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OpenBSD Project Needs Alpha's

Posted by Nik on from the mars-needs-women dept.

sekure writes "I was just on OpenBSD.org, and as I was reading the wanted hardware page I noticed that the OpenBSD project needed more Alpha gear, and if they don't get what they need, they won't ship OpenBSD/alpha on the 2.7 CD-ROM. I don't know what everyone else thinks, but I think it would be a shame. I know I'm going to talk to my boss about lending (or maybe even giving?) an Alpha to the OpenBSD project. Maybe people have old (or new) Alpha's kicking around they don't use anymore, or maybe there are some multi[million|billion]aires that wouldn't mind donating some fresh new Alpha's. What do you think?"

28 comments

  1. Re:OpenBSD foundation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The best thing would be if Compaq's Canadian division did that. A big gready company that might do some good for a change.

  2. Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Unfortunately, only 5 of us /. readers actually go to the BSD section so I don't know if there's much hope a /.'er will contribute one. One can always hope.

    If you actually saw this post attach a comment. It'd be interesting to see how many people read the BSD section.

    1. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Canadians can't stand penguins, they're worse than canada geese.

    2. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I use OpenBSD and Linux, and read Slashdot every day!

    3. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I read the BSD pages. I run linux, but I have tried FreeBSD and OpenBSD. Here is my experience with them and why I choose not to run them:

      FreeBSD didn't offer any compelling advantages over linux. Sound support is not available for my Soundblaster Live! card. In general, many of the people I have met (mostly in irc channels) have not been very helpful, this absence of support made me give up on FreeBSD.

      In addition to the problems I had with FreeBSD I found a few more with OpenBSD. Specifically I can only run it on my IDE drive since my SCSI card (Adaptec 2940U2W) is not supported.

      If I were to choose a server OS I would go with FreeBSD. It is stable and proven. If I need a firewall, I would go with OpenBSD. As a day to day machine I will stick with linux for development and windows for playing games and writing documents (corporations still use Word, not Star Office...).

    4. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i am here!

      Running:
      2 Linux boxes
      1 FreeBSD quad-processor i486 box
      1 OpenBSD router
      1 OpenBSD desktop

      'tis a pity /. hates *BSD =(

    5. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Originally a mac user. Read /. regularly, although I get most of my news fix from a far better combination of sites (dailynews.yahoo.com, politech list, daily.daemonnews.org, macintouch).

      The BSD section is something /. doesn't want to become big. It's a Linux site; they only put a BSD site in an opportunistic move as the BSD movement started getting a number of media stories. DaemonNews is a far better source.

      Run Net, Free, 4 OpenBSD machines, 2 68k Macs running MacOS, Redhat, Suse, and Be when I get bored. Hey, when you live in DC, used computer equipment is dirt cheap because of the government blowing away their surplus and the Reston/Herndon area tech companies have consultants getting rid of old equipment. Haven't seen any Alphas though.

    6. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Saw it - I'm Canadian too but I have no money and I'm sort of stupid about business etc ...

      Otherwise i'd help ;-)

      Posted with mozilla (linux nightly build)

    7. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      no

    8. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      When did SMP support appear on a i486? Heck, adding cache to the chip was bitterly faught over. More expensive, but doubled the performance. That's why most 486s have no L2 cache, but office servers did (256k generally).

    9. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm running OpenBSD in home, and FreeBSD 4.0 in my notebook, i'll switch to OpenBSD in my notebook as soon as he supports my pcmcia card.

    10. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      its an old 486 server. it has 4 486 on daughtercards in it. its a damned beast.

    11. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      BOOYAH!!!

    12. Re:Unfortunately by The+Finn · · Score: 1

      ``I run NetBSD as my OS of choice, and I still read /.''

      --
      NetBSD: the cathedral vs the bizzare.
    13. Re:Unfortunately by Daeron · · Score: 1

      FreeBSD-5.0-CURRENT here :-))

    14. Re:Unfortunately by RowanRedbeard · · Score: 1

      Present. I run a *BSD-only shop; several Open, one Free, and one Net. Unfortunately, I just allocated my one newer Alpha (a Miata) to running Net in a critical role. Otherwise I'd be jumping at the chance to donate it to the Open cause.

      Maybe I'll try to convince the powers to let me donate our HPPA box to the cause. Not the same, but it'd make me feel better.

