# Open source alternatives: a README with eighty anchors and no code > This repository is a curated awesome list of replacements for proprietary software, organised into ten categories and eighty sub-entries. The Next.js application that once lived here was moved out to a separate starter kit, leaving four files at the root. **piotrkulpinski/open-source-alternatives** — Curated list of open source alternatives to proprietary software. - Repository: https://github.com/piotrkulpinski/open-source-alternatives - Website: https://openalternative.co - Stars: 6,839 · Forks: 337 - Language: Unknown - License: CC0-1.0 - Published: 2026-08-21 · Updated: 2026-08-21 · Language: en - Canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/piotrkulpinski-open-source-alternatives ## The Next.js boilerplate that used to live here is now Dirstarter The first thing the README does is tell you what it is not. A note states that the repository has been repurposed as a curated awesome-list, and that the original Next.js directory boilerplate previously hosted here is now available as Dirstarter at dirstarter.com, described as a complete, battle-tested starter kit for building profitable directory websites. That sentence matters more than it looks. The repository's own identity used to be a Next.js application, which is why the homepage field points at a running site rather than at a documentation page. The application is gone from this repository, so anyone who arrives expecting `package.json`, a build step or a components tree finds four text files instead. GitHub also reports no primary language for the repository at all, which is the honest signal: there is nothing to compile here. If you were following this project for the code, you are following the wrong URL. The list is the deliverable now, and the starter kit is a separate product with a separate site. ## Ten top-level categories and about eighty anchors inside one README The contents block is the real index. Ten top-level categories carry eighty sub-categories between them, and every entry is a markdown anchor link pointing at a heading in the same file rather than at a separate page. AI & Machine Learning holds four sub-categories including Machine Learning Infrastructure and AI Security & Privacy. Business Software is the heaviest, with fifteen, from Finance & Accounting and Human Resources through ERP & Operations to Legal. The rest split as follows: Community & Social has two, Content & Publishing seven, Data & Analytics five, Developer Tools eleven, Infrastructure & Operations ten, Miscellaneous eight, Productivity & Utilities sixteen, and Security & Privacy begins with Secrets Management and Identity & Access Management before the listing runs past what the README shows. Productivity & Utilities is the widest at sixteen, running from Office Suites and Note Taking & Knowledge Management down to Maps & Navigation and System Cleanup & Optimization. Because each entry is an anchor in one file, the whole taxonomy is greppable and diffable. That is also its limit: there is no structured data, no per-entry metadata, and nothing a tool can filter without parsing Markdown. ## Every sponsor link carries a utm_source parameter back to the same domain The sponsor block sits above the contents, and each of the nine entries is a paid placement with tracking parameters baked into the URL. CodeRabbit links to coderabbit.link with utm_source=openalternative.co and claims 90% fewer bugs in half the time. InfluxDB carries a longer query string with utm_source=vendor, utm_medium=referral and a utm_campaign value of 2026-04_spnsr-content_open_alternative, which dates that particular link to April 2026. The rest follow the same pattern: Capture for screenshots, PDF generation and browser automation, Docmost for wiki software, Windshift as a self-hosted platform that replaces Jira, Openlane for automated compliance, c15t for cookie banners, Postiz for agentic social media scheduling, and Sent for messaging across SMS, WhatsApp and RCS in more than 190 countries. A link inviting readers to become a sponsor points at openalternative.co/advertise. There is a quiet irony in the vendor list. Each sponsor's one-line pitch describes a product that belongs in one of the categories further down the page: Jira replacement lands in Project & Work Management, wiki software in Documentation & Knowledge Base, compliance automation in Compliance & Risk Management. The list's commercial support is made of the kind of software the list itself indexes. ## Four files at the root, and nothing to build The entire repository is CONTRIBUTING.md, FUNDING.yml, LICENSE and README.md. There is no package manifest, no lockfile, no build configuration, no test suite and no continuous integration configuration in the root entries. GitHub reports no primary language, and the repository has no GitHub releases at all, so there is no version to install and no changelog to read. That shape makes it a link farm with a licence attached, and it changes how you consume it. There is no install step because there is nothing to install. A developer either reads the README in a browser, clones it to have a local searchable copy, or goes to openalternative.co, which is both the homepage field and the domain named as maintainer. The files that do exist carry real weight. CONTRIBUTING.md is the path for adding an entry, and FUNDING.yml is the machine-readable counterpart to the sponsor block above. The LICENSE is CC0-1.0, which is about as permissive as a licence gets and is what makes the text reusable in your own internal documentation without attribution obligations. ## CC0 covers the list text, not the projects