Updated FreeBSD Release Schedule

Serin K Medusa writes: "The folks over at FreeBSD.org have put up a new 'roadmap' detailing the plan of action for the remainder of the year. In particular, check out the plans for a 5.0 preview and expected dates for 4.6. Interesting reading if you're following -CURRENT."

Comments

i like freeebsd

[Anonymous Coward]

free bsd is very coola but di thibnk that freebsd shodul be updated more often ok? it isnt updaterd very often loike it shoudl be instead it i allow for that? i dot think so but who nows. --frank s kind of liek debina potatoe instead sine edbian potrsa isnt updaedt verry often. is it possbile ot make afork of freebasd and then updade it more of tene/; i tink it would be a good thing. but does them bsd licencec

Re:i like freeebsd

[Anonymous Coward]

Why screw up the rock solid stability and great security just to put out a few more issues a year. If you want bleeding edge, pull your binaries off the daily builds and you can have updated to your heart's content.

Re:i like freeebsd

[Anonymous Coward]

ahahahaha YHBT.

Re:i like freeebsd

[Anonymous Coward]

The question that we all should be asking is ``why did *BSD fail?'' It is patentlyobvious that *BSD is what can honestly be described as a failure. Think about that for a minute. Wrap that thought around your brain.

So why now? Why did *BSD fail? Once you get past the fact that *BSD is fragmented between a myriad of incompatible kernels, there isthe historical record of failure and of failed operating systems. *BSD experienced moderate success about 15 years ago in academic circles. Since then it has been in steady decline. We all know *BSD keeps losing market share but why? Is it the problematic personalities of many of the key players? Or is it larger than their troubled personalities?

Th record is clear on one thing: no operating system has ever come back from the grave. Efforts to resuscitate *BSD are one step away from spiritualists wishing to communicate with the dead. As the situation grows more desperate for the adherents of this doomed OS, the sorrow takes hold. An unremitting gloom hangs like a death shroud over a once hopeful *BSD community. The hope is gone; a mournful nostalgia has settled in. Now is the end time for *BSD.

^H^H^H^H BS^HD is ^HDEA^HD

[Anonymous Coward]

It was dying, then it died in january 2002! Its gravestone is sponsored by microsoft windows 2000!

So why are you trying to bring back the dead morons?

Re:^H^H^H^H BS^HD is ^HDEA^HD

[andrewski]

Actually, Jan. '02 is when I installed 4.5 and it works better than ever!

Re:^H^H^H^H BS^HD is ^HDEA^HD

[Anonymous Coward]

you are a fucking shit for brains asshole who knows absolutely nothing about computers

Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

It's been a hectic year and a lot of confusion in the FreeBSD arena with the loss of Jordan and the selling off of Walnut Creek. Thanks to the team for staying focused. It is appreciated. For non-users, try FreeBSD if you have concerns about your favorite Linux distro being around. FreeBSD is for UNIX lovers. Linux is for those who hate microsoft. Join the Daemon Revolution.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

Now, he's right. Linux is only used by people who hate Microsoft. FreeBSD is for users who love UNIX.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux users don't use Linux because they hate Microsoft; they use it because they like Linux.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you mean, "the loss of Jordan"?

I thought he was still involved with the project, that he was still contributing to FreeBSD even if he is employed by Apple?

Did he say so explicitely, that he no longer works on FreeBSD? I don't remember seeing that.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

And thats what 14 year old kids with no experience say.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

FreeBSD is for retards.
go away BSD troll.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[CableModemSniper]

Yay, this means I'm using the right setup (linux). I dont really love UNIX, but I hate microsoft. Thanks for restoring my faith in myself.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

How extremely clever. Shouldn't you be out enjoying the evening? Your mom will probably make you get back to your homework tomorrow, you do have high school on Monday, after all.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[PyroMosh]

I use Linux AND Microsoft. I use both willingly. Each has it's strengths over the other. I tried BSD, but it's not fully compatible with some things I needed (long story). What does that say about me?

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

• That you feel that strange urge for colored textmode messages while booting?
• That you really need graphical installers?
• That you prefer binary rpms instead of building from source, while being proud to run an open source system?
• That you should try harder to understand the way of the BSD warrior?

Come on, man pages aren't that hard to read..

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought he was still involved with the project, that he was still contributing to FreeBSD even if he is employed by Apple?

Did he say so explicitely, that he no longer works on FreeBSD? I don't remember seeing that.

Jordan did some good bridging work, bringing good FreeBSD stuff to Apple and good Apple stuff to FreeBSD (like the NFS testing).

Beneficial technology transfer is one of the key issues of the BSD projects. Watch it work here.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[frost22]

Netcraft has confirmed: *BSD is dying

Yadda Yadda. Folks, the whole fucking thread consists endless repetitons of 3 variants of this same lame old troll. So...
- who let these idiot ACs out of the asylum ?
- what happendend to the lameness filter ?
- and why and since when can fucking AC Trolls post at +1 ???

Inquiring minds want to know...

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[essdodson]

I don't understand why you say that JKH was lost. He is still active with FreeBSD and will be for a while to come as far as I've read.

BSD rocks, enough said.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

From my experience, Windows is for those who don't know any better, FreeBSD is for those who want to be 'alternative' etc, and Linux is for those who actually want to get some work done. I know many FreeBSD zealots but they're all jobless and all they do is hack on their OS, where Linux users hack on their OS only when there's some feature they actually need.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

Every Linux distro I've tried to install was half-baked. I once tried compiling a program on Linux, supposedly a Linux-only port, but I found that, due in part to the fact that linux people keep changing the locations of libraries every five seconds, the program compiled easier on FreeBSD. Unlike the linux attempt, it ran with full functionality. Linux is dying. Sooner or later, all the kiddies developing for it will grow up.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, FreeBSD has failed. Iam very sorry there is no way to state that self evident truth more delicately.
Truth is sometimes a harsh master. *BSD is a failure.

So why now? Why did *BSD fail? Once you get past the fact that *BSD is fragmented between a myriad of incompatible kernels, there is the historical record of failure and of the faild operating systems. *BSD experienced moderate success about 15 years ago in academic circles. Since then it has been in steady decline. We all know *BSD keeps losing market share but why? Is it the problematic personalities of many of the key players? Or is it larger than their troubled personalities?

The record is clear on one thing: no operating system has ever come back from the grave. Efforts to resuscitate *SD are one step away from spiritualists wishing to communicate with the dead. As the situation grows more desperate for the adherents of this doomed OS, the sorrow takes hold. An unremitting gloom hangs like a death shroundover a once hopeful *BSD community. The hope is gone; a mournful nostalgia has settled in. Now is the end time for *BSD.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

let me make this real simple: *BSD is dying

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, although you might not be comfortable with the thought, most people agree that FreeBsd is dying. That is an honest assessment. You really can't argue with the truth, no matter how much the truth might hurt. Truth exists independent of your personal feelings. So suck it up, put your chin up and move on. The death of Freebsd is not the end of the world. It certainly doesn't have to be the end of your world.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Strog]

True that some do but most of the ones I have met take a jab at Redmond every time there is a chance.

Re:Thanks FreeBSD team

[Lazaru5]

Loss of Jordan? He hasn't gone anywhere, he just works for Apple now instead of WR/BSDi/WC. FreeBSD isn't a company and doesn't employ anyone. He's still -core and still the lead P.R. person.

Well planned release

[lamj]

It seems to me that FreeBSD is more well planned than Linux in terms of project management(This is not Linux bashing). When a development project gets bigger, it takes a lot more planning as a group effort than one man's decision, there maybe something for Linux development team to learn. I agree that it is hard to find the balance because most of us like Linux for some advanced new feature but there's got to be better planning and announcement system to let user know what to expect.
I would really appreciate if Linux kernel set stable checkpoint to indicate "This is a stable kernel" instead of 2.4 series trial and error approach.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because FreeBSD is a professional project. Linux is a hobbyist's toy, and will never be considered serious for business.

Re:Well planned release

[Tairan]

That's because Freebsd is a well designed, userfriendly structured operating system, built by professional coders. Linux is a piece of trash operating system thrown together using shitty spare parts built by code junkies who failed their comp sci classes. Not to mention bug ridden shoddy VM and tcp/ip stacks. All aside, FreeBSD makes a better system, but Linux markets better. Oh well, it won't be the first time a better OS has lost (think VMS)

Woops, I tink I just lost a karma point.

Re:Well planned release

[ksb]

Oh well, it won't be the first time a better OS has lost (think VMS)

I think this article should really show that it's certainly not time to write off Freebsd...

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, Linux is a kernel and FreeBSD is a whole OS. You should compare it to one of the distros.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

I switched from FreeBSD back to RedHat, because of things like iptables, transparent proxying, etc. I'm sure some of these things can be done in FreeBSD too, but some packages are still "broke" because of the way that FreeBSD is. (For example, the SMBD package doesn't work as a domain controller because you can't have a dollar sign in a user name in freebsd. There is no smbclient or smbmount, so you can't even think of doing that.) It's a pretty good and fast operating system, but I've switched back to the more popular one for more features and support.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that distributions don't develop anything, they just package the kernel and userland, none of which they created themselves. FreeBSD develops and packages all of these things. I'd say that puts them well above any Linux distro in terms of comparisons for completeness.

Re:Well planned release

[HMC CS Major]

you are dumb. First, IPFW and IPFilter make linux's Iptables look as sad as they are.

Secondly, packages typically arent "broken", they're disabled because of security holes (you still want to install them???).

Furthermore, you obviously know nothing about samba on freebsd:



[2:55pm] me (~) # uname -a
FreeBSD myhostname.edu 4.5-RELEASE-p1 FreeBSD 4.5-RELEASE-p1 #0: Fri Mar 1 15:09:01 GMT 2002 jeff@myhostname.edu:/usr/src/sys/compile/MACHINENA ME_4_5 i386
[2:55pm] me (~) # which smbclient
/usr/local/bin/smbclient

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah. Linux sure does market better. What, with all those billion dollar linux companies.
Unless by "Linux markets better" you mean their users don't believe that their penis length is tied somehow to their operating system.
Also, we'll ignore such factors as SMP and application support in the judgement of the relative quality of an operating system because all people care about is initscripts and C libraries.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

So... you're saying BSD isn't dying?

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

How about a good scheduler? Or a working VM subsystem? Some of us need systems that don't crash under heavy load, and Linux has proven its inability to keep up in the business world. It's sad, but true.

Re:Well planned release

[glwtta]

Isn't that the point of the whole thing? If you want what you described, you use BSD, and if you want the features of Linux, you use GNU/Linux.

This isn't meant in any disparaging manner, but usually when people say things like "I like what we have for the most part, but if only this part of it was like what they have over there" it means that there's a tradeoff that creates both the greater whole that they like and also that one particular difference. Usually.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

My FreeBSD machine is a Samba PDC... yes, with usernames with $ signs in them.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

will never be considered serious

Always avoid using absolutes.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

can the freebsd kernel even handle gcc3? Linux can!

