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manpage is from SUSE 6.1...

Why GNU su does not support the wheel group (by Richard Stallman)
Sometimes a few of the users try to hold total power over all the rest. For example, in 1984, a few users at the MIT AI lab decided to seize power by changing the operator password on the Twenex system and keeping it secret from everyone else. (I was able to thwart this coup and give power back to the users by patching the kernel, but I wouldn't know how to do that in Unix.)

However, occasionally the rulers do tell someone. Under the usual su mechanism, once someone learns the root password who sympathizes with the ordinary users, he can tell the rest. The "wheel group" feature would make this impossible, and thus cement the power of the rulers.

I'm on the side of the masses, not that of the rulers. If you are used to supporting the bosses and sysadmins in whatever they do, you might find this idea strange at first.

April's fool day on ./ featuring RMS ... when I saw it, I thought I'd share this cute (I'd say funny) piece of history, but again, no disrespect intended. Although being somewhat cynical is en vogue in nerd circles (unfortunately and boringly), when I say I respect RMS for what he is and for what he represents, I mean it.

"Submit a post there asking which of Linux or FreeBSD should be used for a high performance server? Which is more stable? Which has a higher performance networking stack? Which is more scalable? Etc etc."

Submit the same post on a linux forum ;) I don't believe anyone on bsdforums would tell you to install bsd on a >4 processor machine (because they won't recommend the 'new technology release' of the 5.x series, and SMP in 4.x simply sucks. As to stability/security: YMMV. And opinions may vary. Linux is as secure as an admin makes it - and it can be as secure as FreeBSD. In My Personal Experience(tm) it was easier to set up a secure FreeBSD than to secure a linux distro (even Debian). That's because the FreeBSD command line (man pages, system layout, config files) are very easy to read and edit.

Of course, giving my reasons for saying that would need a much lenghtier elaboration of this, but a short example: the FreeBSD firewall, ipfw. It has an almost english syntax:

ipfw add 1000 permit all from me to any out via rl0 # this will permit every outgoing
# connection from my machine via a specific interface.
# I could have also written:
allow ip from <my ip address> to any xmit rl0 #or
pass ip from ... #you get the picture
# and here is how it looks like when you create a stateful firewall rule:
check-state
ipfw add 1000 permit all from me to any out via rl0 setup keep-state

another example: blackholing your puter

sysctl net.inet.tcp.blackhole=2
sysctl.net.inet.udp.blac khole=1

Of course, I can say FreeBSD was easier to set up for me given the specific purpose of that machine. At the same time, I agree with the Mandrake post, inasmuch as Mandrake is a far better solution if you want to replace your XP with a free OS, but don't want to deal with the CLI.

So yes, some points might create disagreement in discussing linux vs. freebsd. But there are multiple ways dealing with the issue. For instance, one could say: "the linux console driver sux0rz" This is Very Bad. Or one can say: There isn't separate scrollback buffer for each terminal. When you switch, it gets erased. As a result, it is easier to select a portion of screen output (without using 3rd party application) with a mouse, and paste it in an editor on another terminal. Moreover, you can set the scrollback buffer to an arbitrary number of lines.

Both descriptions have some truth in them. But I would undoubtedly label the former as trolling while the latter as informed (informative). Between the two, there are myriad ways to express this difference. It is up to your individual taste to decide on the point that makes it flambait/trolling. As to the post that lead to this discussion: I don't like the grand(grand-grand) parent's post. But it is my opinion that the reply describing it as flamebait was much more a flamebait than the original. Implicitly (and it wasn't that implicit) it suggests that the BSD community at large is what he perceived the parent post's attitude to be (putting words in his mouth that never left it).

Back to your original suggestion. I can point you to many linux related questions on that forum (the example above is not uncommon or outstanding in any way). And the usual reply to such questions isn't something like use BSD instead of linux. In fact, old time BSD users would recommend linux (on bsdforums!) if they know BSD doesn't suit the task at hand. Here is an example for that. Abe_the_Man probably went for a linux solution (seeing how he didn't post there anymore) - and as you can see he was recommended to use linux on bsdforums. In this post you can see many positive rem

"Submit a post there asking which of Linux or FreeBSD should be used for a high performance server? Which is more stable? Which has a higher performance networking stack? Which is more scalable? Etc etc."

Submit the same post on a linux forum ;) I don't believe anyone on bsdforums would tell you to install bsd on a >4 processor machine (because they won't recommend the 'new technology release' of the 5.x series, and SMP in 4.x simply sucks. As to stability/security: YMMV. And opinions may vary. Linux is as secure as an admin makes it - and it can be as secure as FreeBSD. In My Personal Experience(tm) it was easier to set up a secure FreeBSD than to secure a linux distro (even Debian). That's because the FreeBSD command line (man pages, system layout, config files) are very easy to read and edit.

Of course, giving my reasons for saying that would need a much lenghtier elaboration of this, but a short example: the FreeBSD firewall, ipfw. It has an almost english syntax:

ipfw add 1000 permit all from me to any out via rl0 # this will permit every outgoing
# connection from my machine via a specific interface.
# I could have also written:
allow ip from <my ip address> to any xmit rl0 #or
pass ip from ... #you get the picture
# and here is how it looks like when you create a stateful firewall rule:
check-state
ipfw add 1000 permit all from me to any out via rl0 setup keep-state

another example: blackholing your puter

sysctl net.inet.tcp.blackhole=2
sysctl.net.inet.udp.blac khole=1

Of course, I can say FreeBSD was easier to set up for me given the specific purpose of that machine. At the same time, I agree with the Mandrake post, inasmuch as Mandrake is a far better solution if you want to replace your XP with a free OS, but don't want to deal with the CLI.

