Mourning Steve French
[Posted August 23, 2026 by corbet]
From Jeremy Allison we have the sad news of the passing of Steve French. He was the maintainer of the kernel's SMB filesystem code for many years, having only dropped that role due to health issues in the last week. "I've known Steve for over 20 years. He was a legend in the community, and a really good friend. He will be greatly missed. Farewell Steve." He will indeed be missed.
- * *
to post comments
Steve will be missed
Posted Aug 23, 2026 15:04 UTC (Sun) by **jlayton** (subscriber, #31672) [Link]
Steve merged my first upstream patch into the Linux kernel. He and I worked closely together for several years on the Linux CIFS client, a project he tirelessly pursued and advocated. He was a good friend too, always willing to help someone. I'll always remember going to the evening events after LSF/MM, and there would be Steve, still plinking away on his laptop. Farewell, my friend!
[](https://lwn.net/Articles/1090098/)
Testimonial to Steve
Posted Aug 23, 2026 16:24 UTC (Sun) by **jra** (subscriber, #55261) [Link]
Is now live on samba.org. Including a joke. Steve would never have forgiven us for not having one last "where is Steve ?" joke 🤣
[](https://lwn.net/Articles/1090098/)
Steve had such a positive effect on the whole community.
Posted Aug 23, 2026 16:34 UTC (Sun) by **jra** (subscriber, #55261) [Link] (1 responses)
Steve had such a positive effect on the whole community.
Posted Aug 23, 2026 21:48 UTC (Sun) by **willy** (subscriber, #9762) [Link]
[](https://lwn.net/Articles/1090098/)
RIP Steve
Posted Aug 23, 2026 17:32 UTC (Sun) by **pcacjr** (subscriber, #171081) [Link]
Thanks for all the hard work, conversations, hacking and fun we had
together. You'll be greatly missed. Farewell Steve.
[](https://lwn.net/Articles/1090098/)
Rest in peace, Steve!
Posted Aug 24, 2026 7:59 UTC (Mon) by **ab** (subscriber, #788) [Link]
[](https://lwn.net/Articles/1090098/)
Funniest Steve story.
Posted Aug 24, 2026 16:23 UTC (Mon) by **jra** (subscriber, #55261) [Link]