[talk] So Netgate bails on FreeBSD

[George Neville-Neil]

On 24 May 2018, at 7:43, Franco Fichtner wrote:

>> On 24. May 2018, at 12:23 AM, George Neville-Neil 
>> <gnn at neville-neil.com> wrote:
>>
>> Exotic?  No.  It's logical as is DPDK.  They target Linux because 
>> Linux is the gorilla and because Intel wanted to bypass dealing 
>> directly with the Linux clowns and their clown kernel and clown 
>> community.
>
> The only winners are 6WIND and Intel, selling SDKs and NICs to
> anyone with loose change.  The time to market is easily 5 years
> ago.

The code also runs on Chelsio and it is open source so one can make it 
their own, which is how that thing works.

> Reel in enough profit to buy more SDKs to accelerate VPN and
> other stuff.  The cycle never ends.  Bottom line is vendors all
> have the same offering, the only difference they claim is higher
> high speed.
>
> It's a lose-lose for anyone attempting a product now, especially
> one that claims "open source based" and asks for community help.
>

I'd love to see an alternative.  Luigi's work is nice but no one is 
really picking it up.  Again, hands, time and attention?

>> I've poked at this off and on for a bit but I've not had time to make 
>> much progress on this.  Jim's call for hands is a serious one, it 
>> would be nice to have a few folks poke at this and make it actually 
>> portable.
>
> Please don't advocate volunteering for Netgate.  FreeBSD is a
> better place without the drama they used to induce for at least
> half a decade.

Funny, I wasn't advocating for that, I was pointing out that Jim's call 
is the right one.  In open source people can put up or shut up (or as we 
say on FreeBSD, "Shut up and code.") so, I'd be interested in 
alternatives but I've yet to see any that are viable.  I also know how 
many hands it would take, and it's more than 2 or 4.

Best,
George