Re:Well planned release

[mrmag00]

umm... I (used) to run a samba PDC on freebsd, never have ran into a broken package (security problem? thats an issue with the maintainer and is intentionally 'broken'), and have smbclient and can mount smb shares fine (the program isn't called smbmount, but it converts SMB to NFS and is mounted as an NFS share. Can find easily if you look in the ports.)

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

You've obviously never had a run in with the Amiga Persecution Complex (TM).

As annoying and stupid as the rabid FreeBSDers are, they can't even come close to the Amigans.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Not quite. Look at all the installers (Caldera's LIZARD, now used by Redmo^H^H^H^H^HLycoris, comes to mind), some of the startup code (again, the nice graphical startup used by Caldera comes to mind -- yes, I was that impressed with Caldera OpenLinux 2.2 when it came out), the kernel/KDE/etc. developpers they keep on staff, and so forth.

I think the distros do more than just slap a few disparate but complementary components togheter (sp?) . I think more credit is due to them, they have contributed more to the advancement of Linux than many would like to admit -- especially the commercial distros (sorry Debian).

Your assessment could have been valid a few years ago, but no longer.

Re:Well planned release

[someonehasmyname]

Uhh.. yeah. what you said. Hotmail's mail servers run FreeBSD, Yahoo! uses FreeBSD on over 4000 servers... Hell, apache.org is even running on FreeBSD. Even the Apache people are smart enough to run THEIR own webserver on a "real unix"

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you for yet again proving that the old saying:

"Linux is for people who hate MS, BSD is for people who love UNIX"

should really be amended to:

"Linux is for people who hate MS, BSD is for people who hate Linux"

I suppose we'll have to update it again once BSD gets popular enough that all the "counterculture" whiners who moved from Linux to BSD in 97-98 move on to something even more fringe.

Re:Well planned release

[someonehasmyname]

Because FreeBSD uses a different liscence than the GPL. They use the BSD liscsnce. It's basically the same, but more flexible for developers. You can use their work, compile it, and distribute it without source and make money off it. Hence OSX.

Re:Well planned release

[Teferi]

useradd doesn't let you create usernames with $s, but you can run vipw and add it afterwards.
It does making running a PDC annoying - can't create machine trust accounts on the fly with stock useradd, but you could just hack the tool up to remove the limitation.

Re:Well planned release

[swb]

There is no smbclient or smbmount, so you can't even think of doing that.

$ uname -sr
FreeBSD 4.5-STABLE
$ man mount_smbfs

MOUNT_SMBFS(8) FreeBSD System Manager's Manual MOUNT_SMBFS(8)

NAME
mount_smbfs - mounts a shared resource from an SMB file server

It was added to the system in the past year.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Ahhh... I see. Make a bullshit statement about how you think BSD is "better planned", and you get +5 in a BSD story. What a load of shit.

I take it that BSD planned for shitty SMP support, no journalled filing system (meaning it's next to useless for real enterprise apps) and poor performance?

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that a feature of Linux kernel that it needs significant porting effort for each GCC version? FreeBSD has several new platform ports in progress at the moment, and all of them are being done using GCC 3.1 development snapshots. So, FreeBSD kernel can "handle" gcc3 just finem thank you.

Re:Well planned release

[Metrol]

I switched from FreeBSD back to RedHat

Funny, I switched from RedHat to FreeBSD due to a seemingly endless line of RPM dependancy issues, config files that seem to defy all logic, and a directory structure that feels like your totally lost in a video game maze.

but some packages are still "broke" because of the way that FreeBSD is.

276 packages installed here on my primary workstation. Full implementation of Samba, KDE, Gnome, Apache, MySQL, and lots and lots of other stuff. Each and every package in there is working as expected. Oh, and when one of those packages comes out with a new version...

portupgrade samba

...and it just handles ALL the rest. No subscription fees to RedHat to get access to a non-sucky FTP server.

(For example, the SMBD package doesn't work as a domain controller because you can't have a dollar sign in a user name in freebsd.

Umm, why would you want a dollar sign in the user name?? When doing NT style networking you place the dollar sign in the share name, which works just peachy.

There is no smbclient or smbmount, so you can't even think of doing that.)

SMB support is right in the kernel! Yes, smbmount exists natively in FreeBSD. smbclient isn't native, as it's a part of the Samba package. As it should be I might add.

It's a pretty good and fast operating system, but I've switched back to the more popular one for more features and support.

Probably for the best. Either you haven't used FreeBSD in the last 2-3 years, or you didn't properly research the subjects you were having troubles with.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

how bout support for more than 1 CPU and reasonable scalability? or a journalling fs ?
some of us need systems for real work. for everything else use freebsd.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

but not on the only platform that matters: i386

dumbass!

Re:Well planned release

[jazman_777]

Funny, I switched from RedHat to FreeBSD due to a seemingly endless line of RPM dependancy issues, config files that seem to defy all logic, and a directory structure that feels like your totally lost in a video game maze.

I switched to OpenBSD because I needed a codebase that had been audited for security, and a proven track record of security. And I got tired of RPM-hell, too.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice troll. Scalability? You're kidding, right? You can't scale if you crash. My favorite part about your post is the journaling FS. A filesystem that is designed CORRECTLY doesn't NEED a journaling filesystem to patch a design flaw.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

After all, an installer that you run once every year or two really is contributing to the development of an OS. Not.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

"A filesystem that is designed CORRECTLY doesn't NEED a journaling filesystem to patch a design flaw. "

Nice one, clown. You just gave yourself away as a know-nothing who's riding the "BSD is kewl, linux is fro fag0ts" bandwagon that seems to be so popular here on slashdot within the last year or so.

Linux has never crashed on me except for the case of a bad video driver, which can toast any OS. I'm not flaming BSD either, but it DOES have some catching up to do in terms of filesystem and SMP. Both OSs are damn good and each has it's strengths. Now stop being such a fan-boy

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Excellent try. A non-working VM subsystem that sends the machine into a spiral and crashes it doesn't count as working my book. As long as there is a file called oom_killer.c in the Linux kernel source, I won't be using it. Seriously, do some filesystem research. Journaling is a kludgy patch for a filesystem that is broken by design rather than going back to the source and designing it correctly. McKusick has a few good papers on it.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

You do realize that a journaling filesystem is a kludge for a filesystem that wasn't designed correctly in the first place, right? Go do some reading, m'kay?

Re:Well planned release

[rhizome]

what other platforms does FreeBSD run on?

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, but I mentionned more than just the installer.

And think about it, you do need to get the OS onto your machine at some point, it does not materialize (sp?) on your HD by magic because you want to run Linux. If the installer is hell (Debian's is a good example), no one will install the OS to start with.

But if even Aunt Tillie (sp?) can run an installer to, well, install a Linux distro on her box so that she can use it instead of Windows, it does contribute to the development of the OS. No users, no advancement.

Because users can, eventually, end up contributing to the OS -- bug reports, code, usability feedback, etc.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not flaming BSD either, but it DOES have some catching up to do in terms of filesystem and SMP.

No, the FreeBSD filesystem is using an entirely different approach (softupdates, which is not only about speed ups but also about keeping disk integrity).

Yes, journaling sounds familiar (transaction logs of relational databases etc), but that doesn't mean that is the only solution and that it is best one.

SMP was lacking behind. But there is hard work going on at the moment to remove the giant kernel lock, which will bring improved SMP around 5.0 release.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Alpha and SPARC64

Re:Well planned release

[jaxon6]

Umm, why would you want a dollar sign in the user name?? When doing NT style networking you place the dollar sign in the share name, which works just peachy

Well, you want a $ sign in the username, because the machine name MACHINENAME has to be in the system passwd file as $MACHINENAME, if you want to have a samba server join machines to it's domain. It might be MACHINENAME$, I'd have to double-check.

Re:Well planned release

[andrewski]

Actually, every journaling FS on Linux that I have ever used (JFS, ReiserFS, EXT3) has puked on me in some way. FFS+S on BSD has kept my FS in great shape after numerous power outages and other failures (all my fault).

Obviously if Linux has never crashed on you, you have missed out on the 2.4 series.

There is one thing that Linux has going for it that BSD does not, and that is the experimental factor. People extend Linux in crazy ways that BSD just doesn't go. That is a direct reflection of design philosopy of each system.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet the next big thing after BSD is HURD!

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh wait... yeah sure, and soft updates are an example of a well designed file system, m'kay?

Re:Well planned release

[someonehasmyname]

... and your samag article is incorrect. they made a revision which proves FreeBSD is just as fast as linux. At the time of their article, a default FreeBSD install was "untuned" for rock-solid stablilty, and now most of the required tweaks are installation defaults.

Re:Well planned release

[someonehasmyname]

yeah, just look at what all their "auditing" has done for OpenSSH..! How many times have I patched OpenSSH recently..? 3..? Don't buy into their "auditing," as it's a ploy to be more "secure" than FreeBSD.

Re:Well planned release

[someonehasmyname]

rotfl

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Tuned and tweaked BSD gives the same performance as an untuned Linux box. Whoopeee!

So let's tune the Linux box and watch it cream the BSD one again.

Re:Well planned release

[essdodson]

NetBSD is BSD on the edge, if its got a microprocessor NetBSD runs on it.

Re:Well planned release

[TheBracket]

You might find this problem report helpful, then... it is nice and easy to make adduser become samba-friendly, although I do wish that this would make it into the default release.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh well, it won't be the first time a better OS has lost (think VMS)

Yeah, it was killed by the technically inferior OS called BSD UNIX. Scary thing is that this entire thread is about fixing problems with that codebase 15 years after the fact.

Re:Well planned release

[SurfsUp]

Funny, I switched from RedHat to FreeBSD due to a seemingly endless line of RPM dependancy issues, config files that seem to defy all logic, and a directory structure that feels like your totally lost in a video game maze.

It sounds like you really needed to try Debian.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Getting people to use the OS = contributing to its development. Idiot.

Re:Well planned release

[monksp]

yeah, just look at what all their "auditing" has done for OpenSSH..! How many times have I patched OpenSSH recently..? 3..? Don't buy into their "auditing," as it's a ploy to be more "secure" than FreeBSD.

I'm confused. Isn't that the point of the auditing? ``Here, we found this problem. Here's a patch to fix.'', ``Here, this code was sloppy, here's a patch to clean it up so it doesn't create a problem in the future'', etc?

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice reply! Well said!
I use both FreeBSD/OpenBSD, each have their strengths and weaknesses over each other - each have their own goals in mind. They're both awesome!
I couldn't agree more about your first sentence, about being in a video game maze. That's one reasons I fell in love with *BSD. It just made sense!
Another thing I don't like about Linux is that they have 'EXPERIMENTAL' drivers in the production level kernels. I mean like, WTF!!!?!?!?? I can understand 2.3.x or 2.5.x but non developer kernels, damn! I'm glad I don't use Linux in production.
RedHat.com ftp server, I've never seen anything so slow!
Oh, not to mention, Linux didn't and still doesn't support some of my newer hardware, so still with FreeBSD/OpenBSD and I won't change! I like standardization, such as the *BSD's and not fragmentation among linuz distro's.

Just my $0.02

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

I think we can all agree to sum it up with three little words: *BSD is dying.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no need for fancy manuals or configuration files. Nada.

