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OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

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Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#111

Post by osxrand »

takeda wrote: post #45
jdludlow wrote: post #23

> The OpenBSD project uses a lot of electricity for running the > development and build machines. A number of logistical reasons > prevents us from moving the machines to another location which might > offer space/power for free, so let's not allow the conversation to go > that way. I don't understand this comment. If the choice came down to moving versus shutting down entirely, why is moving an unacceptable answer?

I've seen a picture posted on Slashdot how they server rack looks like. There are many very old machines, I am sure that at least one reason is fear that they break during transportation. Found it: http://www.openbsd.org/images/rack2009.jpg

Am I the only one who want's to organize and clean up those racks? :)

Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#112

Post by mathattack »

aiiane wrote: post #55
brohee wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What kind of "why" do you expect? There is a pretty large collection of computers, network equipment, UPS and HVAC stuff. You want a machine per machine watt usage? 8 year old image of one of the racks, is only grew since... http://www.openbsd.org/images/newrack.jpg

It's a due diligence kind of thing. If you're asking people to make significant monetary contributions, it makes sense to provide a clear picture of what you're using that money on.

Exactly. Donors of non-profits like to see where the money is going. If you're doing an arms length transaction, then it's ok to say "No need to look behind the curtain, and feel free to buy from someone else."

Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#113

Post by scarmig »

mhurron wrote: post #59
drdaeman wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correction: OpenSSH, not SSH at all.

Name another free ssh implementation. On every* UNIX and UNIX-like OS ssh is OpenSSH. OpenSSH is why we don't telnet everywhere anymore. *- Honestly, I don't know of anything that ships with something that is not OpenSSH.

Hmmm, I think SmartOS uses a different SSH. Might be misremembering though.

Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#114

Post by chrissnell »

olouv wrote: post #74
raydev wrote: post #22

I feel like it's useful to point that OpenBSD won't say exactly why the bill is so high, and apparently they don't have open accounting. That bothers me a bit. Link to relevant reddit comment thread: http://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/1vakm9/openbsd_develo...

That bothers me too, what if they are mining bitcoins with the energy/funds? That wouldn't seem too far-fetched for unaudited tech-savy people.

I'm sorry, but that is just absurd. Some of the servers in question are coming up on 20 years of age. We didn't have the power-conserving hardware back then that we have now. Those old SPARCstations put out heat like a hair dryer. That stuff uses a lot of power and remember that ever watt of power you put into a server needs to be cooled. So, basically double the electricity costs for any given piece of gear. This rack is not cheap to run or cool, and definitely not in a home basement without access to highly efficient (and huge) datacenter-class cooling and power infrastructure. There are reasons that this gear needs to stay at Theo's place. If you don't like his reasons, you don't have to donate. He didn't email you and ask for a donation; you read the story here.

Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#115

Post by jlgaddis »

ibdknox wrote: post #102
jxf wrote: post #10

Just to make the call to action a little more direct, the donation link is here: http://www.openbsdfoundation.org/donations.html

If the maintainers of that page are around here, I suggest putting some visualization of how close you are to the goal on there. It's amazing how much of a psychological motivator a bar filling up is.

Somebody from the Foundation said on misc that they were going to do that.

Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#117

Post by jlgaddis »

jdludlow wrote: post #23

> The OpenBSD project uses a lot of electricity for running the > development and build machines. A number of logistical reasons > prevents us from moving the machines to another location which might > offer space/power for free, so let's not allow the conversation to go > that way. I don't understand this comment. If the choice came down to moving versus shutting down entirely, why is moving an unacceptable answer?

Because Theo.

Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#118

Post by bhaile »

Thanks for linking it here and would be better if it was linked to an article providing additional details other than electricity costs. Other users have posted the relevant links.

On another note, the readability of the font was a turn off for me. Fortunately, there is an option to view it in plain text. adding &q=raw at the end of the URL. http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=138972987203440&w=2&q=raw

Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#119

Post by jlgaddis »

nailer wrote: post #79
sdkmvx wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OpenBSD supports a number of odd and unusual platforms and does builds on them. See http://www.openbsd.org/plat.html . Older hardware can both use a significant amount of electricity and require much more hand-holding than is possible. Virtualization and emulation are not acceptable substitutes because they claim that doing builds on e.g. VAX is one of the best ways to ensure that the code works on VAX as opposed to…

OpenBSD's main value is high security standards. - Is there a significant amount of people with high security standards and an interest in SGI workstation hardware? - What about people who have high security standards and Sharp Zaurus hardware? If these groups aren't as important, as say, ARM and x86 users, perhaps it could be worth dropping some of these platforms?

Read further into the thread -- specifically the messages from asshat Theo. He is absolutely opposed to anything like that.

Re: OpenBSD will shut down if we do not have the funding to keep the lights on

#120

Post by tobiasu »

jdludlow wrote: post #23

> The OpenBSD project uses a lot of electricity for running the > development and build machines. A number of logistical reasons > prevents us from moving the machines to another location which might > offer space/power for free, so let's not allow the conversation to go > that way. I don't understand this comment. If the choice came down to moving versus shutting down entirely, why is moving an unacceptable answer?

This discussion comes up every time only because some people seem to think OS development is like racking new x86 servers running RHEL.

Many of the machines do not have LOM. They have hardware failures instead. They hang because they get trashed building OpenBSD and ports pretty much 24/7. There is debugging and serial cables going on. Someone needs to push that NMI button and check the LEDs flicker like they should. Reboot them. Constantly update to the latest development version, making them panic quite a bit. Diagnose that. Installation procedure requires console access, monitor adapters, weird keyboards, ... They don't fit in racks properly. There are security concerns. Etc, etc.

It's wrong to think of the machine room as rack space than can be had for cheap somewhere else. It's much more like a lab (with the mad professor living on top, controlling the experiment).

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