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Rethinking distribution choice
Oct. 5th, 2016 08:04 pmThere is an awful lot I like about OpenBSD technically. The base system is well-designed for me: it does everything I want, things I may someday want, but isn't cluttered with all manner of featureful stuff I don't need and through which confusion and bugs may creep. The project's not afraid to push security, as with driving pf, LibreSSL, W^X and similar. It's easy to configure: some short text-based configuration files largely suffice for my needs. OpenBSD's base system is a combination of tractable pieces that do useful things well yet is lightweight enough to fit easily into the cheapest virtual machine.
Unfortunately, OpenBSD's the first open-source software project I've found really quite uncomfortable socially. I'd already mentioned how easily triggered the founder seems to be. Even if I keep a low profile henceforth myself, if I'm running OpenBSD then I obviously want to read its principal mailing lists, but watching users draw scathing fire from him for what seem to me to be semi-imaginary offenses is really not something I want in my life, even if others' responses tend to be more kind and helpful. After investing such time into learning about and working with OpenBSD I really didn't expect it to be social issues that made me rethink that decision. I'm sorrowed to find myself distracted by thoughts like wondering how well its httpd could work on Dragonfly (which also offers pf, LibreSSL, etc., plus HAMMER and use of git, and should be good for amd64 SMP systems) but goodness knows I'd watch their lists awhile before investing anything as I don't want to make the same mistake again.
Unfortunately, OpenBSD's the first open-source software project I've found really quite uncomfortable socially. I'd already mentioned how easily triggered the founder seems to be. Even if I keep a low profile henceforth myself, if I'm running OpenBSD then I obviously want to read its principal mailing lists, but watching users draw scathing fire from him for what seem to me to be semi-imaginary offenses is really not something I want in my life, even if others' responses tend to be more kind and helpful. After investing such time into learning about and working with OpenBSD I really didn't expect it to be social issues that made me rethink that decision. I'm sorrowed to find myself distracted by thoughts like wondering how well its httpd could work on Dragonfly (which also offers pf, LibreSSL, etc., plus HAMMER and use of git, and should be good for amd64 SMP systems) but goodness knows I'd watch their lists awhile before investing anything as I don't want to make the same mistake again.