Simply commit this phrase to memory: *BSD is dying.

End of story.

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

News flash, I repeat, news flash: *BSD is dying

Re:Well planned release

[Metrol]

It sounds like you really needed to try Debian.

I've actually gotten together a spare box to play with a bit. Slapped Suse on there to goof around with. It sure are perty and all, but I found myself kinda confused about how to install apps that weren't a part of the CD's. Disclaimer: not a dig on Suse, just that I'm very new to it.

When I get done futzing around with Suse I'll probably slap Debian on there for a bit. Been hearing a lot of comparisons to FreeBSD concerning that distro, so I know I'm long overdue in checking it out. Heck, just got finished reading an interesting article about Debian in Linux Journal.

My only real concern about Debian is that it seems to have a fairly small set of apps that are all prepped for apt-get versus FreeBSD's portupgrade. There's a LOT of FreeBSD ports, of darn near all the latest stuff that I'm interested in. Maybe I'm in for a pleasent surprise.

Re:Well planned release

[Arandir]

Thank you for giving credit to the distros. That's the primary reason why Linux is not GNU/Linux: GNU didn't make the operating system, the distributions did. They were the ones that took a kernel, the gnu userland components sitting around waiting for an system, several BSD daemons and utilities, a bunch of stuff from a multitude of projects, including file systems, and their own necessary infrastructure, and FINALLY integrated them all into a complete operating system.

Re:Well planned release

[mvdwege]

Don't worry about app availability on Debian. The apps on stable are a bit out of date, but otherwise the main Debian archive is about as big as the FreeBSD ports, and if you run unstable about as up to date.

When you do run unstable you may run into some weird problems from time to time though. It's not too bad, but the occasional dependency conflict arises. That's why it is unstable after all.

Mart

Re:Well planned release

[Anonymous Coward]

You obviously do not follow Usenix conferences much. Otherwise you would have noticed that BSDs are still darling of acadeic society. Just look at the number of academicv papers related to BSD in some ways.

Re:Well planned release

[Guy Harris]

the program isn't called smbmount

Right, it's called mount_smbfs, as another message indicated.

but it converts SMB to NFS and is mounted as an NFS share

No, mount_smbfs mounts using the FreeBSD SMB-client VFS - no NFS involved.

Re:Well planned release

[mrmag00]

maybe im just an oldtimer. i figured it had native smb support by now. the package name is sharity light ( http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/url.cgi?ports/net/shari ty-light/pkg-descr ), and it converts the SMB protocol to NFS. not needed anymore i guess, but thats what i was referring to.

oh well pointless...

Re:Well planned release

[andrewski]

Excuse me? Where did I ever state that FreeBSD is or is not ANYBODY's darling?

If you are attempting to say that FreeBSD is indeed bleeding edge, you obviously haven't done much research on the subject. FreeBSD aims to be stable, and integrate proven technology.

I'm not impressed with your weak attempt at flaming me. Apparently you aren't very impressed with your own statement either, as you have chosen to post as an AC.

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you have to a commercial interprise to go bankrupt. FreeBSD is a team of volunteers who have kept on plugging away in spite of the main sponsor, Walnut Creek, being sold. The commercial business WC CDROM went away but not FreeBSD, And it won't. Berkely unix at it's best. And of course, OpenBSD and NetBSD have similar business models and all will still be around when all the current Linux distros have dried up and blown away.

Note the date for Developer Preview 1

[Soft]

Action:FreeBSD 5.0 Developer Preview 1
Expected:1 Apr 2002
Description:A full release for the i386, Alpha, and sparc64 architectures.

Prerelease planned for April 1st? Hmmm...

Re:Note the date for Developer Preview 1

[Anonymous Coward]

Not a joke. -CURRENT just exited code slush for the creation of a -DP1 branch in perforce for this preview release.

Re:Note the date for Developer Preview 1

[andrewski]

I have this feeling I've been here before...

Re:Note the date for Developer Preview 1

[Anonymous Coward]

Itis anyone's guss whether this vaporware will see the light of day. Overall, *BSD has had a dismal track record. To speak plainly, *BSD is a failure. Why don't we ponder that for a minute.

So why now? Why did *BSD fail? Onc you get past the fact that *BSD is fragmented between a myriad of incompatible kernels, there is the historical record of failure and of failed operating systems. *BSD experienced moderate success about 15 years ago in academic circles. Since then it has been in steady decline. We all know *BSD keeps losing market share but why? Is it the problmatic personalities of many of the key players? Or is it larger than their troubled personalities?

The recordis clear on one thing: no operating system has ever come back from the grave. Efforts to resuscitate *SD are one step away from spiritualists wishing to communicate with the dead. As the situation grows more desperate for the adherents of this doomed OS, the sorrow takes hold. An unremitting gloom hangs like a death shroud over a once hopeful *BSD community. The hope is gone; a mournful nostalgia has settled in. Now is theend time for *BSD.

5.0 is a pretty big change.

[jon_c]

in case anyone cares the goals for 5.0 are:

SMPng - fully threaded, preemptable and re-entrant kernel with interrupt handlers running as threads. More than one CPU can run in the kernel simultaneously.

devfs - fully dynamic device creation and tear-down (for things like PCCARD and USB).

Geom - stackable disk model (http://www.freebsd.org/~phk/Geom)

Newcard - New PCCARD/CARDBUS subsystem with much better support for newer hardware (like CARDBUS) and integration with FreeBSD's newbus driver API.

gcc 3.0 - Upgrade to latest compiler technology

source

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Chexum]

Now, that's much better than the simple links about schedule dates... I always hated pre-announcements, that's so Microsoftish...

Developer Preview 1 is quite soon, possibly in two weeks, but with 5.0 planned at the end of November... that's quite some time for good stuff.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[__past__]

Does anybody know something about the planned integration of TrustedBSD features?

I remember that 5.0 was meant to use some of their stuff. Will this be done? If so, which features?

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, 5.0 seems to be a significant change. Now, what I'm curious to know -- sorry if this is OT -- is: will the FreeBSD code used by Apple in Darwin/MacOS X be sync'ed with FB5.x???

Furthermore, and, er, "reversely" (can I say that?) will some of the stuff that Apple has been working on (integration of FreeBSD over the micro-kernel who's name I forget, something to do with drivers, etc.) be integrated back into FreeBSD?

With Jason Hubbard now working at Apple and with the *nix underpinnings of MacOS X (IOW: Darwin), how much cross-polination will occur?

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

really? so far i've seen no mention of gcc3 in the mailing list.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[someonehasmyname]

Actually, thanks to Apple, there's more BSD desktops now than there are Linux desktops.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

Gawd save us from stupid BSDers who really think that Mac OSX is really a BSD system.

They take some of your code (I stress, some since most of the code is not fucking BSD anyway)... relicense it under their own bullshit semi-open license... and suddenly you want to suck their cock.

Yes... YES... YEEEEEEESSS Apple will save us from Linux. Slurp, slurp. You fucking corporate whore.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[kan]

It is ongoing process and it happens as we speak.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

You seem to be reading wrong mailing lists then :) Try ones with freebsd-*@freebsd.org names next time . All new platform ports are using development snapshots of GCC 3.1, and integration of GCC 3.1 into -CURRENT is going to happen not so far away in the future.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

no. apple stole code from freebsd and is not going to return it. they might steal some more code from the BSD faggots and not return it. boo hoo. too bad.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do you people incessantly repeat the myth that OS X is unix? It isnt unix at all.
It has a unix userland and an /etc directory which doesnt look like any unix /etc (try vipw sometime), but so what? Do you think NT becomes unix when you install cygwin?

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

'vipw' works great on OS X 10.1.3. Further, it's a full UNIX kernel and userland, with a non-X graphical environment. Sounds like UNIX to me.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[akharon]

...will the FreeBSD code used by Apple in Darwin/MacOS X be sync'ed with FB5.x???

Most likely not. The FreeBSD code that Apple used in OS X is from the 3.x line of FBSD, and in the future jkh has said they'd update to 4.x. (or something to that effect)

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do people incessantly repeat the myth that unix is some sort of religious totem. It isn't that at all, it's a set of musty specification documents put forth by some bureaucracy.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[lyberth]

Come on, have some guts, post with a name, don't be an anonymous coward. And secondly, give some arguments, if you have any. You sound like one of those Windows guys.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[lyberth]

As long as its the right people who use the systems, nothing is dying

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

FreeBSD Status Reports.

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

Let me make it simple for you.

Frankly, it's no mystery: *BSD is dying

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[Anonymous Coward]

OK, here is the real skinny on *BSD:

• FreeBSD is dying
• OpenBSD is dying
• NetBSD is dying
• *BSD is dying.

The truth shall set you free: *BSD is dying

Re:5.0 is a pretty big change.

[prog-guru]

'vipw' works great on OS X 10.1.3.

It runs, but changes you make there mean nothing, you have to use netinfo stuff.

XFree86 4.2.0

[Anonymous Coward]

Will they get XF86 4.2.0 for thew 4.6 release ?

It is not present in current ports, and the binaries from xfree86.org core dumps on 4.5 (and I can't get it to compile/install from sources...)

Re:XFree86 4.2.0

[Anonymous Coward]

4.2.0 IS included in the current ports, it's a meta-port such that it is easier to upgrade as components instead of downloading a single X410.tar.gz. Go do some reading, okay?

Re:XFree86 4.2.0

[Anonymous Coward]

ports updated 2 hours ago from a mirror

x11-servers/XFree86-4-Server is version 4.1.0

Seriously, can you enlighten me ? (I already lost a dozen of hours trying to get my f*** i830m to work with fbsd...)

Re:XFree86 4.2.0

[Anonymous Coward]

4.2 was pulled out of ports in favor of 4.1 for the FreeBSD 4.5 release. XFree 4.2 will re-enter the ports tree Real Soon Now, and certainly well before 4.6.

Re:XFree86 4.2.0

[kan]

It just happened. Re-cvsup your ports again.

Re:XFree86 4.2.0

[Anonymous Coward]

So my question was not so stupid. I cvs'ed up the port tree a dozen of times the last three week in the hope of seeing 4.2.0.

I don't want to upgrade to current just for 4.2.0 (last time I upgraded to current was because mozilla was not present in the ports. I appeared 3 days after my upgrade, but it took me a week to downgrade to stable).

Thx for the answer. I'll try to compile the xfree86 sources directly (but their anoncvs looks down right now)

Re:XFree86 4.2.0

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep. I just saw this in another VT (and wanted to post about it when I saw your reply). (But the port does not compile: it fails with a cannot create xf86site.def... But that's another story).

Joy, joy, happiness !

Re:XFree86 4.2.0

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, and btw, the glitch in 4.2.0 install have just been corrected.

cvsup rules.

so...

[Anonymous Coward]

when do they plan on going to a sane init scheme, like /etc/init.d?

Re:so...

[prog-guru]

You can drop a script into /usr/local/etc/rc.d, but the base system will probably still use the current system.

I wish /etc/rc just did things necessary to boot (mount disks, bring up network) then allow the user
to start daemons from /etc/rc.local.

Some might not think init.d is very sane, but it can do anything.

