On 10/21/24 09:26, notpeter87 notpeter87 wrote: ...
if anything would happen to Theo de Raadt, he is 56 years old according to wikipedia, what would happen to OpenBSD? will there be any other strong and technically good leaders for it?
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This is a valid question, but it needs to be asked in a MUCH bigger way. EVERY part of your business operation has to be replaceable. Every Single Part. I'm always amazed when companies with a long history hang their future on a relative upstart with no exit plan. While this is true across all a business's operations, let's review a few recent cases in just the IT World: VMware: has changed owners repeatedly over the years, and the most recent change is clearly "customer hostile". And they can do this because...whaddya gonna do? switch tomorrow? CentOS linux basically vanished (well, ok, changed into a totally different thing) abruptly and without fulfilling its support promise for its last release. Company still went on, they just decided they didn't want to play anymore, took their code and went home. This lead to the creation of CentOS alternatives, which lead to RH attempting to shut them down, too. Heck, key people in the Linux world are bragging about how Linux is becoming "42% less Unix". Do you follow blindly, or say, "Maybe I need to shop around"? How much data is backed up on proprietary backup systems that is expected to be recoverable years after the SW vendor may vanish? Even seemingly "eternal" companies, like Microsoft or IBM, just aren't. And even if the company continues on, you can't be sure the products will continue to fit your needs, either through your needs changing or the product's change. IBM has terminated almost all of its US AIX development team and moved development to India. This is not a move indicating "long term continuity". If your product or application relies on IBM HW or SW, you should be grateful -- unlike the VMware userbase, YOU have got a clear warning that you need to be planning your platform change. (and...what is IBM's long-term future? They have been shrinking for decades, both in market share and market respect. And IBM owns RedHat.) Microsoft has Windows 11, and ...I'll leave it at that. No product or person should ever be given blind and eternal acceptance. OpenBSD should earn your trust each and every release, as should any other product you use, free or commercial. Part of your initial system design has to include replacement of any component that either no longer earns your trust or where some other product is clearly better becomes available (or is found). If you can't do that, recognize you are gambling the future of your business on the future of an unrelated product. Nick.
