Slashdot Mirror
FreeBSD 4.7-RELEASE
Triumph The Insult C writes "FreeBSD 4.7 is out. Here is the announcement. New items include an option for IPFW2, a number of disk controller updates, security updates, and some changes to userland. Remember, please use a mirror." Among other things, the release announcement says: "FreeBSD 4.7 also incorporates all of the security and bug fixes from
4.6.2 (released in August 2002), including several ATA-related
bugfixes, updates for OpenSSL and OpenSSH, and fixes to address
several security advisories." And here are the release notes.
I've been waiting for an upgrade.
http://saveie6.com/
Just a question, I'm not knocking FreeBSD.
But I'm seeing Linux coming up so fast... Is there a likelyhood of putting the best of FreeBSD into Linux and getting a single best-of-breed Free Unix distribution?
My blog
nice(1) now uses the -n option to specify the ``niceness'' of the utility being run.
Doesn't that just sound like a happy command?
Who is John Galt?
Instead of pointing to the front page, it may be more useful to point at the mirror list.
I can't say that I don't give a fuck. I've just run out of fuck to give.
I think its a good thing i didnt buy 4.6 from the London (UK) Linux Expo then isnt it :)
;) )
No, dont ask me why they were selling BSD (quite heavily actually) along side Linux on most stalls.
Oh, and a note to KDE and Gnome teams, having blank stalls with two spotty kids sitting at laptops, with no promotional items or banners or posters really isnt a good way to promote your product guys. (And believe it or not, they were sat next to each other, AND NOT FIGHTING
It seems to me, from reading the release notes, that FreeBSD is running behind Linux on the support side. I am seeing things that are being released for FreeBSD that have been released for Linux, in the stable environment, for quite a while now (unfortunately I cannot provide exact dates.) I'm just wondering what the major benefit of using FreeBSD is. Linux has been the most stable OS I have yet to use. I haven't tried FreeBSD, yet. Perhaps I'll put this new distro on one of my junky PIIs or something.
:)
I have heard (rumors) that FreeBSD is the most amazing OS to exist; that it's much more stable than Linux will ever be. Just curious if it's for the Uber-Geek people. I put myself in that category and am wondering if I need it to complete my Uber-Geekness.
find ~your -name '*base* | xargs chown
I love FreeBSD b/c of it's security and it's great ports system. I wish there was a linux distro on par with those two aspects of FreeBSD. But the one problem with FreeBSD for me?
No native JDK 1.4.
It's on linux, windows and solaris. The announcment of the license thingy with Sun came out 12/01 and I haven't heard anything yet.
How come FreeBSD has no cardbus support?
That's the only thing keeping me from running it on my laptop.
I get lots of free BSD's already with Windows
so why is the article called "Free BSD"?
cha ching! Tasteless humor!
I thought *BSD weren't so for the masses, so why the '-n' for cp and mv when you have yes?
Linux hackers have stolen ATA driver code from FreeBSD. Yes, stolen. And on Red Hat's dime, too.
another release goes by...
remove NOT from email.
I want to try BSD... but have some questions before doing so. My computer has both win xp and linux. I am going to buy another hard disk to put freebsd. Can I boot bsd with grub? also... Can anyone please tell me why some people prefer bsd from linux? doesn't linux have more support? does unreal tournament run under bsd(I don't thinks so)? I'm a bsd newbie but been using linux for about 2 years. What differences would I find? thanks
OpenBSD 3.2 will be released on November 1, and pre-orders have started! Check openbsd.org
I love FreeBSD. I would run it in place of Linux... but my Audigy doesn't work. And I don't have accelerated nvidia drivers (though I did read something about those coming to FreeBSD?). But the nvidia issue isn't important... I need sound, and that's all there is to it... and I refuse to use those payware drivers that apparently don't support the digital out on the card.
Happy New Year, it's 1984!
just a curiosity...what is the reason that all the *BSDs are sticking to gcc2.95.x? I know that Linux has been using gcc3.2 for quite a bit of time now, and it can be considered somewhat stable.