Re:so...

[Matty_]

You mean the SysV way of doing it?

They are more likely to adopt NetBSD's new rc.d system, which retains a BSD-likeness.

Re:so...

[Anonymous Coward]

I just read a paper on the new rc.d system, and i think it really would be a nicer way of handling system services than the sysv init.d.

Perhaps a what linux needs is a group willing to work on core, non-kernel projects.

Re:so...

[Anonymous Coward]

FreeBSDis dying

It is now official - Netcraft has confirmed: *BSD is dying Yet one more crippling bombshll 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 FreeBSD at this point in time. For all practical purposes, *BSD is dead.

FreeBSD is dying

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

Debian GNU/Linux is made up of a much larger team of volunteers than FreeBSD. They have kept on plugging away despite never having a main sponsor of any kind. How are the FreeBSD volunteers different from the Debian volunteers?

You sir, are an ass.

FreeBSD=developing a dead horse

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, exactly that. You few guys just wanna develop a dead horse. Our company did a major benchmark and FreeBSD performed poorly.

Re:FreeBSD=developing a dead horse

[Anonymous Coward]

The main question which we should be asking is ``why did *BSD fail?'' It is patently obvious that *BSD is what can honestly be described as a failure. Think about that for a minute. Why did*BSD fail?

So why now? Why did *BSD fail? Once you get past the fact that *BSD is fragmented between a myriad of incompatible kernels, there isthe historical record of failure and of failed operating systems. *BSD experienced moderate success about 15 years ago in academic circles. Since then it has been in steady decline. We all know *BSD keeps losing market share but why? Is it the problematic personalities of many of the key players? Or is it larger than their troubled personalities?

Th record is clear on one thing: no operating system has ever come back from the grave. Efforts to resuscitate *BSD are one step away from spiritualists wishing to communicate with the dead. As the situation grows more desperate for the adherents of this doomed OS, the sorrow takes hold. An unremitting gloom hangs like a death shroud over a once hopeful *BSD community. The hope is gone; a mournful nostalgia has settled in. Now is the end time for *BSD.

FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

So, you just keep on developing a dead horse??! Well, keep on wasting your time.

FreeBSD is dying...

[Anonymous Coward]

More planned?? When do you plan to implement most of the major drivers for devices?? FreeBSD is currently useless piece of...

Re:FreeBSD is dying...

[mvw]

There are few areas, where users should experience a lesser performance from a FreeBSD box than from a Linux one.

One is the nvidia OpenGL driver (a generic x86 driver in theory, a Linux specific one for a long time in practice). Perhaps the out of the box tweaking is a bit conservative.

Linux SMP scaled better than FreeBSD's in the past, but how many users you know run multiprocessor boxes?

That's why I believe you post bullshit.

Re:FreeBSD is dying...

[Anonymous Coward]

Whatever, FreeBSD has always had better SMP support since the very beginning, as well as virtual memory. FreeBSD is the better stable server platform, Linux is better on the desktop. FreeBSD 5.0 will bring a new edge to the server arena. If you think FreeBSD is having a rough time, look at most of your favorite Linux distros. As stated in the original article...

Re:FreeBSD is dying...

[Anonymous Coward]

FreeBSD (self admits) that thier current stable release (4.5) has SMP that is inferior to even linux 2.0's, with one huge lock.

That fantasy world you live in is might neat, what type of drugs do you take to be there?

Re:FreeBSD is dying...

[essdodson]

FreeBSD takes skill. Your average user moving from Windows to BSD will a bit alarmed when they're not greeted with the kooshy crap found with most modern Linux distros. These people are not the target of any open source BSD project that I'm aware of. Lame questions will be met with RTFM rather than some wizard popping up and holding your hand. Hand holding lessons are available, just not installed by default.

As far as performance goes, I've never seen solid proof that FreeBSD is truly lacking in performance. Any slack in performance is more than made up for in stability.

FreeBSD is dying...

[Anonymous Coward]

From what I have seen a lot of people didn't like FreeBSD when they tried it. Most of them were disappointed because FreeBSD performed poorly.

just run FreeBSD

[Anonymous Coward]

Why bother to replicate the FreeBSD success
in Linux? Just run FreeBSD.

freebsd is amazing

[Anonymous Coward]

i like how people complane about freebsd releases as if you can't upgrade anything from 4.5 till 4.6 comes out. cvsup your src and build you lazy bastard. freebsd is not dying *BSD is not dying. specially since everyone is using bsd's code :)
i love freebsd and i love how linux is finally getting at the point to nip at the heels of freebsd after being so cowardess for so long. i am not surprised at the fact there's a bunch of people here spewing shit about something they've never used.

Wind River and FreeBSD 6.0?

[cpeterso]

I read that Wind River will be contributing more features back to the FreeBSD community. According to an article I read (Wind River announces product rollout plans for future BSD/OS releases), FreeBSD 6.0 will be based on be based on Wind River's VxWorks microkernel.

Re:Wind River and FreeBSD 6.0?

[Anonymous Coward]

and since the VxWorks microkernel is released under a EULA, the BSD license will also be changed to a EULA. dont forget who really owns freebsd.

Re:Wind River and FreeBSD 6.0?

[phoenix_rizzen]

FreeBSD and BSD/OS are *not* the same thing. They are two totally different operating systems.

FeeBSD is dying.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please, don't write in English if you don't know how to.

hear, hear! I ditched linux for freebsd.

[xeeno]

I've been running linux since kernel 0.99pl14. I like the hardware support, but freebsd has
matured so much and is so much more stable that
I moved away from linux to an all-freebsd environment.
For those of you that bitch about the time between releases, just look at debian. And learn how to cvsup. :)

Re:hear, hear! I ditched linux for freebsd.

[Admiral Llama]

I'm in the same boat as you. Since '96 I've been a Linux user, screaming about it from the rooftops, bringing it into huge companies and basing smaller companies on it. Ever since 2.4 though its been degrading. These days I don't dare run a stock kernel unless its been patched all the way to hell and halfway back. Even then its iffy. Linux apps are twitchy, and an above poster is definitly correct about it feeling thrown together.

Just last week I tried out FreeBSD 4.5-RELEASE and I must say I'm impressed. The whole thing feels really professional and tightly bundled, and the ports tree is a dream. I havn't found anything that isn't straightforward. It still blows my mind that I was able to do whatever I needed to do by looking in logical places, or at worst doing my one stop shopping for info at www.freebsd.org.

The project feels like one team built the whole works as opposed to everything being a mishmash from whoever showed up for amature night.

Best of all, I don't have to look at that fat, stupid penguin. It was cute a couple of years ago, but its a really insipid logo that makes it seem like a kiddie project.

Re:hear, hear! I ditched linux for freebsd.

[Arandir]

For those of you that bitch about the time between releases, just look at debian.

Man, what a cheap shot at Debian!

In any case, FreeBSD gets a new release every six months like clockwork. There may be a couple of Linux distros that have faster cycles, but most are in the six to nine month range.

If even that's too slow for you use cvsup.

Looks tempting, but what about IEEE-1394?

[gaj]

5.0 looks great. Lots of nice goodies to bring FreeBSD back up to snuff with Linux (feature wise). I have one question though: what about firewire/iLink/IEEE-1394, especially with SBP2 support? The Linux support is pretty decent, and I depend upon it for my CDRW drive, as USB for storage is a joke and my Vaio 505 came with a IEEE-1394 port anyway. So, any BSDers out there know what's up with firewire on FreeBSD? I know some dude in Japan had basic firewire working for use with digital video and such, but I want my Serial Bus Protocol 2 support, dammit! (grin)

And also..

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget about all the great features being incorporated from the TrustedBSD project into FreeBSD 5.0 .. brand new jail implementation and ACL come to mind.

...and it shows.

[pschmied]

FreeBSD feels like a real quality product. The installer, and the overall level of "spit shine" is better than I've seen anywhere else (Windows, Solaris, Linux, QNX).

The packages/ports collection rocks. Software works as documented. Documentation exists.

I can't wait to see all the goodies planned for FreeBSD-5.

Anyone who is interested in UNIX should check it out. It is one of the very "cleanest" implimentations out there, and it also happens to perform quite well.

Go ahead download the .iso (or buy from Daemon News). The install doesn't take long (6 minutes boot to finish on my 1.0ghz Athlon).

-Peter

Re:...and it shows.

[BrookHarty]

Bullshit.

FreeBSD installer while fast and efficient is the same installer they have used for years.

The main problem I see with BSD vs. Linux posts is nobody can ever say anything good about either, its always 1 sided. Linux has good points and so does BSDs. BSD isnt gods gift, and linux doent cure cancer, Both are tools that should be used for its purposes.

The only reason I still use linux is its popularity and all the apps I want run on it. It supports the hardware I have, the applications I want are on the cd in .rpm format.

If you must argue or promote a viewpoint, at least give some details. Then people can comment on your views, or give some insights, maybe offer alternate ideas.
-
Before you open your mouth to speak, please make sure it's an improvement upon the silence.

Re:...and it shows.

[archen]

The installer, and the overall level of "spit shine" is better than I've seen anywher

I'm a happy FreeBSD user, but I think the installer still needs work. In a lot of ways it's still un-intuitive, and I think it needs to be a bit more descriptive about the packages (Red Hat did this right). The other annoying thing about the installer is that it doesn't DO a whole lot for configuring various stuff. For instance: if I select bash as my default shell, it would be nice if I got some sort of freaking .bashrc SOMEWHERE on the system! (no, you have to make one yourself). If you want window maker as your desktop environment, good luck. the majority of the programs won't be on the programs list, and the ones that are listed probably aren't even installed.

With that said FreeBSD can be a pain in the ass to set up initially, but once that's done you can basically clone most of the config stuff for the rest of eternity - it's just a hurdle that beginners shouldn't have to go through IMHO.

Re:...and it shows.

[r00tarded]

freebsd 5.0 will cure cancer.

Re:...and it shows.

[KiwiSurfer]

FreeBSD installer while fast and efficient is the same installer they have used for years. What's is the problem with the current installer? If it works well for the purpose it was designed for in the first place there isn't really any need for a new method of installing that may or may not improve on the current installer used in the 4.x releases of FreeBSD. That said, there are, I beleive, some work on a new installer which will be able to work in either text-only mode or graphical (X11) mode and will include many other improvements over the current installer. However, from what I know, it probally won't be used till 5.0-RELEASE or later releases. The only reason I still use linux is its popularity and all the apps I want run on it. It supports the hardware I have, the applications I want are on the cd in .rpm format. I rectently bought a very new box and FreeBSD 4.5 worked right-out-of-the box with all the stuffs except the onboard AC'97 sound so its hardware compatibility is, IMHO, quite good. It may not support some of the more exotic hardwares but it does have decent support for most hardwares that are in common use. Also, I have yet to find any decent UNIX program that doesn't work on FreeBSD -- i currenly have around 130 different packages installed (including KDE, GNOME, gaim, freeciv, doom, galeon, xchat and many others) and they all work perfectly. FreeBSD also has excellent linux binary emulation which emulates many Linux binaries (including StarOffice, Netscape, Acrobat Reader, Opera, and others) flawlessly. - James

Re:...and it shows.