it points at GitHub reports the repository as CC0-1.0. Read that narrowly: it covers the curated text, the category structure and whatever images or files sit in those four files. It says nothing about the hundreds of products named inside the README, each of which carries its own licence and its own terms. That distinction matters in practice because the entries span everything from office suites to databases to messaging infrastructure. Copying this README into an internal wiki is unrestricted. Copying a claim like an open source replacement for a particular commercial product into customer-facing copy is a decision about that product's licence and about whether the entry is still accurate, and the README cannot answer either question for you. The absence of per-entry licence information is the practical gap. Nothing in the four files records what licence a listed project uses, what version it is at, or when its entry was last reviewed, so the list cannot be filtered for licence compatibility without visiting every project separately. ## No release tags and no per-entry dates, so entries go stale in place The repository has no GitHub releases and the default branch is main. The last push was on 2026-10-04, so the list as a whole is current, but there is no mechanism that tells you which entries inside it are current. An anchor for a project that was abandoned two years ago looks exactly like an anchor for one released yesterday, because the only date in the repository is the date of the last commit. This is the failure mode of any hand-maintained list, and it is worth planning around. Treat the README as a directory of starting points rather than a verified catalogue, then check each project you are actually considering: read its own README for install instructions, look at its commit history for recent activity, and confirm the licence yourself. The list is good at telling you a category exists and at naming several candidates inside it. It is not evidence about any single candidate. For that reason the hosted site is the version to search when you need one answer rather than a category tour, since a maintained front end can carry the metadata this repository does not. ## Searching means scrolling anchors, so the site is the practical entry point There is no search, no filter and no index file in the repository. Finding a replacement for one specific tool means either scanning the eighty anchors until you hit the right sub-category, or running a text search over the raw Markdown for the product name. Both work. Neither is pleasant once you know which category you want. The high-intent phrasings people reach for around this kind of project are the tell: alternatives to a named tool, an open source list, a free static generator. Those questions are all category lookups, and the eighty anchors answer them only as a browsing exercise. openalternative.co is where the same content is presented as something you can query, and it is also where the maintainer identity and the sponsorship route both point. The honest framing is that this repository is the source and the site is the product. Read the README when you want the raw list, watch the commits when you want to know the list is being tended, and use the site when you have a tool in mind and want its replacement now. ## Conclusion Use this repository when you want a browsable index of open source replacements and a CC0 licence that lets you reuse the text freely, and read openalternative.co when you want to search rather than scroll. Do not treat an entry as a recommendation: there is no entry metadata to check, no version and no date. Before adopting any project it names, confirm the repository is still pushed to, read its own licence, and test it against the workload you actually have. If you were looking for the Next.js directory starter that used to sit in this repository, it now lives at dirstarter.com and nothing here will help you build one. ## FAQ ### What is piotrkulpinski/open-source-alternatives now? A curated awesome list of open source alternatives to proprietary software, maintained by OpenAlternative. The Next.js directory application that used to be hosted there is now the separate Dirstarter starter kit at dirstarter.com. ### Does open-source-alternatives contain any code I can run? No. The repository holds only CONTRIBUTING.md, FUNDING.yml, LICENSE and README.md, and GitHub reports no primary language for it. ### How many categories does the open-source-alternatives list cover? Ten top-level categories, from AI & Machine Learning through Business Software, Developer Tools, Infrastructure & Operations and Productivity & Utilities to Security & Privacy, holding about eighty sub-categories between them. ### What licence does open-source-alternatives use, and does it cover the listed projects? The repository is licensed CC0-1.0, which covers the list text. Each project named inside the README carries its own licence, and the repository records none of them. ### How current is the open source alternatives list? The last push was on 2026-10-04 and the repository has no GitHub releases. Entries carry no dates or versions, so individual entries have to be checked against each project's own repository. ## Sources - [Official documentation](https://openalternative.co) - [Official README](https://github.com/piotrkulpinski/open-source-alternatives#readme) - [Project repository](https://github.com/piotrkulpinski/open-source-alternatives) --- Hysen Labs editorial analysis, written from the project's own repository and release notes. Cite the canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/piotrkulpinski-open-source-alternatives