E67: Automated Certificate Management with Smallstep

Adoption Journey

Mike Malone, founder of Smallstep, shares the unique journey of their open source project, which was built from scratch to address authentication challenges in distributed systems. He explains that while TLS is a widely used protocol for secure connections, the complexity of certificate management in cloud-native DevOps environments necessitated a new solution 1. This led to the creation of Smallstep's open source project, which aimed to provide a ubiquitous and core infrastructure for certificate management. Malone emphasizes the necessity of open source for widespread adoption, stating, "If we didn't open source this, somebody else would," highlighting the strategic decision to become the de facto solution 2.

   

Community Strategies

Smallstep's community engagement strategy focuses on authentic content marketing and leveraging various platforms to foster growth. Mike Malone discusses how they use content to educate and engage the community, testing ideas through content marketing before development to gauge interest and relevance 3. They manage their community through platforms like Discord and GitHub, using tools like Orbit to track engagement. Malone acknowledges the challenges of open source, noting, "Open source is hard sometimes. I refer to it as crappy product led," reflecting the difficulties in measuring community quality without direct user data 4.

   

Decision Challenges

Deciding what to keep open source versus commercialize is a complex challenge for Smallstep. Mike Malone explains that their approach is to open source features that align with core infrastructure needs, while enterprise-specific features remain commercial 5. This strategy ensures that essential tools like hardware security modules are accessible to all users, while advanced features for enterprise needs are monetized. Malone admits the difficulty in balancing these decisions, stating, "It's hard. And I don't know that we're 100% perfect at focusing on there," emphasizing the ongoing challenge of maintaining this balance 6.