Slashdot Mirror
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.'"
While i use OpenBSD 3.1 on my server at home, and love their security standpoint, i couldn't help but correct the article. It mentions that there's been one hole in 6 years, what it doesn't say, is that it is only the default install that has that track record, not the ports database or any of the apps people compile themselves. It's an important distinction to make.
I think (the 1 paragraph answer), Linux is popular because of the "Tech Boom Era", where companies could get millions in funding for having a business plan written on a napkin. Linux embodied the "One Smart Guy Takes On The World", and "Everything Is Changing" ideals that drove the economy a few years back. To think that Linus, a single guy, with a rag-tag group of developers, with their sandals and freakishly stylish hair, could make an OS that would compete with the biggest and best offerings from Sun and IBM. Its a cultural thing. Linux had timing. BSD has been around much longer, and its much more mature than Linux. Linux has GREAT marketing, BSD has (basically) none.
Its not about the technology, but about the marketing, the timing, and the media's embrace.
The Linux community is larger. I'm guessing that this is because Linux was written for x86 origionally, and was therefore available for the platform just about everybody has before BSD was. Obviously this is not true now, but momentum is a hard thing to overcome. I'm not confident on my timeline here, so if someone could prove that BSD was available for x86 prior to 1991, I'd happily concede the point.
The Linux community is less mature. Obviously there are some negative aspects to this, and I'm sure you could find a few BSD folks who would be happy to list them for you. However, there are positive aspects as well. The most important, I think, is that it leads to more focus on things "normal" people (meaning people who aren't sysops) care about, like games. This lures more "normal" people into the community, who lure their frinds into the community, making it larger.
The Linux community is more vocal. I think this is largely connected to the "immaturity" of the Linux community, and serves as both blessing and curse. Regardless, the world listens to those who speak out, and the fact that our culture glorifies youth almost to the point of worship goes a long way towards mitigating the negative aspects of the lack of maturity in the public eye.
Anyway, that's my take on it. For the record, I'm a Linux guy. To my knowledge I have never used a BSD.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.