I've noticed snappier performance from FreeBSD compared to RH Linux, on the same hardware, but FYI - FreeBSD code cannot be "stolen". I suggest you re-read the license.
People have been beating the shit out of gcc 2.95.x for at least a year or two; gcc 3.2 is still a bit recent.
High UID support probably hasn't even hit the FreeBSD radar yet... Makes FreeBSD non-usable by decent sized institutions that have a large number of users. Otherwise I'd actually be taking a look at it.
--JLockard - "Some mornings, it's just not worth chewing through the leather straps." - Emo Phillips
The various BSDs are not differet distributions of a single operating system. They originate from a single source code base, but are separate operating system.
Their kernels differ (often substantially), their filesystem layouts and utilities (to some degree) differ, their packaging systems differ, etc. There is cross pollination, and it's easier to adapt kernel features among the BSDs than between BSD and other *nix type operating systems, but they are not the same Beastie.
And while we're on the topic, OsX is not really a BSD operating system; it's a Mach microkernel with a BSD layer on top that provides some utiltiy functionality. It's not substantially BSDish.
Being a relative newbie to FreeBSD, how do I go about upgrading my 4.6.2 box to 4.7?
ÕÕ
what are you smoking ?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Ridiculous claim since Linux binaries are supported at the kernel level.
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
Here is a mirror.
I'm glad 4.7 is out, but I want to know one thing:
When does 5 come out?
Does this mean that you can run the 1.4 JDK if you have the ABI support for Linux enabled?
there's no place like ~
Yeah, what's up with that? It really bites -- I know people who've switched from running FreeBSD to Linux just for the Java support on their servers.
While there is a native unofficial 1.3 port, I've heard a friend (professional Java developer) run into a few random problems that he couldn't reproduce on the Linux 1.3 JDK. Then again, knowing Java, it's probably another one of those "Write One, Test Everywhere" issues.
Another issue with FreeBSD is its weak threading support. A lot better in -current, but there won't be a release of -current for a month or so (and even then, it'll take a 5.1 release before people start using it in anger).
Ah, I hope it will support my promise Supertrak SX6000 RAID controller.
hmm:
The pst driver, for supporting Promise SuperTrak ATA RAID controllers, has been added.
Sweet. There is hope, thank you Søren Schmidt.
And ftp.freebsd.org is hosted by a local ISP, as well as the local mirror. Ah, I will have the disc in 40 minutes. yes.. Now if only I haven't drunk that bottle of wine for dinner, oh well. just makes installing that more fun.
my sig
Er, write onCe, test everywhere.
I started playing with it a week ago and now I'm thinking about abandonning RH for FreeBSD: so far, I've had nothing but good experiences with it:
- all the stuff I like (bash, Python, Java, PostGres, webmin) is there
- KDE is fast, very fast!
- boot time is amazingly fast
- the Ports system is *amazing*
what's not to like about it?
there's no place like ~
linux_compat on FreeBSD has always been a bit of a guessing game, it certainly is not plug and play.
here is why:
... ... .. ..
www.gentoo.org
faster then FreeBSD, better ports system than FreeBSD.
Native java support,
NVidia
Clustering
Journaling FS
.
"Your husband is somewhat dead."
"Sir -- I got your daughter somewhat pregnant."
I think you should reconsider your definition of "stable" somewhat.
Hmmm... yes I know, many ex FreeBSD user uses Gentoo Linux on their desktop now.
Including me.
FreeBSD is nice, but I found Gentoo faster and better quality.
CVSup is nice, not as nice as Portage though.
Gentoo makes a nicer, faster desktop.
FreeBSD is OK otherwise.
Then wait till 5.0 comes out and use it. As far as I know FreeBSD current is the only Unix running gcc-3.2.1 [prerelease] and they just imported a new gcc snapshot a few days ago [or yesterday.... I forget].
:). I am pretty impressed at 5.0's progress as of late. I can't wait till they get it more stable :)
The only Unix I run on my PC right now is FreeBSD CURRENT which is only for the uber-geek or the person who doesn't care when stuff dies
Did you not read what was written?