[Anonymous Coward]

I just installed RedHag 7.2 and I have to say that I prefer the FreeBSD installer by miles. I found that I had much more control over the system, and configuring everything afterwards was much easier as well. The graphical install for RH7.2, while looking nice, was clumsy and awkward to use. Especially the part about setting up the disk. In FreeBSD you just select the slice and the auto selection usually gets you pretty close to where you need to be. RedHat was not so easy. It would not even format the slice. I had to use Partition Magic in Microsoft Windows ME, to get a file system on the slice before Red Hat would install on it. It seemed like they are going the Microsoft way with the installer, making it look nice but not quite as good as it should be. I do admit that it is much better than installing Red Hat 6.1.

Re:...and it shows.

[Admiral Llama]

Ok, granted its not as pretty as Mandrake's installer. It is pretty simple though. Ever try to trudge through Debian's ocean (and I MEAN ocean) of packages and you'll understand. FreeBSD's installer is pretty simple to walk through.

That, and the kernel compile is pretty hard to screw up. First shot through and it booted doing all I wanted it to do. The sound was a little confusing to configure because there wasn't anything to configure! Just tell it you want a PCI sound card and from there on out its pure magic.

Re:...and it shows.

[essdodson]

Installer doesn't hold your hand because the intended audience isn't the pirate who got pissed because Microsoft requires them to register the latest version of Windows.

Re:...and it shows.

[BrookHarty]

The FreeBSD installer is hard for new people, thats why linux distros take the time to develop nice graphical installers with online help. But then FreeBSD has always target the advanced crowd. But its true, after you installed your OS, do you really care about the installer? Nope.

all the stuffs except the onboard AC'97 sound..
Are you using that as a workstation? Then ya gotta have sound.. AC97 is widely known, must be a configuration issue.

I migrated to linux for the tcp configuration, then moved to FreeBSD for my servers, went back to Linux for my dual cpu servers. Now Linux is mature enough and stable to keep using Linux. The gripes i had about the lack of configuration tools in linux/bsd has been solved in most Linux Distros now. No reason to switch again. Even thou people have stated the VM engine has major problems, I havnt personally noticed any problems or downtime. But Ill just upgrade my kernel with a fixed VM when the time comes. And now that I have a journling FS, cant find anything to bitch about. Well other than X-Windows (smile) problems. Ill be glad when a FrameBuffer replacement comes out.

-
My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right? - Charles M. Schulz

Re:...and it shows.

[Anonymous Coward]

freebsd 5.0 will cure cancer.

Yes, and even Microsoft know it. FreeBSD is the cure for the GPL.

Re:...and it shows.

[archen]

RedHag 7.2 and I have to say that I prefer the FreeBSD

Actually I agree, but the only thing I would like with the BSD installer is for better descriptions of the packages, since I have the feeling I'm skipping stuff that might be useful mainly because I'm not sure what the thing really does (and the description is not too helpful either). At work my machine runs FreeBSD despite the fact that I've been trying to standardize on RH linux (not by choice). I've tried installing RH 7.2 around 5 times, and 7.1 - 3 times, and I can't get either of them to actually take. Neither of them will write to the boot sector, and neither ends up in a bootable state via another bootloader either. Hell even the boot floppy won't work. In contrast FreeBSD glides through the install with no problems.

Re:...and it shows.

[Sly-Guy]

Are you using that as a workstation? Then ya gotta have sound.. AC97 is widely known, must be a configuration issue.

Not all chipsets are known... I have the KT133 chipset on my AMD box here at home and the AC'97 works beautifully. A buddy of mine has the exact next revision of the chipset the KT266 which uses a different AC'97 chip... And is not supported. It all depends. If you dig into the sound support (I have, I tried to hack my buddies machine to work properly but failed) you will see that even though all the AC'97 chips are touted to be equal they all have their own qwirks...

Re:...and it shows.

[Arandir]

The FreeBSD installer is hard for new people, thats why linux distros take the time to develop nice graphical installers with online help.

First of all, not all Linux distros have gone to a GUI installer. The two notable exceptions are Slackware and Debian.

Second, a text mode installer will work on 100% of target machines. A GUI installer will not. So you still need to keep around a text based installer. The next version of the FreeBSD installer will be a library with two (or) more front end interfaces. Aside: I think a CGI front end would be cool for installing remotely.

Third, the text based FreeBSD has excellent help. I actually prefer text mode installers because I can read a whole page of help, instead of constantly scrolling down a tiny 640x480 text widget made even smaller with borders and scrollbar .

Finally, and I don't mean this sarcastically, users who won't use FreeBSD because they don't like, or are afraid of, the text mode installer are not the target audience. They just might be happier elsewhere. Once past the installer there will be a myriad places where the command line will have to be used. If they are uncomfortable with the command line, then I would suggest OSX.

Re:...and it shows.

[Arandir]

For instance: if I select bash as my default shell, it would be nice if I got some sort of freaking .bashrc SOMEWHERE on the system!

The primary reason for this is that bash itself does not come with .bash_profile or .bashrc files. It is not the FreeBSD way to alter any ported software package beyond the minimum needed to port it or correct bugs.

That said, you do have a .shrc file installed by default in your home directory. bash should be using this by default in the absence of a .bashrc file, but unfortunately it does not. The solution is absurdly simple. Link .shrc to .bashrc and be finished.

If you want window maker as your desktop
environment, good luck.

Huh? Windowmaker is one of the default window manager you can choose during installation (the others being KDE, GNOME/Sawfish, GNOME/Enlightenment, Afterstep and fvwm).

Re:...and it shows.

[INMCM]

Haha, I wish I had mod points for that.

Re:...and it shows.

[Lazaru5]

The "description" in the package list of sysinstall is really just a one line 'comment' for that package. If sysinstall can't show the _actual_ full description, you can look at it in /usr/ports/category/program/pkg-descr (it's the pkg-comment that's used in the package list) or at www.freebsd.org/ports

Re:...and it shows.

[Anonymous Coward]

I like the part where I boot up the FreeBSD cdrom, and observe 7 kernel conflicts before I even get to any kind of menu.

Now I have to configure my kernel before I can even run the installer.

Now I insert the Slackware cdrom and install that instead.

Re:...and it shows.

[Strog]

Kernel conflicts? Sounds like some bad hardware. I've run FreeBSD on a lot of different systems and have yet to see that one. I've only needed to tweak the kernel setup on the install on one machine. I later figured out I could change the hardware resources on the mb to a more standard config. I just skip the config and do all my kernel tuning after it is up and running.

Linux is dying

[Anonymous Coward]

Woah, with centralized FreeBSD already better than Linux and getting better all the time, no wonder *linux with all their incompatible kernels and library versions is dying.

Troll much?

[Doktor Memory]

The article you reference says no such thing:

BSD/OS 5.0 and other future releases of the product will target servers, server appliances, and purpose-built server applications, as well as non-real-time embedded systems that require a full-featured UNIX-based operating system. Such systems often have high degrees of software complexity and need the capability to run applications developed for UNIX-style operating systems.

Wind River's VxWorks(TM) real-time operating system will continue to be Wind River's core offering for embedded applications that require real-time, deterministic performance and constrained memory footprints.

Try harder next time, please.

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

Why did FreeBSD go bankrupt? Did everyone get paid or was it like the Loki fiasco? It all smells bad anyway.

File system ACL

[slashtop]

you forget to prompt file system ACL to enhance traditional UNIX ugo security mode.

But i thought

[LadyLucky]

*BSD was dying..

Sorry....

Re:But i thought

[lyberth]

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was to convince people that he didn't exist

Re:But i thought

[LadyLucky]

Goddam, that was supposed to be funny.

Boy did I get bitchslapped.

Thank you for continued excellence

[Anonymous Coward]

Who cares who uses FreeBSD? Its an excellent OS that STILL is better nailed together than your local linux distro.

As for linux support in industry - don't get too excited - every workstation IBM sells still proudly exclaims how IBM "recommends Win2k".

Wait a minute..

[Anonymous Coward]

Didn't *bsd just totally crap out on the java front. Actually it seems that BSD is now pure nonfree. MacOSX and WindRivers enhanced BSD/OS systems seems to be the only supported BSD's out there. FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD are all dead or dying fast. I mean FreeBSD which is the most *ahem* "popular" doesn't even have decent support for sound. Yeah servers don't need sound but still I keep hearing how BSD does what linux does only better. Linux can run several Java VM's and can support the majority of sound cards. BSD has been blocked cold on Java and no development on sound. No wonder BSD is dying.

Re:Wait a minute..

[dkwiebe]

FreeBSD not run jave? Whatever you say... But I have used a few different java servers on it... I think that freebsd is soon going to be shipping a java server as well? Can anyone back me up on that? **BSD is alive and well**

Re:Wait a minute..

[Anonymous Coward]

Amen brutha... BSD is not only tha shiznitz, but it's rock solid too! So much for Linux's kernel oopses! :)

Re:Wait a minute..

[Neovanglist]

FreeBSD has run java via linux emulation for ages. FreeBSD 4.5 runs a native FreeBSD version that gets installed via the ports collection.

Regards,
Neovanglist

Re:Wait a minute..

[Neovanglist]

Well you are totally right if you consider the Sun Java JDK2 non-commercial quality. The Sun Java JDK1.3 has a native FreeBSD version, and you can run the Linux version on FreeBSD.

Regards,
Neovanglist

Re:Wait a minute..

[Neovanglist]

My mistake.. it's not the JDK2.. that was a typo.. it's JDK 1.3.

My Mistake,
Neovanglist

Re:Wait a minute..

[Anonymous Coward]

FreeBSD has no Java implementation that can be considered production quality. Compared to to Solaris, Linux, and Windows, FreeBSD Java is not in the game. I know; I tried. Believe me I tried. Java is not there on FreeBSD. If you want a Java toy, OK, FreeBSD hs that. But it does not have anything fast enough or robust enough for business use. Period.

What is worse are the flat out lies told to me by some individuals who were promoting FreBSD to me. Not only did they discredit themselves, they discredited the very operating system they were trying to tout.

Re:Wait a minute..

[innate]

I'm probably replying to a troll, but...

FreeBSD is a server OS. Who cares about sound?

I am sure it will evolve into a comfortable workstation OS, as Linux is, and I'm sure many folks here use FreeBSD on their desktop on a daily basis. But its heart and soul is in the server realm where things like sound and CD ripping don't really matter.

The FreeBSD slogan is... "The Power To Serve."

Re:Wait a minute..

[jsprat]

All JDK >= 1.2 are known as "Java 2".

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

And you sir are a WHOLE ASS, not to be confused with a simple asshole.

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Tribbin]

That's Debian who is dying...

It's Interesting to Me...

[Neovanglist]

It's interesting to me how you can think FreeBSD is dying when several major things have happened on the FreeBSD front.

1)FreeBSD released FreeBSD-4.5 RELEASE just not to long ago, and it has full Java support.