So yes, some points might create disagreement in discussing linux vs. freebsd. But there are multiple ways dealing with the issue. For instance, one could say: "the linux console driver sux0rz" This is Very Bad. Or one can say: There isn't separate scrollback buffer for each terminal. When you switch, it gets erased. As a result, it is easier to select a portion of screen output (without using 3rd party application) with a mouse, and paste it in an editor on another terminal. Moreover, you can set the scrollback buffer to an arbitrary number of lines.

Both descriptions have some truth in them. But I would undoubtedly label the former as trolling while the latter as informed (informative). Between the two, there are myriad ways to express this difference. It is up to your individual taste to decide on the point that makes it flambait/trolling. As to the post that lead to this discussion: I don't like the grand(grand-grand) parent's post. But it is my opinion that the reply describing it as flamebait was much more a flamebait than the original. Implicitly (and it wasn't that implicit) it suggests that the BSD community at large is what he perceived the parent post's attitude to be (putting words in his mouth that never left it).

Back to your original suggestion. I can point you to many linux related questions on that forum (the example above is not uncommon or outstanding in any way). And the usual reply to such questions isn't something like use BSD instead of linux. In fact, old time BSD users would recommend linux (on bsdforums!) if they know BSD doesn't suit the task at hand. Here is an example for that. Abe_the_Man probably went for a linux solution (seeing how he didn't post there anymore) - and as you can see he was recommended to use linux on bsdforums. In this post you can see many positive rem

I don't know why you say that. Care to point out where can you see serious linux bashing sessions in the BSD community? (I'm not interested in years old derogatory statements/jokes). BSDforums has its own linux section, for instance. Occasionally linux newbies post there - and you won't see 'hey, use bsd instead' remarks there. People simply try to help. Or just a few minutes ago I saw this post - talking very positively (gasp!) about a linux distro in the middle of bsdforums (gasp again!) - and see the replies? No flames - just friendly discussion.

Now, on the other hand, I could point you to gentoo-forums posts that are very much against the BSDs. I think what you try to do here is simply smear the bsd community with FUD - the 'examples' you give are years old (and at that time, linux was in its infancy, so some things might have been even true - no offense). I myself came from a Mandrake background btw - which has an excellent community, both on mandrakeusers.org and pclinuxonline. And the FreeBSD community was as welcoming and tolerant to my early blunders that any linux distro would be proud for such a great user community. (I never saw RTFM posts - even if someone blatantly ignored/refused to read any documentation, the excellent handbook was pointed out as an important resource in a civil manner).

You are aware that you can configure KDE any way you want, aren't you? To look like gnome if you are a puritan ;) - or the way OS X looks like if you are a mac fan. And yeah, you can make it look like windows as well.

sorry, link above is: cameras

It takes about 5 minutes to install.

You can instantly download a pre-compiled binary of the latest version of pretty much anything by issuing the following command:

pkg_add -r [NAME]

You can instantly upgrade any software to the very latest version by installing sysutils/portupgrade and then typing

portupgrade [NAME]

Its so stable Apple used it as the foundation for OS X.

IMHO, hardware support is dramatically better in release 5 compared to release 4.5

If you havn't tried it yet you don't know what your missing.

Check out the FreeBSD Forums

Actually, if Broadcom's 802.11g chips use software-defined radio (SDR), which I believe but am not sure that they do, the FCC won't allow them to offer open access to the hardware because it can then be "redefined" to use spectrum that's not allowed.

This is tricky: you can't say, who cares?, because Broadcom has to as they're the one that will be fined and have their equipment recalled.

You can read about Sam Leffler's work with Atheros that allowed him to create a proprietary hardware abstraction layer and then an API to it. This let Atheros provide (indirectly) Linux, FreeBSD, etc., support without violating FCC rules. It gave them an arm's length distance, while licensing just to Sam the hardware details. The HAL has to stay a black box, Sam said at a BAWUG (Bay Area Wireless User's Group meeting) in April.

Sam's drivers are now part of the FreeBSD tree. So someone needs to be able to cultivate a relationship with Broadcom or convince Broadcom to write a HAL themselves.

The support group surpasses any linux on i ever tried to use, (FreeBSD forums) and they have helped me with any problem i have ever had.

FreeBSD is becoming both more powerful and easier to use as it ages, (I point to devfs) and kicks any linux distro for ease of use. the major features that to me seperate the men from the boys here are ...

• Sysinstall- useless as you get better, but beautifull for the newb and install
• Devfs- I dont know how i would live without it
• The ports and packages system. I know debian systems have somthing simmilar, but i havent yet had the chance to use it. To me make install is a lot simpler than both rpms, and dpkgs.
• just the stability and compatability. I run linux binarys regualary and all but a couple run even faset on my 166 fbsd machne than my friends 200 red hat.

JDK 1.4.1 patchset 3 on FreeBSD (daemonnews.org)

points to:

JDK 1.4.1 patchset 3 on FreeBSD (at freebsdforums.org)

the patches:

http://www.eyesbeyond.com/freebsddom/java/jdk14.ht ml

Note they are ALPHA! But this is good news for native jdk on freebsd.

whats grinding to a halt here?