Let me quote for your feeble comprehension skills:
If you get FreeBSD 4.7, it is exactly the same as anybody else's FreeBSD 4.7 in terms of included software. There's no RedHat FreeBSD, SuSE FreeBSD, Debian FreeBSD, etc. It's just FreeBSD.
"FreeBSD" != "BSD"
I browse at +5 Flamebait- moderation for all or moderation for none.
Write once, run on Windows and Solaris. Fuck Java and fuck you if you want Java.
I'd like to try out BSD, but last time I tried FreeBSD (4.4 IIRC)
I was unable to get it to install, in large part due to the really
bizarre way it handles partitions. Now, I may not be an expert,
but I'm no newbie to partitioning either; I've got DOS 6, two
distinct Windows versions, and two different Linux distros on my
main home system now, plus a couple of hosted systems (BeOS and
QNX, both within disk images on FAT partitions). My friends think
I'm crazy because I run fdisk in a window while X11 or the Win32
GUI is running. But something to do with what partitions can be
booted (my only free partitions are on the second drive, and well
past 1024 cyllinders) or with the disklabel thingy has been
preventing me from getting it to work.
Is there an installation guide that explains in detail what has to
be done to get it to work in a multiboot scenerio like mine?
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
[ed note, the following text, former FreeBSD developer Mike Smith gives his reasons for abandoning FreeBSD]
When I stood for election to the FreeBSD core team nearly two years ago, many of you will recall that it was after a long series of debates during which I maintained that too much organisation, too many rules and too much formality would be a bad thing for the project.
Today, as I read the latest discussions on the future of the FreeBSD project, I see the same problem; a few new faces and many of the old going over the same tired arguments and suggesting variations on the same worthless schemes. Frankly I'm sick of it.
FreeBSD used to be fun. It used to be about doing things the right way. It used to be something that you could sink your teeth into when the mundane chores of programming for a living got you down. It was something cool and exciting; a way to spend your spare time on an endeavour you loved that was at the same time wholesome and worthwhile.
It's not anymore. It's about bylaws and committees and reports and milestones, telling others what to do and doing what you're told. It's about who can rant the longest or shout the loudest or mislead the most people into a bloc in order to legitimise doing what they think is best. Individuals notwithstanding, the project as a whole has lost track of where it's going, and has instead become obsessed with process and mechanics.
So I'm leaving core. I don't want to feel like I should be "doing something" about a project that has lost interest in having something done for it. I don't have the energy to fight what has clearly become a losing battle; I have a life to live and a job to keep, and I won't achieve any of the goals I personally consider worthwhile if I remain obligated to care for the project.
Discussion
I'm sure that I've offended some people already; I'm sure that by the time I'm done here, I'll have offended more. If you feel a need to play to the crowd in your replies rather than make a sincere effort to address the problems I'm discussing here, please do us the courtesy of playing your politics openly.
From a technical perspective, the project faces a set of challenges that significantly outstrips our ability to deliver. Some of the resources that we need to address these challenges are tied up in the fruitless metadiscussions that have raged since we made the mistake of electing officers. Others have left in disgust, or been driven out by the culture of abuse and distraction that has grown up since then. More may well remain available to recruitment, but while the project is busy infighting our chances for successful outreach are sorely diminished.
There's no simple solution to this. For the project to move forward, one or the other of the warring philosophies must win out; either the project returns to its laid-back roots and gets on with the work, or it transforms into a super-organised engineering project and executes a brilliant plan to deliver what, ultimately, we all know we want.
Whatever path is chosen, whatever balance is struck, the choosing and the striking are the important parts. The current indecision and endless conflict are incompatible with any sort of progress.
Trying to dissect the above is far beyond the scope of any parting shot, no matter how distended. All I can really ask of you all is to let go of the minutiae for a moment and take a look at the big picture. What is the ultimate goal here? How can we get there with as little overhead as possible? How would you like to be treated by your fellow travellers?
