I played with OpenBSD many, many years ago (when I had much more free time) but then didn&#x27;t touch it for years.<p>After hearing about JETPLOW [0], I decided to replace the Cisco ASA that I had been using for my (fiber) Internet connection at home with an open-source router&#x2F;firewall.<p>I had a RouterMaxx 1106 [1] (PDF) laying around so I decided to put OpenBSD on it and use that. In short order, I built an OpenBSD virtual machine, used flashrd [2] to build an OpenBSD image I could put on a CompactFlash card, and had it up and running.<p><i>It just works.</i><p>About two years later, it&#x27;s still humming along nicely. The only downtime that I&#x27;ve had is when I upgraded to a new OpenBSD version. I could&#x27;ve minimized somewhat but I use a new CF card every time.<p>Nowadays, I&#x27;ve also got a dedicated laptop running OpenBSD that I use solely for &quot;security critical&quot; stuff for $work. A separate machine stands in between the Internet and our MX hosts and runs OpenBSD&#x27;s spamd [3] to help keep spam out of our users&#x27; mailboxes (N.B.: the number of messages hitting out Barracuda dropped by ~70%, with <i>zero</i> complaints received from any of our users).<p>In addition, we&#x27;re just beginning a project to basically rebuild our entire server infrastructure and we&#x27;ll be using OpenBSD for certain functions: remote access (OpenVPN), SSH jump hosts, possibly authoritative DNS, etc.<p>I&#x27;m a firm believer in using &quot;the best tool for the job&quot;. Most of our servers will be running FreeBSD, but OpenBSD definitely has its place in our environment.<p>[0]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;nsa.gov1.info&#x2F;dni&#x2F;nsa-ant-catalog&#x2F;firewalls&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;nsa.gov1.info&#x2F;dni&#x2F;nsa-ant-catalog&#x2F;firewalls&#x2F;</a><p>[1]: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.balticnetworks.com&#x2F;docs&#x2F;routermaxx%206%20port.pdf" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.balticnetworks.com&#x2F;docs&#x2F;routermaxx%206%20port.pdf</a><p>[2]: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nmedia.net&#x2F;flashrd&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nmedia.net&#x2F;flashrd&#x2F;</a><p>[3]: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.openbsd.org&#x2F;spamd&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.openbsd.org&#x2F;spamd&#x2F;</a>