2)FreeBSD is getting new applications ported to it every day. (Note: XFree86 4.2.0 now has FreeBSD binaries available, check XFree86.org)

3)FreeBSD was a good enough OS to have Apple base their new flagship OS (MacOSX) on it. (I don't see them planning to make a Linux based MacOS)

4)FreeBSD's TCP/IP stack was good enough for Microsoft to steal and put in Win2k/XP

With all this said, and the new release schedule, how in the world can you call it dead?

Regards,
Neovanglist

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[rjamestaylor]

3)FreeBSD was a good enough OS to have Apple base their new flagship OS (MacOSX) on it. (I don't see them planning to make a Linux based MacOS)

To be fair, Apple doesn't incorporate *anything* GPL'ed but many things BSD/MIT licensed; case in point: curl (not to be confused with Curl) is included not the supperior wget. So, regardless of the technological merits Apple would not base its flagship product based on Linux.

Until, perhaps, the GPL is determined unenforceable and deemed just plain wacky by the Supreme Court (SCOTUS).

BTW, Mac OS X rocks.

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[Neovanglist]

Thanks for pointing that out. I've yet to really use Mac OS X because I have a PC, but if I could get ahold of a version of Mac OS X, or program that allows it to run on my PC then I'll probably give it a shot.

Later,
Neovanglist

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[Anonymous Coward]

There is an x86 version of Darwin (complete with X support and all that jazz, IIRC) being distributed.

See
http://gnu-darwin.sourceforge.net/
more specifically
http://gnu-darwin.sourceforge.net/x86/
and, of course
http://www.publicsource.apple.com/projects/darwin/

As for X, see
http://mrcla.com/XonX/

You won't get Aqua, the nice spiffy UI (ok, it's imperfect, but it's still spiffy) but at least you'll have the core of OS X that you could play with.

Of course, there are those rumoured complete-the-whole-nine-yards x86 ports of OS X that are apparently floating deep in the bowels of 1, Infinite Loop, in Cupertino...

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[PhotoGuy]

3)FreeBSD was a good enough OS to have Apple base their new flagship OS (MacOSX) on it. (I don't see them planning to make a Linux based MacOS)

I think this has a lot more to do with the licensing. No commercial vendor in their right mind would base their custom OS with value-added proprietary extensions, upon an OS that places such heavy dependencies upon the GPL license. (The term GNU/Linux just makes me shudder.)

The FreeBSD license doesn't preclude commercialization, which makes it far, far, far, more appealing for putting on commercial users' desktops.

Of course, the rock solid stability, better planned releases, centralized control, yadda, yadda, yadda, are no doubt factors that made it more appealing than Linux as a base. But even if those things were all equal, the GPL alone would have prevented Apple from basing OS X upon Linux.

Similarly, I'm working on two projects that will be commercialized; I'm using FreeBSD as the base, and sleeping well knowing that I won't have any licensing grief down the road. Linux and it's supporting utilities are just too fraught with GPL restrictions; if the core technology of Linux were leaps and bounds above FreeBSD, it would be more of a dilemma. But in terms of the kernel and core utilities, they really are neck and neck. I make my living creating this value-added code, I can't afford to give the source away for my modifications or extensions, and live off of services or whatever. (And the zealots will no doubt scream "if you don't like the GPL, don't use software that uses it!" Well, despite the kneejerk reaction that might be, that's exactly the right advice in my case, I'll use FreeBSD.)

I do think it's a shame for Linux, though. If Linux didn't have this restriction, and had four or five offshoots of commercialization, I think it'd be taken a lot more seriously on the desktop. With the release of OS/X, BSD really did leapfrog Linux in terms of popular acceptance on the desktop. Linux might have been the beneficiary of this, if it were more BSD-like in its licensing. And FreeBSD seem to be gaining even more momentum every day.

In any case, choice is good. I love Linux, but I choose BSD. :-)

-me

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[aidan skinner]

Apple doesn't incorporate *anything* GPL'ed

That's just not true, apple incorporates gcc, emacs and other bits of the GNU system into OS X.

If you read the GPL, it states:

In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under the scope of this License.

So it's perfectly safe to do this, and FreeBSD, OpenBSD and NetBSD distribute gcc as part of their base systems as well as things like cvs, awk and grep

- Aidan (typing on a FreeBSD machine)

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[lpontiac]

curl (not to be confused with Curl) is included not the supperior wget.

I don't think it's fair to say that wget is always superior. They're different tools for different jobs. wget's big feature is recursive fetching of linked web pages. curl concentrates more on single operations, and lets you do a lot more in this area. One biggie that I'd really miss is the ability to use HTTP POST instead of GET. It can also upload files (HTTP and FTP); wget can't.

It's worth noting that curl is basically a simple wrapper around libcurl, which is probably the best cross-platform library out there for doing stuff with HTTP.

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[rjamestaylor]

Thanks for that explanation of curl vs. wget. My appreciation for curl just increased. I'll check it out for automating form submission...

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[Luke Marsden]

I'd be very interested to see a VMWare-like project for PPC Hardware, especially if it could do hardware-accellerated graphics.

Has anyone seen or heard of something like this?

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[scrytch]

4)FreeBSD's TCP/IP stack was good enough for Microsoft to steal and put in Win2k/XP

And you were doing so well before this. I am going to say the same thing I have been saying over and over and over and over to this bullshit:

PROVE IT

The most evidence anyone has ever offered was BSD copyrights in the DLL's ... precisely the same ones that are in the BSD sockets compatibility header files. A header file does not a stack make.

Are you really even interested in the truth though?

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[Arandir]

A) Aggregation is not incorporation

B) Only GNU considers compilers and editors to be OS components

Re:It's Interesting to Me...

[Lazaru5]

#3) That's as much due to OpenStep's ties with BSD and the BSD license than FreeBSD being better than Linux.

#4) It's not theft when it's been given away.

Re:It's Interesting to Me... Amen

[Anonymous Coward]

Well said... It has been really encouraging lately watching the progress being made.

Re:*BSD is dying

[Anonymous Coward]

This is about the tenth time I've seen this on this story already... Originality is cool...

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

Trolling Back ?

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[cozziewozzie]

Yeah, like Debian.

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Cro Magnon]

Linux isn't going anywhere! Debian has the same "business" model as the BSD's, and if Pat V ever stops making Slackware, we'll see some community based forks.

Wind River to follow Apple's Mac OS X strategy?

[cpeterso]

After a second read, that article has some interesting implications. Sounds like Wind River is following a strategy similar to Apple's Mac OS X: microkernel downstairs + BSD layer upstairs.

That kind of sucks for FreeBSD's users. Because of the business-friendly BSD license, there is nothing the FreeBSD developers can do to prevent Wind River from using their code like this. Plus, because FreeBSD's source code is kept in a public CVS server, Wind River can freely check-in their code changes, like it or not! >:-\

Re:Wind River to follow Apple's Mac OS X strategy?

[rycamor]

So?

As a happy FreeBSD user, I fail to see why this "sucks". FreeBSD users tend to have the attitude that if FreeBSD is a good thing, why keep it from anyone? Business or non-business, it doesn't matter. In fact, generally it is a good thing for businesses to use FreeBSD wherever they want, because sooner or later they realize that they will benefit directly by contributing back to the main FreeBSD effort. Otherwise their (patched) version will drift too far from the main releases to be able to keep taking advantage of FreeBSD. Symbiotic relationship, you dig...?

Re:Wind River to follow Apple's Mac OS X strategy?

[Anonymous Coward]

> River can freely check-in their code changes, like it or not!
Who gave you this idea? You have to be committer and your changes have to be reviewed before you can check-in anything into FreeBSD CVS.

Re:Wind River to follow Apple's Mac OS X strategy?

[bovinewasteproduct]

Where on that page do you see the ability to check stuff into the tree?

Only a select group of people can check stuff into the tree, but anyone can see the history of the tree. With Caldera releasing the source code to the ancient unix releases, we can even once again see what 1.X looked like!

I'm a former developer(for about 6 or 7 years) and I can tell that getting commit privs are not that easy, it takes some work.

BWP

Re:Wind River to follow Apple's Mac OS X strategy?

[Lazaru5]

Are you just a total tard or a plant from some company trying to spread FUD?

This combined with your WindRiver/FreeBSD 6.0 troll earlier leads me to believe the second.

Yes, there's nothing the FreeBSD project can do to prevent people from using their code. That's their INTENT. They _want_ their code used.

The public CVS server is anonymous, read-only access. The master cvs repository is only writable for FreeBSD committers (about 300) with accounts.

What's your motive with this propaganda?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just curious.

www.gentoo.org

[Anonymous Coward]

www.gentoo.org

Port system + Linux = Linux on steroids

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

I think thier sponsor was Enron.

Attitude problems

[Eric Green]

1) FreeBSD is user friendly, but it's picky about who its friends are. I like FreeBSD, but that's because I'm a member of the circle of people that FreeBSD is friendly with: computer geeks.

2) The attitude of the FreeBSD elite towards the hoi paloi is well known and noted. FreeBSD zealots have accused both me and David Miller of needing Qualudes in our meals when we point out (with code patches) idiocies in FreeBSD that need fixing (especially irritating when we just finished fixing the same idiocy in Linux... idiocy is idiocy, no matter what OS it is in or who wrote the code, and the migration goes from Linux->FreeBSD as often as it goes from FreeBSD->Linux, there's no reason for FreeBSD zealots to jump down our throats just because we're Linux geeks who found a bug in their precious OS).

3) The so-called stability advantages of FreeBSD are a myth. From FreeBSD 3.3 up to FreeBSD 4.0, both my system at home and my system at work would spontaneously reboot at random intervals under FreeBSD (I mention two different systems because that rules out hardware problems -- hell, they didn't even have the same chipset, one was AMD and one was Intel, the only thing they had in common was that both had an IDE hard drive). In fact, FreeBSD 3.4 led me to switch back to Linux -- I got tired of my system spontaneously rebooting and destroying all my unsaved work.

I love the FreeBSD ports system, and wish there was something similar for "mainstream" Linux distributions. RPM's rock for pre-packaged software (pkg_add etc. are decidedly showing their age as package management tools), but suck for software that you're trying to update from the source stream.

FreeBSD has one advantage: It is an operating system. Linux is not an operating system. Linux is a kernel, surrounded by a hodge-podge of tools tossed into it willy-nilly kitchen sink fashion. In particular, the entire "C" library situation in Linux is tragic. It seems like every other release of a distribution will go to a new incompatible version of the "C" library, to the point where we have over 10mb of "C" libraries loaded in memory to run our normal work load of software compiled against various different versions of those libraries, and the "C" library suffers hugely from code bloat. FreeBSD never seems to have that problem. Of course, FreeBSD doesn't have any precompiled commercial software written for it anyhow...

Basically: I see no religious reasons to use one OS over the other. At various times in each OS's development they have swapped places as to which one was least stable. Neither one is anywhere near perfect. But I expect to be flamed roundly from FreeBSD zealots with attitude for daring to suggest that their precious OS was at anytime unstable, even though they can go to their very own mailing list and see the bug report for the problem -- and see how long it took to solve it.