Shouts
To the Slashdot "BSD is dying" crowd - big deal. Death is part of the cycle; take a look at your soft, pallid bodies and consider that right this very moment, parts of you are dying. See? It's not so bad.
To the bulk of the FreeBSD committerbase and the developer community at large - keep your eyes on the real goals. It's when you get distracted by the politickers that they sideline you. The tireless work that you perform keeping the system clean and building is what provides the platform for the obsessives and the prima donnas to have their moments in the sun. In the end, we need you all; in order to go forwards we must first avoid going backwards.
To the paranoid conspiracy theorists - yes, I work for Apple too. No, my resignation wasn't on Steve's direct orders, or in any way related to work I'm doing, may do, may not do, or indeed what was in the tea I had at lunchtime today. It's about real problems that the project faces, real problems that the project has brought upon itself. You can't escape them by inventing excuses about outside influence, the problem stems from within.
To the politically obsessed - give it a break, if you can. No, the project isn't a lemonade stand anymore, but it's not a world-spanning corporate juggernaut either and some of the more grandiose visions going around are in need of a solid dose of reality. Keep it simple, stupid.
To the grandstanders, the prima donnas, and anyone that thinks that they can hold the project to ransom for their own agenda - give it a break, if you can. When the current core were elected, we took a conscious stand against vigorous sanctions, and some of you have exploited that. A new core is going to have to decide whether to repeat this mistake or get tough. I hope they learn from our errors.
Future
I started work on FreeBSD because it was fun. If I'm going to continue, it has to be fun again. There are things I still feel obligated to do, and with any luck I'll find the time to meet those obligations.
However I don't feel an obligation to get involved in the political mess the project is in right now. I tried, I burnt out. I don't feel that my efforts were worthwhile. So I won't be standing for election, I won't be shouting from the sidelines, and I probably won't vote in the next round of ballots.
You could say I'm packing up my toys. I'm not going home just yet, but I'm not going to play unless you can work out how to make the project somewhere fun to be again.
= Mike
--
FreeBSD Unleashed a really good book
,to see what all the hub bub was all about.
having 6 months of linux experience, i decided to give myself a crash course in FreeBSD
using the book, i learned the ins/outs of the install process, some of the idealogy, and learned about ports (really cool way to get/update software)
Running Mac OS X 10.2.1 (`Jaguar') here, which is of course built on the BSD-family OS Darwin -- "Apple Computer, Inc. GCC version 1161, based on gcc version 3.1 20020420 (prerelease)".
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
Putting gel-filled bags into Natalie Portman's tits is no problem at all. The problem is always getting the desired aesthetic result. It's very easy (see Erika Eleniak, for instance) to damage what was absolutely perfect in an effort to improve it.
Slackware has a BSD-style configuration, differently from the other distros you mentioned, which are SystemV-based. Therefore, Slackware is notoriously difficult to configure.
I'm sure you get that in many statistics packages. Or you might try the "average" command, instead.
I have a piece of cra..., i mean, a modem PCtel HSP on board, and I cant afford a new (real) modem for now. But Id like a lot to install FreeBSD as my desktop OS. Someone knows about someone who got that modem workin on a FreeBSD???
I have seen this "FreeBSD is more stable than Linux" before, and I always wonder how do you prove that. I have worked with Linux servers since 1998 and I have never seen one crash. I'm talking about one year or more average uptimes, the kind of system which you only boot to change major kernel versions, like updating from Linux 1.2.13 to 2.0.36. For me, that's *perfect* stability, how can FreeBSD be better than perfect?
The FreeBSD handbook is an excellent guide to all aspects of installing, configuring, and using a FreeBSD system. The allocating disk space section contains well written instructions (with pictures) that explain how disk partitions work on FreeBSD, and how to create them.
On my system, I use the GNU GRUB boot loader (used as the default boot loader in many Linux distributions), and it seems quite able to boot partitions over the infamous 1024 (cylinder?) limit. The GRUB manual suggests this configuration for booting FreeBSD. If you use GRUB, select the "Leave the Master Boot Record" option when you install FreeBSD.
