karmawarrior's Journal: SMP in OpenBSD - well done everyone

For a while now, I've been recommending that when people contact their elected representatives to argue the case for some IT issue, they also bring up the issue of the lack of SMP in OpenBSD, and the consequences this has for the effective deployment of OpenBSD on workstations and servers.

Well, it looks like all the lobbying has finally paid off. The next version of OpenBSD will support SMP which is a remarkable achievement. While many will, rightly, want to congratulate the programmers behind the OpenBSD project for this major improvement, I also think some credit has to go to the Slashdotters who put time and effort into lobbying their Senators and Congressmen and women to do something about this. I know many of you have been writing letters since 2002, but a year and a half isn't a long time to wait for something this extraordinary. Would it have happened without the lobbying? We will never know, but somehow I doubt it would have happened in such small a space of time.

This is proof, as if any were needed, that democracy can work, that we can all make a difference, that even if we can't code or market open source products, we can - simply by leveraging our collective elective strength - lobby the people who can make a difference to ensure the time and resources can be devoted.

Well done everyone.