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Overview of the BSDs
zeekiorage writes "A good informative article about the various BSD OSs, their legacy, philosophy and importance on the ExtremeTech web site. Excerpt from the article: 'Nowadays, the term 'The BSDs' refers to the family of operating systems which were derived, to a greater or lesser extent, from BSD. The five best known BSDs are FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, BSD/OS, and Darwin (which serves as the foundation for Apple's MacOS X). But virtually all modern operating systems -- from Windows to BeOS to Linux -- rely on crucial BSD code to run.'"
What is BSD? If you ask a typical computer "expert," he or she is likely to reply
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(incorrectly!) that it is "an operating system." The correct answer, however, is more complex than that.
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BSD is -- among other things -- a culture, a philosophy, and a growing collection of software, most (though not all) of which is available for free and with source code.
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Here are the origins of BSD and the operating systems it has spawned.
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BSD stands for "Berkeley Software Distribution," the name first given to the University of California at Berkeley's own toolkit of enhancements for the UNIX operating system.
Friends don't let friends drink and dual-boot.
"I may be quite wrong." - Socrates
Do you shut your eyes when you drive through bad neighborhoods, too?
You don't know what you're missing.
-DDT
So long, michael. Don't let the door hit you...
i confess i'd been curious and completely oblivious to BSD until this article (and i'd attempted research... all my searches were just too vague to really address the "linux vs. bsd" question, and the differences between the BSDs) - and my impression from the article, is thus:
;-p
if the oddly mixed world of free and open software were like some role-playing game...
linux would be the rather barbarous, anarchal tribes living in the wilderness. some of us would be religious war-chiefs (FSF/GNU), and others of us form tribes for the sole purpose of survival (the distros) making war over "Civilization" (Microsoft), in hopes of redefining it. the religious tribes seek enlightenment, to change the universe's consciousness to the greater good.
BSD is the more civilized, almost like Tolkien's elves, living off the OSS landscape with an higher academic purpose. they, unlike the linux tribes, live cooperatively with "Civilization", content in and of themselves to know that theirs is the glue binding the Universe.
-- i'm sure this sounds sarcastic, but i intend to be humourous.
as seems to be the case with many articles, this one completely ignored that not every (not-)Unix user *buys* or downloads a distribution. sometimes the best linux's are those we roll ourselves. in this fantasy, we Linux-From-Scratcher's would be rogues, living off the land ourselves and scorning cooperatives. (some of us rogues GNU-priests, others agnostic.)
are these non-existant among the BSDs? can you not "roll your own" BSD? (if you can, please tell me... i'm curious to try some BSD).
i think the author misunderstands (or is simply firmly against) the GPL. it's obvious by the success of distro's like RedHat that Stallmanesque Freedom does *not* dismiss profit (though RH is often under fire for *not* being Stallmanesque). my impression, then, is that BSD is not GNU-friendly - perhaps even antagonistic.
and it seems the author also misunderstands the distros... Caldera, SuSe, RedHat, i recall the author mentioning; businesses making profit, using whatever software is available. following the (apparent) BSD methods of development are Debian and (i'd argue) Slackware. how are these two distributions so radically different from BSD's development scheme?
thanks for posting the article! it finally answered some of my BSD questions (and created more questions) - it's good to know how the folks on the other side of the figurative open-source pond live.
btw, count me a GNU-layman rogue who trades freely among the tribes and collegiates.