early for April fools :(

[–] gid@piefed.blahaj.zone 41 points 2 days ago

Not a fan of this news. At all.

[–] eager_eagle@lemmy.world 46 points 2 days ago

oh well, it was good while it lasted

[–] lmr0x61@lemmy.ml 38 points 2 days ago

Damn… these were some of the OSS projects I was the most excited about. uv in particular is brilliant. Hope it breaks out again once OpenAI collapses.

[–] a_good_hunter@lemmy.world 17 points 2 days ago (3 children)

The tools are open source. Someone needs to fork them before it's too late.

[–] Brummbaer@pawb.social 4 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

Good luck - uv is under a MIT license, so every fork is just a free buffet for openai to incorporate into their enshittified version of uv. There is a reason the GPL exists and many people will learn this the hard way ...

[–] a_good_hunter@lemmy.world 2 points 11 hours ago (2 children)

Your truust in the Law is admirable. OpenAI does not care at all about laws. They do what they want and have an army of lawyers to fight anyone who says differently. Just look at copyright laws.

This is why I am saying do it now. Better safe than sorry.

But, since all l am getting is abuse.... I'm out! Y'all have the say you deserve.

[–] HubertManne@piefed.social 1 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

alll I see is abuse? I see only one comment under yours (and its pretty reasonalbe from brummbaer) but maybe all the rest are folks I have blocked.

[–] a_good_hunter@lemmy.world 1 points 5 hours ago

Not here....

[–] Brummbaer@pawb.social 3 points 10 hours ago

The world does not consist entirely of the US.

While I agree that openai can buy enough "law" in the US to do what it wants, the license is important in other jurisdictions and can be enforced.

[–] axum@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Too late for what exactly? Describe in actual detail.

You said it yourself, it's open source so why are you running from it? The code is and will continue to be there in the open.

[–] a_good_hunter@lemmy.world -2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

OpenAI can change the license at any time. Who's going to stop them?

[–] axum@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It can also be forked at any time from the commit prior.

[–] a_good_hunter@lemmy.world -5 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Nope, they can retroactively change it

[–] axum@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 points 15 hours ago

Commit history literally exists, you can go back to the commit prior to changing the license and fork it. Do you understand git in the slightest?

[–] Vulwsztyn@programming.dev 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

the current versions will still be open source, you will always be able to fork them

[–] 30p87@feddit.org -2 points 22 hours ago (2 children)
[–] prenatal_confusion@feddit.org 2 points 14 hours ago

It's version controlled.

[–] fruitcantfly@programming.dev 1 points 13 hours ago

They’ve already been using Claude for at least the last few months; you’ll find a CLAUDE.md file and related settings in the uv repo if you look

[–] hoppolito@mander.xyz 19 points 2 days ago (1 children)
[–] harsh3466@lemmy.ml 14 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Well fuck. I was eyeing uv, but I guess um sticking with pip.

[–] Midnitte@beehaw.org 5 points 2 days ago (1 children)
[–] harsh3466@lemmy.ml 5 points 2 days ago

I am nowhere near good enough to fork and maintain uv.

[–] axum@lemmy.blahaj.zone -3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Don't gaslight yourself. uv is open source and will not kill your grandmother. They just happon to be funded via Openai for now under their umbrella.

[–] gid@piefed.blahaj.zone 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

It's not gaslighting yourself to be concerned when a company as morally bankrupt as OpenAI becomes the steward of these tools.

[–] axum@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yeah it is gaslighting yourself. I get Openai isn't great, but uv is open source.

Explain to me in great detail what exactly you think is going to happen here.

Also Bun, which was acquired by anthropic, is doing just fine as an open source project.

[–] gid@piefed.blahaj.zone 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

OpenAI could direct anyone working at Astral to insert whatever they want into uv, ruff or ty, without any regard to the needs or desires of the wider community. Or just drop working on it entirely.

Sure, these tools are open source and can be forked. But to do that successfully you'll need to replace everything that Astral currently provides these projects: expertise of core contributors, the time they have to actually work on it, and organisational skills to manage these projects.

This isn't something you can do overnight.

[–] axum@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

OpenAI could direct anyone working at Astral to insert whatever they want

This would be suicidal for the project if it ignores the community. the project would instantly risk forking and OpenAI losing the ability to influence the ecosystem direction.

to your second point on needing contributors and infrastructor after a fork, while this is true, uv specifically has seen MASSIVE adoption both for hobbyists AND corporate interests. it has greatly simplified the overall python packaging experience. I would not be shocked if other corps began supporting a community fork if the main project went off the rails.

Bun, another open source project, has been doing just fine under Anthropic nearly a year later. Until there is more concrete info on the direction this will take, the fear is MASSIVELY overblown. uv is quickly starting to hit critical mass adoption and may be too important for it to end up in a dumpster.

Fuck shit asshole what thr fuck motherfucker why??????? I was starting to like uv :'(

[–] ALERT@sh.itjust.works 3 points 2 days ago

the day was OK before I read this. sooooqa.

[–] NostraDavid@programming.dev 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I am sceptical, but hopeful. The Codex CLI is open source, so I'm somewhat hopeful it'll stay open source. My only worry is that they'll take too many people off the tools, stalling the development of uv, ruff and ty.

PS: Can we get a pytest alternative? It's so slow :(

[–] moto@programming.dev 8 points 1 day ago

I'm not a huge fan of AI companies buying up all the tool chains and trying to insert themselves as the only middleman to coding.

Which feels like what these moves are.

[–] Ephera@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 days ago
[–] IceFoxX@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Im not suprised (still using using pip) 🀣