Update (8/23/19 @ 2:30 PM ET): The OpenGApps team is moving its hosting from GitHub to SourceForge.

Although Android is open source, it's difficult for most users to stomach using an Android device without Google Play apps and services. Projects like OpenGApps make it possible for users to easily get their favorite Google apps on custom ROMs. OpenGApps even comes in bundles of various sizes with each bundle comprised of Google Play Services and the Google Play Store along with a number of other Google apps.

OpenGApps has a website that makes it easy to choose your desired GApps package, but you may have noticed a few days ago that all of their downloads suddenly stopped working for a few hours. As it turns out, the project came under fire from GitHub management over a breach in GitHub's Terms of Services, as the team explained in a recent blog post.

OpenGApps' APK Repositories are Changing Location

Each party hosting their projects on GitHub must "agree not to reproduce, duplicate, copy, sell, resell or exploit any portion of the Service, use of the Service, or access to the Service without GitHub's express written permission." GitHub didn't like that OpenGapps was storing so many huge APKs inside their repositories. The reason for this is that it's an inefficient use of Git, as the service has poor performance when the repository gets too large. For a long time, OpenGapps stored APKs in GitHub repositories that their build scripts then used to compile flashable packages, but this will be changing soon.

The OpenGApps team decided their best course of action in response to GitHub's concerns is to self-host their APK repositories with GitLab Community Edition. The main script repository will still be hosted on GitHub, but the team will soon update the build scripts to redirect to the new APK repos on GitLab. As for OpenGApps flashable releases, you'll be able to find them on the project's GitHub Releases page.

Gearing up for Android Q

The OpenGApps team is getting ready for the first official release of Android Q developer preview so they can extract GApps built for Android 10. While the team is confident about making the builds available in time, it is seeking support in the form of donations via PayPal. This will help the team deal with the increase in hosting costs and motivate them to continue further development.

Support OpenGApps (PayPal)

Update: Moving to SourceForge

The OpenGApps team has announced that they will be moving their hosting from GitHub to SourceForge. They previously moved their APK repositories to Gitlab, and then GitHub gave them a new restriction that forced them to remove ZIP packages from releases. After weighing a few different options, the team decided to move to SourceForge. New releases can now be found at sourceforge.net/projects/opengapps/files.

Source: OpenGApps