Note that on an Intel 386-compatible system, you'll need a spare primary partition to install FreeBSD. Perhaps you don't have one, as there are only four, and each DOS or Windows install will want one, and one will be used to create the extended partition your Linux distribution is likely to install itself in. It might be easier to buy another hard disk drive.
Tell me, what does an end user gain from the BSD license? I'll tell you what it buys them: an opportunity to get screwed by an entity with a desire to profit at their expense.
The GPL = (BSD license - opportunity for users to get screwed). What about the companies? Please, think of the companies! If it weren't for their inherent greed, the GPL would not have come into being. The GPL is the community's way of saying "You won't be screwing us over any more." They've had their chance, and they've shown us that they are not intersted in the us, but the money - which gives incentive to locking people in.
Why do you think most big projects use the GPL these days? Gnome, KDE, Linux, GCC, Wine, as well as most applications on freshmeat and sourceforge? Because people prefer the GPL - it empowers the end user whereas other licences (such as the BSD license) empowers the guy with the most pull/money/clout/whatever. Everyone knows that the GPL isn't the best license for everything, but it's the preferred license for anything I contribute, and the same holds true for many other people as well.
GPL doesn't prevent you from writing something and selling it - it only prevents you from NOT providing the source to your changes. So? I would do that anyway.
It's very easy:
If don't want your code or it's users will be exploited/denied - use the GPL.
If you don't want your code or it's users will be exploited/denied - use another license.
In my opinion, the 'linux movement' is a mix of things, but it's mostly excitement behind the GPL, or the assurance of a community-driven computing platform, whose interest is only to serve the community, forever.
Why do I keep typing pythong?
Yeah, I have some typos in there. It's late for me.
Why do I keep typing pythong?
I was unable to get it to install, in large part due to the really bizarre way it handles partitions.
Hope you aren't referring to the BSD partitioning system itself. The entire primary/extended partition system is total bullshit. Free BSD handles this very gracefully in that you give the OS a slice. In that slice you cut up stuff and BSD does whatever it wants. About how you would WANT to do partitioning...
The five most popular and successful Open Source applications today are either not under the GPL, or under a dual'ed or exception'ed GPL:
XFree86 - MIT License
Apache - Apache License
Perl - Artistic/GPL
Linux - GPL with exception
Mozilla - MPL/NPL
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
in large part due to the really bizarre way it handles partitions
It's not bizarre, it's just not the Microsoft DOS way.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
You clearly do not understand the dynamics of ... I didn't think so. Troll.
software licensing. Can you please explain the
exact sequence of events that allows your mythical
malefactor to mess with users of BSD-licensed
software?
Ben "You have your mind on computers, it seems."
Does it matter whether the license is dual or not? If it's GPL, then the GPL rules apply, and I still stand by my statement.
My statement mostly applied to newer projects.. Samba, for instance, is GPLed
I mentioned the Wine project. While it's not a server application, it's a very popular piece of software and will probably play a big role in creating an alternative to our current dominant platform. In fact, the Wine project switched their license to LGPL (which still protects users rights) because they saw the potential for everyone to get screwed over.
My point was that I think the success and momentum behind Linux is due to it's licensing. KDE, Samba, Wine, Linux, etc are all what end users see, and it is those people who the GPL seeks to protect.
Why do I keep typing pythong?
There have been problems getting JDK1.4 (linux) working flawlessly under FreeBSD. So grow up when stating 'Ridiculous...'
0 02 -june-2002.html#FreeBSD-Java-Project
If you're going to use a unix as a Java development environment, excluding Sun's, you're forced to use i386 Linux since it's the only other platform with a working 1.4.1 release. Why I won't be switching to OSX!
Latest info I saw was:
http://www.freebsd.org/news/status/report-may-2
Does it matter whether the license is dual or not? If it's GPL, then the GPL rules apply
The GPL part of the dual licensing is typically there just to ensure GPL compatibility. Otherwise the license ends up being least common denominator. This makes a huge difference from the standard GPL. Artistic License + GPL removes all copyleft. MPL + GPL removes the need for GPL linkage chains. Etc.
