FreeBSD As A Workstation For UNIX Newbies

JT writes: "OSNews features an article introducing the FreeBSD operating system to newbies and Windows users. The article describes the installation, its GUI, application base and it has some more information about Unix and *BSD in general." Since Linux (at least the varieties with cute installation routines) is often presented as the *nix beginner's best choice, it's good to see articles like this one pointing out a broader range of choices.

Comments

Maybe, maybe not...

[ichimunki]

Unlike Red Hat, there is nothing on FreeBSD that takes away the true hacker-only nature of the system.

The partitioning, as the article points out is mostly manual, but only if you can't dedicate your drive... if you can dedicate you press one key and it does a default partition scheme, ditto mount points. This is not a problem for any but the types who can't RTFM long enough to find out what page of the FM they're on.

The package system vs. ports is slightly confusing, especially since so much stuff appears in both places, how do you know which to use when and why? I'm sure this confusion is cleared up by reading the Handbook in depth. Ditto the fact that the ports system isn't just a system for getting and compiling tarballs-- it's a whole packaging system unto itself, just a bit more CPU intensive than rpm.

Speaking of the handbook, here's my favorite line (from memory, may not be exact) "recompiling a kernel is a rite of passage for Unix users". There, they said it, plain and simple you *will* recompile the kernel... and they're right, the generic kernel has no support for sound, so off to the config files you go. Hello make and make install! FWIW, they're 100% right, compiling a custom kernel is just too important not to learn to do it on either BSD or Linux systems.

IMHO, FreeBSD is not a suitable system for a computing newbie, unless they have a patient, available hacker friend. It might be a good introduction to x86 Unix for someone who's used a Unix mainframe at school/work (where someone else was the sysadmin). And it might be a good introduction to Unix for an advanced Windows user. And for the hacker? Of course it's a great choice, especially that ports system. I've not seen a Linux distro with that level of commitment to the offsite code base.

But best of all, no one's running around saying it should be called GNU/BSD! And with good reason, if you're used to the GNU binutils and BASH, you're in for a bit of a surprise with FreeBSD.

FreeBSD myths.

[pschmied]

O.K. There always seems to be a number of out right false hoods perpetuated about FreeBSD. More often than not, they are not malicious. More often than not they are perpetuated by casual FreeBSD users. Let me set the record straight.

"The ports collection sure is great! I just wish that FreeBSD had some kind of package management that didn't require building from source."

It so happens that FreeBSD does have package management that won't ever invoke gcc.

Try the package management tools (man pkg_create(1), pkg_delete(1), pkg_info(1), pkg_update(1), pkg_version(1) for more specific info).

In fact, FreeBSD is so bad-ass that you can type something like "pkg_add -r mozilla" and the system will download and install the latest mozilla. Carefull though, some packages require that you specify the whole version (i.e. pkg_add -r lyx-1.1.6.3). This will get all the dependancies you need in most cases.

The only real reasons to build from the ports are:

1. You need specific compile time options. (Install a custom Apache on RedHat then with FreeBSD's ports and come back and tell me which is easier)
2. You have a multi architecture workplace and you want to use a central distfile repository. (Please note that this is rare.)

"FreeBSD is less user friendly than Linux"

This is highly subjective. I taught a class this summer to a group of people at my University who had never installed Windows, much less anything else. By the end of the first week, they were able to install FreeBSD, compile a kernel, and successfully manage packages. By the end of the second week, they all had their desktops going with the productivity apps they wanted. By the middle of the third week, I couldn't hold their attention because they were having too much fun playing with the OS.

FreeBSD belongs to the "it just works" school of computing. I don't know how to describe it. I've never had to worry about whether or not FreeBSD would correctly auto detect my USB optical mouse during the install (I've had a number of Linux distros both succeed and fail). FreeBSD Just Works(tm). No dicking around. "Does your system have a USB mouse attached to it?" "Yes?" "OK, we'll make sure and load usbd." If I've had "device pcm" in my kernel config file at build time, my sound has always worked.

As a workstation, FreeBSD performs very well. I don't have benchmarks for you, but I've never had a FreeBSD machine that has felt slower than any Linux distribution on the same hardware. Incidentally, FreeBSD starts notably quicker than any Linux distro newer than Slack 2.0.

I feel really good about the state of FreeBSD. They have made things easy by design, not by GUI abstraction. If you judge ease as being a point and click installer, then Linux will win every time. If you judge ease as simplicity and consistancy, FreeBSD is a clear victor.

-Peter

Just my $0.02

Re: .. I've ran since 4.3 as a production workstat

[maquaro]

I won't deny that not have a FreeBSD user around to help answer questions can be very agrivating. I happened to be enlightened by a co-worker to the finner unix points of FreeBSD. I moved from RH6.2 -2.2.19 to FreeBSD 4.3-Release. I have since removed Windows completely from my computer except for a VMWare window of 98. (Windows was meant to run in a Window(TM)). Besides, with the improved jail capabilities of FreeBSD we have all but moved our entire unix OS's to 1(one) box. It actually runs about 7 virtual OS's, namely dns, imap, dynamic-www, smtp, database, information processing. The ideas that sold me on FreeBSD over Linux were, ports/packages, 1 distribution, stablility.

Starting with 1 distribution, the OS has benefits out of the box. All kernel code is under peer-review. One person can't just say I want this to be this way. Any major additions are under peer scrutiny. Also the members of the core development team only got there because they have been and were submitters to FreeBSD for a long time. With have 1 distribution all the channels of the distribution talk to on another. You don't see Suse talking with RedHat. I didn't think so.

The stability issue is tied into the 1 distribution also. I feel sorry for Linus. He make a great kernel, but he can't do squat to make the surrounding distribution work if it breaks. The distro is only as good the surrounding subsystems. In my opinion FreeBSD leaves newer features in the CURRENT tree structure a little longer than Linux. Thus when a release version is created the release versions tend to have less problems.

Finally the ports and packages. It took me a few months to fully understand ports versus packages. I actually install the bash-2.05 package on any new installation so I can use the shell from the start. The packages can be accessed from /stand/sysinstall. Once the OS is installed just browse for the package of your choice. The package is a snapshot of the current packages at the time of release. You can even change the settings in sysinstall to fetch older packages, if you want. The ports are great because you can search through a selection of software that you can be sure will work in freebsd. FreeBSD works on it's Linux compatibility, not getting people to code on FreeBSD unless they develop exclusively on FreeBSD. If you can run it on Linux, changes are it will be available on FreeBSD in a little time. BTW, the ports directory/tree is created every day at 9AM EST. New changes everyday.

"You must unlearned what you have learned!" - Yoda