… for every time I wrote a blog whose reason for existence was invalidated within weeks of publication, I’d have 2 nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice.

First,

I put some effort into writing down exactly how to run FerretDB, an open-source document database. While large parts of it are still useful to show how to setup a self-recovering database with CloudNativePG, FerretDB has been slowly disappearing since after legal issues and the Linux Foundation adopting a different open source document database project. I cannot claim to know the how or why, but of course I regret this, as they were a community-focused small company taking on a huge corporation and fighting for an open standard. That open standard is there now: unfortunately, FerretDB isn’t anymore.

The second time it happened,

is just this week, and is a happier story. I wrote a month ago that the Rockchip RK3588-based SBCs are the ideal low-power machines for network attached storage (NAS) and distributed storage systems, with their 2.5 Gb/s network interface:

Because ten Gigabit tends to be expensive and power-hungry

So guess what happened: 10 Gb/s is now available on an incredibly power-efficient single-board computer: the Odroid H5

Again, there’s still value in the article: the Odroid H5 does not come with 32GB of DDR5, it has to be purchased separately, so it is still a lot more expensive. And the tips on how to safely connect a bunch of SATA SSDs to a small computer that only has M.2 connectors, as well as how to handle volumes in Talos, are just as applicable to the Odroid H5 as to the Rockhip.

Still, I can’t help but feel like there is some negative predictive power to my blog. Every time I say “do X because Y”, Y ends up becoming untrue within weeks.

So now,

to better serve the community, let me state some more tips with reasons to do them, see if it happens again:

  • because RAM and SSD prices will stay very high for a long time, sit on your hardware
  • because the Steam Frame is not coming out for a while, get a used VR headset
  • …
  • …

I was going to list some more things that I hope won’t come true, related to European (digital) sovereignty, but it gets really dark, so I’ve left some space for you to fill that out yourself.