Even in the trivial case of Linux with a GPL exception, you now have the ability to make standard kernel calls from non-GPL applications. This is not something intended by the GPL.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
I was basically defending the GPL from someone who called it Marxist or whatever..
The Wine project started out with a BSD-style license, and switched to LGPL.
A quote from the page:
"However, with some recent events I cannot disclose, it is clear to me that the opportunity for Wine to be used in a proprietary product is too tempting and has caused some harm to the Wine project. Based on experience, I feel strongly that the potential for harm is great enough that CodeWeavers needs to take two actions. First, we would like to release all new code we develop under an LGPL style license. Second, I would like to open another call for a license change and thereby strongly add my voice to Alexandre's."
Why do I keep typing pythong?
Of course the BSD vs. GPL license debate is not new. Here's a link to a very good article on the subject. The author does lean toward BSD, but there is a lot of good information. Also, here are the author's research notes for the paper.
Neither BSD nor GPL does much for the "end-user" If we're talking about licenses we're talking about coders' and distributors' rights. As a coder, I'll use BSD because I want to give my code away. I want people to use it. I don't care if they make money off of it. If I do care, I'll use GPL. Simple.
My code can't be "exploited" because I said they can do pretty much whatever they hell they want with it (under BSD) I want the code I release to be free in the truest sense. Your code (or modifications) I don't really care about, so do what you want, even if that means re-releasing under GPL.
> He that breaks a thing to find out what it is has
> left the path of wisdom
> -- Gandalf the Grey
Gandalf should stick to saving the world; based on
this quote, I wouldn't trust him with the bizarre
task of installing a free unix on an x86 machine.
Ben "You have your mind on computers, it seems."
Mozilla Is licensed under MPL/GPL/LGPL, and MPL is a copyleft-type license.
To be honest, I'm not sure what the exception is you speak of in reference to Linux. Could you post a link explaining?
Why do I keep typing pythong?
The BSD license is not corporatist any more than
the GPL is Marxist. Just because someone else is
slinging bullshit doesn't mean that you should do
the same.
The quote from the Wine project indicates that the
Wine developers wanted to ensure that Wine could
not be used as the basis for a proprietary product.
Given that, the [L]GPL is an appropriate license
for them to choose. Other developers don't feel
the same way, and for them, the BSD license is a
valid choice.
The right license for a given project depends on
that project's goals. There is no One Right
License for everything. Why is this so hard for
people to understand?
Ben "You have your mind on computers, it seems."
There is no One Right License for everything. Why is this so hard forpeople to understand?
It's not. In fact, I agreed with you in earlier posts on that.
Why do I keep typing pythong?
Linux has more popularity because it has GPL to 'protect' it from corperate greed, but remember, the coperations run the governments nowadays, so really the GPL is a paper thin protection. Does the GPL protect you from people with deep pockets from suing your progent out of existance? no. It doesn't. Does the GPL protect you from compaines claiming they designed the software themselces when it's pretty clear they just obfuscated your GPL code? no, it doesn't. And if you don't have the legal resources to stop them, they'll do it if they want to, GPL or no. At least with FreeBSD companies like Microsoft and Apple that blatently rip-off code give you the credit that is due for having written it in the first place. (and I realize that apple isn't just ripping code off, they're semi-interested in helping the open source community, kinda, as long as it doen't hurt them)
However all that aside, we really need both source licenses available. Because as long as diverse range of open source projects (and licenses) thrive it will be harder for any one comapny to quash them all. And while OSX isn't a 'pure' BSD derivative, I believe that it can only help expose more people to the power of having open source and unix like tools, as well as draw more tech savy users to apple. Although apple doesn't seem to market up the tech savy aspect of OSX.
most of the FTPs seem to be pretty much overloaded, but a really good way to find mirrors is to use a good ftp search like alltheweb.com search for 4.6.2-disc1 or better still 4.7-disc1 (which still wasn't returing results when i posted) and hunting for fast low ping servers running unlisted mirrors, preferably finding a mirror that is geographically close to you. Just make sure you get the md5sum list from the official site. I'm currently pulling 95k of my 100k Downstream cap from an undisclosed university (.edu) mirror. much better than fighting the rush of people trying to mirror the new files from the official sites.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
is the documentation. Yes there's some excellent linux docs on the ldp site but for FreeBSD you can just consult the Handbook for everthing.