I currently run Linux. I run Linux for one reason, and one reason only: software availability. Yes, FreeBSD has a Linux emulator. No, it isn't perfect, and I don't have time to play with it nowdays. I am by no means a rabid fan of Linux nowdays -- the whole 2.4 series kernel has been a disaster, for example -- but I need to get work done, and it's "good enough". Purity is for virgins, not software.

Re:Attitude problems

[Admiral Llama]

Ohh, the C library situation.... I definitly understand that. How many people here have either heard or told stories like:

"Well, I was upgrading my system libraries and [insert sob story here] ......installation media."

FreeBSD? There is no /lib directory. That's because everything that's no in /usr is COMPILED STATICALLY!!!! I even threw on bash from the ports tree, and whoever set up the port was smart enough to realize that the shell is totally critical and making it dynamic is nothing short of suicide.

Of course, I'm sensitive to the issue because I had just tried to upgrade my Mandrake 7.2 box to glibc2.2....... My sob story at least didn't end in "installation media" because I was fortunate enough to have a statically compiled copy of busybox on an nfs share without nosuid flagged. Otherwise I'd probably have been reachin' fer the bootable CD.

Re:Attitude problems

[pwileyii]

Comments on 3) I've been following FreeBSD since 2.2.7 and have never had my FreeBSD reboot for no reason unless there was a hardware problem. I've had my 4.1 box up for over 6 months. I'm sorry, but I know dozens of BSD user and none have had that problem. Perhaps you did have some bad hardware in both you didn't know about.

Of course, FreeBSD doesn't have any precompiled commercial software written for it anyhow...

I'm not sure what kind of comment this is, but FreeBSD has plenty is commercial software writen for it. Check out the bsdmall for a nice selection of them.

Also, to comment on the Linux "emulator." It is really linux compatabilty. They more or less put a loadable kernel module that is the linux kernel. With the compatablity, you need to install all of the linux libraries as such for applications to work. (There is a port to do this.) After this, you just run the linux program and it will run. No need to "play around with it," it just works. Plus, it will run 99.9% of all Linux programs, including VMWare, a very kernel dependant program.

Just thought I get the facts straight.

Re:Attitude problems

[Anonymous Coward]

> here's no reason for FreeBSD zealots to jump down
> our throats just because we're Linux geeks who
> found a bug in their precious OS).
You probably made a circus of your bug patch submission and you got laughed at in return. People who really want to contribute bugfix will just submit a patch through PR system and if patch has some real merits behind it, it will be incorporated quickly, or it will be rejected just as quickly if deemed inappropriate. Reserve circus for linux kernel mailing list. That's how they do business over there.

Re:Attitude problems

[pschmied]

2) The attitude of the FreeBSD elite towards the hoi paloi is well known and noted. FreeBSD zealots have accused both me and David Miller of needing Qualudes in our meals when we point out (with code patches) idiocies in FreeBSD that need fixing (especially irritating when we just finished fixing the same idiocy in Linux... idiocy is idiocy, no matter what OS it is in or who wrote the code, and the migration goes from Linux->FreeBSD as often as it goes from FreeBSD->Linux, there's no reason for FreeBSD zealots to jump down our throats just because we're Linux geeks who found a bug in their precious OS).

I've found that the development people are actually quite friendly with or without code patches. I've found that people are much friendlier when you approach them with a tone of, "I think I may have found a problem with said code. I have a patch that I've made to correct this." I've found that they are much less receptive when you use the tone, "Hey fix your code. Here is a patch for you idiots since you obviously can't code your own shit."

The fact that you are starting with term "idiocies" makes me believe that, infact, you should perhaps work on the people skills aspect of software design (the very aspect of FreeBSD's design that this article is highlighting).

3) The so-called stability advantages of FreeBSD are a myth. From FreeBSD 3.3 up to FreeBSD 4.0, both my system at home and my system at work would spontaneously reboot at random intervals under FreeBSD (I mention two different systems because that rules out hardware problems -- hell, they didn't even have the same chipset, one was AMD and one was Intel, the only thing they had in common was that both had an IDE hard drive). In fact, FreeBSD 3.4 led me to switch back to Linux -- I got tired of my system spontaneously rebooting and destroying all my unsaved work.

I've had very good luck with FreeBSD stability and so have a lot of other people. I'm guessing that maybe you had some other problems, but it sounds like you have some coding experience, so maybe you could try out one of the recent builds and start from there on helping with stability if it is still a problem for you.

Deviating from the topic at hand....

I hate this new "I'll try to sound like a moderate while flaming" tactic on Slashdot. "idiocies in FreeBSD that need fixing", "The so-called stability advantages of FreeBSD are a myth." "The attitude of the FreeBSD elite towards the hoi paloi".

No offense, and sorry to go off topic, but what a load of shit. You are most definitely biased, as am I. This is the joy of discussion forums---telling other user when they didn't get something right, or you disagree. Don't give me this tripe: "But I expect to be flamed roundly from FreeBSD zealots with attitude for daring to suggest that their precious OS was at anytime unstable..."

The fact is, that you are going to get flamed if you flame. Whether or not I'm a FreeBSD, Plan9, QNX, MacOS, or BeOS zealot is not the issue.

Rather than continue to troll on Slashdot about how FreeBSD failed for you in the past (and then make platitudes toward it to avoid being labeled a troll), how about giving a recent version a shot. FreeBSD 4.5 surprised this die-hard *BSD user with how polished it was.

-Peter

Re:Attitude problems

[Baca]

I believe crux linux has a ports tree simliar, I've also seen one other one do it too, I think there's a package on sourceforge.

Then again, I could just be suffering from low caffeine.,

Re:Attitude problems

[bluGill]

FreeBSD 3.3 up to FreeBSD 4.0

FreeBSD 3.x was always lacking in the stability department. On hindsite it should have stayed in -current for anouther year, but unfortunatly 2.2.7 (2.2.8 came out not long after) was getting dated and would not run on some hardware without new features that were dangerious to back-port. 4.0 was a .0 release, but in general was better than anything in the 3.0 series, but not up to the 2.2.8 release. About 4.2 the 4.0 series came clos to the 2.2 series, and support for old releases was droped. Official support, I understand every once in a while someone will commit something to the 2.1 series, and I'm sure that someone making changes to 2.2 once in a while.

If your last expirence with freeBSD was 3.x or 4.0, then try it again! It has really matured a lot. I have high hopes for the 5.0 series as well, but unless you can stand stability problems I would wait for 5.1. That advice applies to software in general.

Re:Attitude problems

[salyavin]

I believe Gentoo linux has a ports like system that you might want to try. http://www.gentoo.org/

Please Ask Yourself This

[Neovanglist]

I have a question of this community. I remember back in the days when conversations would be carried out over BBS forums/newsgroups. What I remembered of those "old-school" programming/networking communities was a group of people who were always ready to help, and who were always ready to encourage someone in whatever they set out to do. I have a hard time understanding how this community turned into something as bitter and close-minded as what it is now. It seems that there are only a handful of people left out there that still have the original focus of what created this community.

I do not understand how this bitter *BSD vs. *Linux war started. One side blames the other, and vice-versa. The result is a spiral toward a completely destroyed community. You may ask yourself "Well what is in being nice and helpful for me" the answer is, if this trend continues and expands itself onto others like it has as of recent, there will be no more community. That means that once again the computer world will be dominated by companies who are out for nothing but money, and as a direct result, you will suffer from it. Even with corporations like Sun Microsystems, who are big supporters of this community, if the community turns south, it will start to hurt them as well, resulting in them ceasing involvement with it.

As much as you all say *BSD is dead, you do nothing but complain about how it is dead, and why nobody should focus on it any more. Wouldn't someone truly in the spirit of open-source do what they could, or contribute to *BSD in some way to help it? You must all see that the reason any OS will fail is because of a lack of support from a community. Even Windows would disappear off the face of the earth should no person want to use it or support it. I do not believe that *BSD is dead, but with respect to those who do, please answer my question. Why do you continue to say this without making a effot to help? The only reasons I can find is that it is either easier for you to just complain and do nothing, or you vent personal frustration on it thus making yourself feel better at the expense of others. Both are acceptable, but there are other answers that would benefit the community as a whole as well.

This community greatly reminds me of a failed Communist government. It started with intentions to make everyone equal, and make everything available to everyone on the terms that some people would give to the community as well as take. But this proves that history repeats itself, even on a medium such as the Internet. It would seem to me that once again a Communist government has failed because of one thing. Money. Greed from corporation's, people's frustration from it, and a mixed, and cut-throat atmosphere have destroyed it. The people are becoming bitter, and taking harsh sides, (Note the way people acted during the Russian/Soviet revolutions, because the community activity matches up quite well with what we see here) and making bitter enemies.

As much as it would seem, that all hope is lost, it is not. With cooperation of this community, and a re-focus of what we all try to stand for, we can rebuild it into something far greater, and something remarkable that can leave it's positive mark on the world for future generations to behold.

Please, join me and join all of us who want to make this community great, and voice your thoughts on what this should become. Lets build toward a future, not destroy it. I am going to call this emotion of mine the "Open-source Manifesto" and hope that one day the world will share it for the good of not only the Internet, but the people that love it so.

Regards,
Chris Gilbert

Re:Please Ask Yourself This

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the same reason for any "war" between hardware or software enthusiasts. Somebody tries something, likes it, tries something else for one reason or another (perhaps because their peers use the same) and then feels the need to justify their choice to the world. These people simply can't convince themselves that their choice is right for them without the support of others. In many cases, these people attempt to garner support by slandering the opposition, regardless of how ignorant, misleading, or just plain wrong they may be.

The majority of these folks read a line or two from another well-known militant promotant on some randon message board or website and then regurgitate the same line over and over, never truly knowning what it even means.

In the end, it really boils down to one thing:

Small dicks.

Re:Please Ask Yourself This

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm perfectly happy using both GNU/Linux and *BSD, currently I'm using OpenBSD 3.0 and Debian Woody, and I love them both, it's the *BSD vs GNU/Linux war that f*cks up everything, people tend to refuse to try new things out of spite because of ill feelings.
I think some *BSD users should swallow their pride and try out Debian, and vice versa.
As soon as the FreeBSD NVIDIA driver get's released and has full glx support working, I will run FreeBSD
on my next machine, but I will continue to use Debian as much as ever.

Re:Please Ask Yourself This

[scrytch]

I have a question of this community. I remember back in the days when conversations would be carried out over BBS forums/newsgroups.

The first day I installed FreeBSD and had problems with the bootloader, I went over to #freebsd on efnet and asked for help. The guy who wrote the bootloader helped me out. Perl problems get answered with regularity on #perl. Both of those channels are fairly sick of newbies asking FAQ's, but that attitude was around in the old days too ... asking the gurus something that was beneath them was to beg for their forbearance with your ignorance.

There's irc.openprojects.net, which is well-known for being a helpful place that even helps with FAQ's.

Finally, you could do with toning down your lofty rhetoric, it's frankly over the top. The people you want to appeal to are smart folks who don't care for demagoguery and emotional manipulation. This is operating systems, not world peace.

Re:Please Ask Yourself This

[Arandir]

The users fight each other all the time.

But the people actually building stuff rarely if ever fight.

