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Ever since cmb sold to netgate the Pfsense project has been run by people who I suspect are working hard to find a way to stop releasing open source versions.

Ever since cmb sold to netgate the Pfsense project has been run by people who I suspect are working hard to find a way to stop releasing open source versions. FYI, my observations as an outsider are the project went through three phases of owners: BSD Perimeter is owner and starts open source fork creating open source releases = CMB and Scott as founders. Electric Sheep Fencing ownership is a result of CMB taking more of the day to day while Scott bows out and Netgate starts funding things / sinking hooks in. Open source continues to be important and CMB is in charge for the most part. Netgate ownership completes obtaining full ownership / gets their hooks into every bit of the project. We see annoying screen about licensing and they start nonsense with OPNSense to flex their tiny muscles. FYI netgate hardware isn’t bad and you get stellar support for what is currently an open source product but they have worked hard to fracture the hard won trust CMB had been building up in the community.

pelasaco 5y ago
I remember when pFsense removed the pfsense-tools.git from github because people were creating forks from pfSense.. looks like somebody got the open source thing totally wrong: https://marc.info/?l=pfsense-dev&m=139336551027270 https://marc.info/?l=pfsense-dev&m=139336551027270 https://forum.netgate.com/topic/66157/pfsense-tools-missing-from-repository https://forum.netgate.com/topic/66157/pfsense-tools-missing-...
- oneplane 5y ago
  Definitely. Their aim has always been to figure out ways to squeeze the software for money. It partially makes sense as they built the company and expenses first and now have to monetise that. Yet nobody asked for it. With pfSense "plus" they published that they will only work on that paid product and mostly ignore the open source stuff, only do the essential requirements. It's essentially just a marketing gateway into their closed products. At that point you might as well buy any other mature closed product... there are many and from a closed source commercial product perspective they are all better than wat netgate produces, including commercial VyOS without a gui.
apple4ever 5y ago
And not only that, the people running it are arrogant and mean.

pelasaco 5y ago

I remember when pFsense removed the pfsense-tools.git from github because people were creating forks from pfSense.. looks like somebody got the open source thing totally wrong: https://marc.info/?l=pfsense-dev&m=139336551027270 https://marc.info/?l=pfsense-dev&m=139336551027270 https://forum.netgate.com/topic/66157/pfsense-tools-missing-from-repository https://forum.netgate.com/topic/66157/pfsense-tools-missing-...

oneplane 5y ago
Definitely. Their aim has always been to figure out ways to squeeze the software for money. It partially makes sense as they built the company and expenses first and now have to monetise that. Yet nobody asked for it. With pfSense "plus" they published that they will only work on that paid product and mostly ignore the open source stuff, only do the essential requirements. It's essentially just a marketing gateway into their closed products. At that point you might as well buy any other mature closed product... there are many and from a closed source commercial product perspective they are all better than wat netgate produces, including commercial VyOS without a gui.

apple4ever 5y ago

And not only that, the people running it are arrogant and mean.