If you are frustrated with Github being down again, and just want an alternative, the other options listed are better fits. If you have the time to look at doing more than that, then check out fossil https://fossil-scm.org/home/doc/trunk/www/index.wiki
- It isn't git - Works best with smaller teams - You need to be ok self hosting (single binary, easy to do)
The first point is really the killer. It is revision control, it is as good as git (maybe better), but it is different. Git = branches are easy, was built to support Linux's lieutenant development model, and a massive, loosely connected team. Fossil = branches are intentionally hard, built to support a small, tight knit team (SQLite).
Most teams I've been on are closer in size to SQLite than they are to Linux, but everyone already knows git at a gut deep level. YMMV.
I've sorta overlooked Fossil a lot (mostly because it's not git...), but just browsing some instances on chisel and the fossil homepage has me intrigued.
If you'll entertain me for a moment...
My dream "forge" would just be nice-looking frontend for displaying repos on the web, a public issue tracker (with per-issue permissions), a public way to submit issues, and essentially a single canonical root for repositories that users on the team work on. I don't want individual user repos or pages, organizations, or any social stuff. I definitely don't want open registration.
It really looks like fossil is actually what I've always wanted.
How limiting is the custom theme support? It looks like you can just straight up write your own HTML/CSS for everything. If I really want a custom design, will I be disappointed in the long run?
Also, it looks like it follows that user model I want, where it's "repositories with users" instead of "users with repositories". Is that correct?
And here I was trying to hype myself up to write my own git web frontend.
Fossil looks really cool. I like how it's all in one and includes the web interface. The only thing is it doesn't seem like anyone actually uses it outside of sqlite. I don't necessarily need to use the most popular thing out there, but some social proof is nice.
It is a small community. The forums are moderately active though: https://fossil-scm.org/forum/forum
There's also a hosting service for fossil repos which does a really good job for a number of years now https://chiselapp.com/repositories/