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FreeBSD Goes Home
ChrisKnight writes: "According to this article FreeBSD is returning to Walnut Creek. Cool. They never screwed up my subscription, unlike Wind River." The article briefly traces the complicated ownership history of the FreeBSD name, too.
OK, breathe deeply. Let it out. aaaaaahhhhhhhhh. The sound of many happy users. I'm very glad FreeBSD is returning to Walnut Creek. That's where it simply belongs.
--- Think of it as evolution in action ---
Yet another crippling bombshell hit the beleaguered *BSD community when recently IDC confirmed that *BSD accounts for less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of the latest Netcraft survey which plainly states that *BSD has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. *BSD is collapsing in complete disarray, as further exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.
You don't need to be a Kreskin to predict *BSD's future. The hand writing is on the wall: *BSD faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for *BSD because *BSD is dying. Things are looking very bad for *BSD. As many of us are already aware, *BSD continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood. FreeBSD is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core developers.
Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.
OpenBSD leader Theo states that there are 7000 users of OpenBSD. How many users of NetBSD are there? Let's see. The number of OpenBSD versus NetBSD posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 NetBSD users. BSD/OS posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of NetBSD posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of BSD/OS. A recent article put FreeBSD at about 80 percent of the *BSD market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 FreeBSD users. This is consistent with the number of FreeBSD Usenet posts.
Due to the troubles of Walnut Creek, abysmal sales and so on, FreeBSD went out of business and was taken over by BSDI who sell another troubled OS. Now BSDI is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.
All major surveys show that *BSD has steadily declined in market share. *BSD is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If *BSD is to survive at all it will be among OS hobbyist dabblers. *BSD continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, *BSD is dead.
Fact: *BSD is dead
there's another interesting timeline of all the BSDs here. What a long strange trip it's been!
They were a very thoughtful company when it regards to providing information on their regular commercial OSes (they've also bought pSOS along the way) but I never saw this attention paid to FreeBSD.
I think they were being a bit overenthusiastic and optimistic in buying the FreeBSD business when all they knew they wanted was BSD/OS.
Glad to see at least the FreeBSD foundation is back in familiar, caring hands.
Gladly this doesn't affect the release of 4.5-- I've been using it since 4.1 and it keeps getting better and better. The fact that 5.0 was delayed, forcing more work on 4.x branches, means that FreeBSD 4.x could be the most refined Free *nix ever.
I love the name Walnut Creek. It sounds so pornographic, yet beautiful. Take a great OS, like FreeBSD, put it together with the brilliance of Walnut Creek, and you've got paradise.
... And now for something completely different.
The Cure - Pictures Of You
i've been looking so long at these pictures of
you that i almost believe that they're real i've
been living so long with my pictures of you that
i almost believe that the pictures are all i can feel
remembering you standing quiet in the rain as
i ran to your heart to be near and we kissed as
the sky fell in holding you close how i always
held close in your fear remembering you
running soft through the night you were bigger
and brighter and whiter than the snow and
screamed at the make-believe screamed at the
sky and you finally found all your courage to
let it all go
remembering you fallen into my arms crying
for the death of your heart you were stone
white so delicate lost in the cold you were
always so lost in the dark remembering you
how you used to be slow drowned you were
angels so much more than everything oh hold
for the last time then slip away quietly open
my eyes but i never see anything
if only i had thought of the right words i could
have hold on to your heart if only i'd thought of
the right words i wouldn't be breaking apart all
my pictures of you
Looking So long at these pictures of you but i
never hold on to your heart looking so long for
the words to be true but always just breaking
apart my pictures of you
there was nothing in the world that i ever
wanted more than to feel you deep in my heart
there was nothing in the world that i ever
wanted more than to never feel the breaking
apart all my pictures of you
It is now official - C/Net has confirmed: *BSD is alive and thriving
Yet another crippling bombshell hit the beleaguered AC crowd when C/Net reported that FreeBSD is going home. Wind River and FreeBSD Mall Inc. published a joint press-release today announcing the sale of Wind River's FreeBSD assets to Bob Bruce, founder of Walnut Creek CDROM--the company that in 1993 first published FreeBSD. This was the company that almost a decade ago declared to the world that *BSD is alive and thriving!
The FreeBSD Mall web site has been redesigned, with many new products, including FreeBSD CDs, books, polo shirts, microfiber jackets, boxer shorts, bumper stickers, lapel pins, several different styles of t-shirts, mouse pads, travel mugs, buttons, sticker sheets, plate logos, denim shirts, CD cases, and paid support options.
FreeBSD and its close relatives NetBSD and OpenBSD all are open-source projects, meaning that anyone can see, change and distribute the underlying source code.
With the main FreeBSD distribution back in the hands of the record holding Free Software distributor Bob Bruce, trolls posting that *BSD is dead had better keep the "anonymous" in "anonymous coward."
Fact: *BSD is alive and thriving!
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
your treetops so tall
FreeBSD, FreeBSD, FreeBSD
FreeBSD has it all
now maybe the FreeBSDMall will send me the Right T-Shirt in the Right Size!!
the one I had shipped over for christmas is like a night shirt Oliver Hardy might've worn!!
I know I don't get out my seat much, but I think my 50" waist is a farther away than 5.0-STABLE
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
I screwed up my moderation, so I'm posting to undo it ...
How many FreeBSD developers are part of this hot potato? It doesn't appear to have affected product quality, but too frequent corporate changes do have a negative effect on resources. Funny how some projects can be more stable in part because no two people work on it full-time for the same company.