It’s hard to imagine something as fundamental to computing as the sudo command becoming abandonware, yet here we are: its solitary maintainer is asking for help to keep the project alive.
It’s a common trope in the open-source computing community that a small number of solitary maintainers do a disproportionate amount of work keeping critical software going, often with little recognition or support. Ubuntu Unity and the NGINX Ingress Controller are just two examples we’ve covered in recent months, and now we can add another, far more critical one to the mix.
Sudo, for those not familiar with Unix systems, is a command-line utility that allows authorized users to run specific commands as another user, typically the superuser, under tightly controlled policy rules. It is a foundational component of Unix and Linux systems: without tools like sudo, administrators would be forced to rely more heavily on direct root logins or broader privilege escalation mechanisms, increasing both operational risk and attack surface.
“For the past 30+ years I’ve been the maintainer of sudo,” developer Todd C. Miller notes on his personal webpage. “I’m currently in search of a sponsor to fund continued sudo maintenance and development. If you or your organization is interested in sponsoring sudo, please let me know.”
Miller has been maintaining sudo since 1993. According to sudo’s website, Miller’s former employer, Quest Software, served as sudo’s sponsor beginning in 2010, but its sponsorship of sudo ended in February 2024, which coincides with Miller’s departure from Quest subsidiary One Identity.
Archived copies of Miller’s website suggest he’s been looking for a sudo patron since then.
That said, sudo updates haven’t dried up since then, with plenty of updates released since February 2024 according to sudo’s changelog, so Miller is clearly still working on it – and it definitely still needs updates.
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Source: Sudo’s maintainer needs resources to keep utility updated • The Register
Robin Edgar
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