    15. Re:Unfortunately by obobo · · Score: 1

      Yet another occasional BSDer.

    16. Re:Unfortunately by tomreagan · · Score: 1

      I'm here and I don't even run BSD!!

      Do use OpenSSH, though. Thanks, Theo.

      tkr

    17. Re:Unfortunately by lw54 · · Score: 1
      1 FreeBSD 3-STABLE
      1 FreeBSD 5-CURRENT/Windows 98 SE/Windows 2000
      1 Windows 2000
      1 PicoBSD

      I've never ran Linux though. :-)

    18. Re:Unfortunately by shrub34 · · Score: 1

      I tried OpenBSD but stopped when I discovered that it did not support my dual processor machine. I currently run FreeBSD, but would go back to OpenBSD once SMP support is added.

      =====

      --
      [url=http://thistleshrub.net]Thistle & Shrub Studios[/url] Central Illinois Painters
    19. Re:Unfortunately by Doppelgaenger · · Score: 1

      I read /. religiously and my OS of choice is FreeBSD... Frankly, I'm still trying to figure out why everyone thinks Linux is so great :)

      --
      -- If a god of love and life ever did exist, he's long since dead. Someone, something, rules in his place
    20. Re:Unfortunately by hubertf · · Score: 1

      Oink :-)

      NetBSD here, on i386, arm32, sparc.
      Anyone want to give me an alpha? :-)

      - Hubert

    21. Re:Unfortunately by jeroenb · · Score: 1

      It really amazes me how quiet this section is... Even when you multiply the amount of follow-ups to this message by a thousand, it's still not much... :(

    22. Re:Unfortunately by DrWiggy · · Score: 1

      In the days before I joined the .com (or rahther .co.uk) startup I work for now, I used to work a biggish ISP. We originally ran about 20 OpenBSD machines, and about half a dozen Linux boxes. Before I left there was a move to push them all over to FreeBSD.

      Where I am now, I have merely 2 FreeBSD dual-processor machines, but I'm going to be watching the new SMP branch of OpenBSD closely. I suppose I'll take whichever BSD has the best SMP support, and would ideally like to consider moving everything over to Alpha machines. I will always have a soft spot for OpenBSD as it was the OS that showed me Linux was pants, and proper Unix was far better. It would be a shame if there were not the resources for development for Alphas and even for SMP.

      In the UK this time of year is normally the best time to try and get charitable donations due to the end of the tax year, but unfortunately we're already fully allocated on that front. If there is some loose budget after allocation next month, I'll consider putting some money towards a few of the BSD projects. To be honest, any small company that put money behind any of them is going to get a raised profile and a bit of respect from the community, so it's probably a good idea, especially as it comes at 'half price' when you take the tax write-off into account...

      I can't find it now, but I seem to remember Theo having a page on OpenBSD.org that listed all the donations, along with amounts. The amounts have now been taken away, but IIRC Theo's contribtutions were a few orders of magnitude greater than everybody elses. Even when combined. :-)

      I know a few rich people who are geeks. Perhaps I shall make a few phone calls. ;-)

  3. I submit all documents in PDF by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0



    Screw word. Any Unix can create PDF's with ghostscript (I have a PDF virtual printer script I got off the net - it's great) --- I edit in whatever I want and then press print ... the print dialog pops up and I choose lpr -PPDF to print to a PDF file.

    I submit that format in all cases where editing is not required. When they ask for a word document I say "why do you want to edit my document"? Then I tell them to open it up in Acrobat select and cut and paste into Word.

    But uhh just as a side note you can save to Word97 from StarOffice.

  4. Shucks by unitron · · Score: 1

    I thought they meant they wanted alpha testers : (
    Really, I did. And I'd certainly be the perfect "clueless newbie" test bed : )

    --

    I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

  5. Re:OpenBSD foundation by lw54 · · Score: 1

    But Compaq is 0wn3d by Microsoft.

  6. OpenBSD foundation by Nonesuch · · Score: 1
    We (The ISP from Hell) have been discussing this off and on for a while, and Theo is not opposed...

    A non-profit, 501(c)3 educational foundation, dedicated to improving OpenBSD. This would allow for tax-deductible donations of money and hardware.

    One reason we have not taken this idea further- we are based in the USA, while OpenBSD is, for very good reasons, run from Canada.

    It would make much more sense to base the Foundation in Canada. Any volunteers?

    --

    I do not deploy Linux. Ever.