Get a Debian and FreeBSD user locked in the same closet and blood will flow out under the door. Lock a Debian and FreeBSD developer in the same closet and you'll get a new feature.

Re:Please Ask Yourself This

[Ded Bob]

Both of those channels are fairly sick of newbies asking FAQ's...

Just a note for everyone: newbie questions would best be asked on #FreeBSDHelp.

Why?

[PhoenixK7]

Seriously, why do you people waste so much energy flaming every time there's a post about BSD/MacOS/MacOSX/Be/etc. Why the heck do you care what someone else uses?! If it gets their job done, and they like it, whats the use posting unconstructive things like:

"It sucks!! Why are you using it!!??"

"Its dead/dying!!"

etc..

If you're going to whine and complain about someone elses OS, at least provide _VALID_ _TECHNICAL_ points.

Re:Why?

[T-Punkt]

Because it's different to what they are using. Simple minded people fear what's different, think of racism, McCarthyism, relegious or cultural conflicts...

Re:Why?

[lyberth]

Yet another post by a teenage coward who dosn't have the skills to explain why.

Sysinstall needs *something*

[swb]

Systinstall works pretty well for installation, especially if you do a complete non-X installation. It gets weird if you try to do anything out of the ordinary, tho.

I've actually roached a disk or two trying to do post-installation partitioning of a disk with sysinstall. To do this day I'm not sure what went wrong. Heh, nor do I remember how to make FBSD partitions and slices using fdisk and disklabel..

I think the biggest obstacles to improvement is probably the urge to fit the whole thing on two floppies. I'm sure no one will agree with me, but it'd be nice to see some modularization that would create multiple disk 2s depending on what kind of install you were doing -- CD, FTP, NFS. Putting those methods and their supporting code on seperate disk 2s might leave enough room to clean up and strengthen sysinstall.

One thing I don't think it needs is a GUI installer, or lots of flash. I'm not sure why people like GUI installs so much, but a clean, text-based installer seems so much easier to work with than a bad UNIX GUI.

FreeBSD for play, Linux for work

[Eric Green]

I love playing with FreeBSD, but sometimes I have to get work done. FreeBSD is Unix. Linux is Linux. They're different operating systems, and have different goals. FreeBSD aims to be a good Unix. Linux aims to be a good general-purpose operating system that happens to be POSIX compliant (well, sort of). I find that when I need to get work done, though, FreeBSD doesn't hack it for me other than as a web server.

-E

FreeBSD vs. Linux "war"

[Eric Green]

This "war" has been going on for as long as the two have existed, and is carried over from the BSD vs. Sys V wars of the late 80's (that Sys V won when BSD-based SunOS, the last major commercial BSD release, was sunsetted and replaced with SysV-based Solaris). FreeBSD is, of course, BSD. Linux started out very Sys V'ish.

There are a number of us who switch back and forth between the two based on what we feel like running at any given time. For example, I did the port of mtx to FreeBSD myself, mostly by reading their scsictl source code.

Lately I've been stymied in doing this by the resolute refusal of the FreeBSD and Reiser people to get along. The Reiser file system is the best filesystem for Linux right now -- it does away with that aweful inode limit for example (I need the ability to put 40,000,000 symlinks onto a single volume, no, that's not a typo, these symlinks are pointing off into a virtualized DVD jukebox). So some of my most important filesystems on my home server are now Reiser'ed. That basically means that it has become excruciatingly difficult to flip back and forth between the two. Other than going back to the pathologically broken ext2 filesystem (which is altogether too shaky for my preference), there's little I can do about that situation. Thus FreeBSD has faded from my horizons lately, even though I've been very frustrated by the Linux 2.4 kernel (well, up until 2.4.18, which so far actually appears to WORK RIGHT, a new thing for 2.4 series kernels!). The fact that my employer can't find any jukebox virtualization software for FreeBSD undoubtedly contributes to this too (we have found at least four different commercial jukebox virtualization packages for Linux).

Re:FreeBSD vs. Linux "war"

[NWT]

I can get along with both of em, FreeBSD as server-os and linux for the desktop ... they're both great systems, each with its advantages and disadvantages ...

Re:FreeBSD vs. Linux "war"

[Ded Bob]

I did not understand your last paragraph. It looks like you are comparing ext2 to Reiser. FreeBSD supports neither. You are comparing Linux to Linux. Are you saying the FreeBSD's UFS does not handle 40,000,000 symlinks on a single volume?

OT: why in the world would you need 40,000,000 symlinks? I doubt you have that many songs on a DVD jukebox, so I cannot imagine the need. I am just curious.

Re:Linux is dying

[lyberth]

I expected this kind of meaningless bs from a linux guy, but never from a bsd guy. and i thought that a bsd guy would have the guts to post unanonymously

Re:*BSD is dying

[lyberth]

ohh wittle teenage spammer, did someone piss in your soup? did someone make you jealoux by making a better os? do you want a glass of milk?
Don't worry anonymous coward. even thou *BSD will never die, nobuddy will take away your linux.

BSD is DEAD?

[sofawarrior]

I guess the "BSD is DEAD" boneheads do not manage servers on the net.. Can you say STABLE.. SECURE, UPTIME? As for support? -- Rackspace offers FreeBSD on Dedicated servers with 24x7 Support.. Hmm I have never called them for support on my machines.. wonder why? Isn't Hotmail still "stuck" with BSD on the backend? I remember an article on the WALNUT CREEK ftp server, serving more ftp users daily (over a terrabyte of data) on a single Pentuim Pro than the entire MS FTP Farm (700 GB)... Hmm I recently remember having to change out 3 Linux boxes to FreeBSD because the Linux boxes choked on 160K mail messages per hour. Hmm have not recieved an alarm on the FreeBsd boxes in six months.. I wonder if my pager is broken?

Re:BSD is DEAD?

[Anonymous Coward]

It might be. If you want, you can post the phone number for it, I'm sure the kind, ever helpful trolls of slashdot will test it for you. ;)

Where is LainOS on that schedule?

[Anonymous Coward]

I just got done reading this great story how FreeBSD will become this amazing anime based OS with animated splash screens. The guy looked like he done an astounding amount of work in only three days, yet I don't see any mention of LainOS in the schedule? What snobby BSD bastards.

Re:Where is LainOS on that schedule?

[xA40D]

LAIN OS is, by all accounts, a new BSD flavour, forked from FreeBSD. So why the hell should a FreeBSD schedule mention it?

Dying?

[sysop]

Are all of these anonymous posts coming from Redmond? Someone is trying really hard to spread FUD about FreeBSD.

I recently shifted a 200Gb web cache array from FreeBSD to Debian/2.4 on the basis of popular opinion about linux-vs-BSD performance, and I've been dissapointed with the results. VM stability definately affects quality and long-term performance.

DaemonNews question

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a question about DaemonNews: the art looks like it was drawn by somebody's wife. Likely a beautician or a soccer mom, by the DEclining quality.

Will they take bad art from people who aren't sleeping with the editor too?

Re:DaemonNews question

[Anonymous Coward]

Begging pardon, but DaemonNews has the feeling of a Commodore Users Group.

Looking at the art and content reminds one of fat balding men in thong sandals and Hawaiian shirts, getting together with a box of disks under each arm, ready to swap C-64 software and theorize on the world-changing wonders of the Amiga, once they can someday afford one.

Amateur hour weekends in the community college lecture hall. You can hear the user group leader reciting from Roberts Rules of Order, trying to interrupt the treasurer argument against four packs of hotdog buns instead of three for next month's outdoor picnic.

Somewhere in the background, two prepubescent kids decide it'd be neat to label a new system "certified" because one of them thought of a neat little logo, and both think a new system looks cool.

DaemonNews certification was born.

Nvidia

[Anonymous Coward]

Does Freebsd support the nvidia binary drivers? Seems to me that freebsd is useful for server-only needs.

Kinda funny, this was supposed to be what linux was for 2 years ago...

Re:Nvidia

[Anonymous Coward]

No, none of the BSDs support binary nvidia drivers.

They have only unaccelerated OpenGL for all video cards, and there is no DVI support.

Further, FreeBSD cannot run on any form of LCD display, including laptops. For some reason, many of the more devoted FreeBSD users carry headless laptops however. The logic of this escapes me to this very day.

This is both an outright lie and a troll. The poster obviously knows nothing about FreeBSD.

Most of us use Metro X from Metrolink, available here.

Metro X offers hardware acceleration for most PCI video cards, as well as AGP Voodo 1 and 2 cards, and costs only $249. And with Metro X Professional, for only $399, 16-bit and 24-bit color modes are supported at resolutions over 800x600.

Over six laptop display chipsets are supported, and work has already begun on an nVidia TNT driver. Geforce work will begin once that is complete.

There's really no difference between Linux and FreeBSD where graphic speeds are concerned. FreeBSD does have faster TCP/IP and USB support, however. Let's see Linux touch that!

FreeBSD installation died

[Anonymous Coward]

Starting from the installation - it just doesn't work. If you try to install the latest FreeBSD by booting from the latest floppies and installing over the internet, NEARLY HALF OF THE FTP SITES WHERE YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE ABLE TO DOWNLOAD IT ARE DEAD! It's pretty fucking annoying trying to guess which of the links will work. Seems to me *BSD is dying.

Re:FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, since FreeBSD is dead, what is going to happen to the source code? Is it still legal to use or will it be tied up in the USL lawsuit again? What parts of FreeBSD are still legal to use?

TCP/IP stack in w2k/xp is a failure!!

[Anonymous Coward]

We have Citrix MetaFrame XP and we have several problems daily concerning poorly implemented TCP/IP stack.

Feel free

[Anonymous Coward]

to try the latest www.gentoo.org

Linux + P O R T S = Linux on steroids.

Oh, yeah?

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you seen the Netcraft longest uptimes? Dominated by Linux.

Hhat? Huh? Only one Linux and about 40 BSDs? How about that.

There is a reason for that

[Anonymous Coward]

In a lot of ways it's still "un-intuitive"

It is that way by design - too keep the Linux dorks away.

Re:Give it up.

[Anonymous Coward]

EEEEEEEEENGGGGGHHHH!!! WRONG!!!!

Slashdotters don't use Linux either.

Statistically, they use Windows 2000 with Internet Explorer.

Sad, but true.

Slashdot turns people into retards. I know, look at me.

Re:*BSD is dying

[Anonymous Coward]

+20 Original!!

BSD/Linux tension split between user types

[Groganz]

Most posters dissing FreeBSD do so because because it doesn't work some piece of their desktop hardware or because a piece of software wasn't installed by default. Most people complimenting FreeBSD are doing so on the basis of its server perfomance/stability. I think it shows where a lot of this tension is coming from. The Linux posters appear to be mostly desktop users and the FreeBSD posters mostly server users, so is there any wonder that there are going to be differences in what each is looking for in the OS?

Re:BSD/Linux tension split between user types

[Anonymous Coward]

Most Linux users who bash *BSD do so out of frustration over being made to look like idiots. Most *BSD users who bash Linux are proffessional IT folks who have no time or patience for (usually Linux) idiots.
Remember: "GNU is for people who hate commercial development, BSD is for people who love freedom".