Post #231276

2026-01-31 20:44 UTC

Todd C. Miller has been maintaining the #sudo codebase for over 30 years. This is exactly one of those cases where an entire critical infrastructure is held together by the work of a single volunteer who apparently can’t find anyone willing to sponsor him for some financial support. #opensource #linux #foss #GNU

Replies (15)

@spacehobo@teh.entar.net 2026-01-31 22:33

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social Didn't openbsd move to `doas` a while back?

Open ##2397414
@egoldblatt@gardenstate.social 2026-01-31 22:52

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social Half the point of #FOSS (or more than half, for a lot of people) is the "free as in beer" element. If they were willing to pay for things, they'd be in the Windows or Mac walled gardens. That's just the reality of the situation. Create a tool for everyone, and everyone will use it until they need to pay up.

Open ##2397429
@AndiBarth@muenchen.social 2026-01-31 22:52

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social Hey @sovtechfund@mastodon.social, do you have any idea how to help here? Sudo really is critical (perhaps the most criticial not under team maintenance)

Open ##2397441
@L_yah@mastodon.social 2026-01-31 23:29

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social This needs to be seen. are people seeing it on twitter or somewhere?

Open ##2397442
@winissen@sfba.social 2026-01-31 23:38

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social Do you remember the SSH rooting contests from the 90s? At that time they would provide you the root password on the idea that if you could achieve unauthorized access to the machine across the network, a simple privilege escalation was trivial. Nowadays, that's no longer true, thanks to this hard work. I'll admit I take that level of security for granted these days.

Open ##2397443
@kstrlworks@techhub.social 2026-02-01 01:46

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social yes but, he definitely has not made it easy for anyone to find a link to sponsor or donate to him directly

Open ##2397444
@martinosacchi@mastodon.social 2026-02-01 04:18

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social please exlain to us!

Open ##2397445
@adulau@infosec.exchange 2026-02-01 07:21

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social Thanks for the reminder. I just sponsored the project via GitHub.

Open ##2397449
@usul@piaille.fr 2026-02-01 07:26

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social su ftw

Open ##2397450
@steppl@mastodon.social 2026-02-01 08:20

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social I think "father of time " (NTP) has a similar problem - the list could go on.

Open ##2397451
@KeithWM@mastodon.social 2026-02-01 08:35

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social But surely he can just "sudo sponsor my efforts" and all will be well? xkcd:149

Open ##2397452
@postmodern@digitalcourage.social 2026-02-01 09:46

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social why didnt he use sudo to get funding?

Open ##2397463
@ketmorco@fosstodon.org 2026-02-01 14:44

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social we need a better way to charge corporations with buckets of cash, as opposed to folks on a shoestring. Or just outlaw billionaires

Open ##2397466
@wyliecoyoteuk@mastodon.org.uk 2026-02-01 15:49

@pafurijaz@mastodon.social The discussion of monetary support is missing the point. If he's been supporting it for 30+ years, he is probably 50+ and due to retire sometime soon. So what happens if he falls ill, or (hopefully not) dies?

Open ##2397467
@brian@social.brian.jp 2026-02-02 00:52

RE: https://mastodon.social/@pafurijaz/115991659475358114 My dumbass thought `sudo` was a posix or coreutils command. Turns out it's not.

Open ##2397503