Not one mention of the fxp bug fixes in the release notes.
Look at Revision 1.110.2.24 of if_fxp.c
MFC 1.136
Where 1.136 is "fix handling of RNR conditions when using polling"
click me
I really felt a FreeBSD 4.6.2 box I maintain was getting bit by that bug. The interface would just drop dead with a few kernel messages about it croaking.
No native JDK 1.4.
Ridiculous claim since Linux binaries are supported at the kernel level.
DISCLAIMER: My experience is with OpenBSD, not FreeBSD. (However, FreeBSD users have confirmed my findings in considerable detail.)
DISCLAIMER: I hate Java's bloated reeking guts. Java's only purpose in life is to run Freenet until someone rewrites the Freenet reference node into a portable language like C.
My experience with Java and Freenet on OpenBSD is that the Linux native JDK does not work. Freenet will appear to start up and run, but once you actually start using it, it fails miserably. Specifically, the Freenet node listens for connections on two or more TCP/IP sockets. Connections made to any port that Freenet is listening to will be silently dropped if no data are waiting on the socket (e.g., if you telnet localhost 8888 it will drop the connection after accepting it). However, if data are actually waiting in the buffer, the connection may work, at least sometimes (e.g., if you echo -e "GET / HTTP/1.0\n" | nc localhost 8888 it will work most of the time).
As you can imagine, this makes running the software a fool's mission. Things just break and there's no rhyme or reason to it, because there's at least one case where the behavior is nondeterministically broken. And that's just the case that I happened to discover -- who knows what else is lurking in those murky proprietary-Sun-code depths?
Fortunately, Kaffe 1.0.7 seems to work at least acceptably for running Freenet on OpenBSD. (Don't use Kaffe from the ports tree, which is 1.0.6. Kaffe 1.0.6 has serious bugs, at least one of which is in big number handling, which is essential to many of Freenet's encryption algorithms.) Kaffe 1.0.7 has some bugs of its own -- for example, it tended to crash and core dump on me, at least until I commented out one assertion that the Kaffe mailing list said was probably spurious. (And you don't want to see how big a Kaffe/Freenet core file is.)
Yes it does prevent you from selling it, or at least it does prevent you from selling it to the second customer. Why would they bother to purchase it from you if they can just get it from the first customer?
The GPL causes organisations to transition from a sale/licensing model to a professional services model which is a rather large shift for any company that doesn't do it---and frankly the professional services model doesn't work in a number of markets.
This is an argument that I've seen many times, and I don't quite understand exactly how users have the opportunity to get screwed. I mean, ``oh no, someone can put their own license on BSD code!!!'' Well, this does not mean that they can put their license on the original BSD code. So what if they add a few features and slap their own license on it? Does it matter? How exactly are the users getting ``screwed''? Maybe the users might ``get screwed'' if they choose to buy the new code and accept the EULA on it. But, why exactly should I care that they make that choice? In fact, who am I to deny them that choice?
The GPL puts unreasonable restrictions on what I may do with code, and so I generally try to avoid contributing to projects that use it. It is actually too expensive for me to do so, since I do not want to be legally required to provide the source code to things that I write for free to anyone who asks for them for the next 3 years. By using the GPL, I actually ``get screwed'' for writing code. It costs me additional money and time beyond what I'm willing to do for free.
As an example. Say a friend of mine is having a hard time with a piece of GPLed code and he asks for my help. I hack it a bit, and send him the compiled program. It still doesn't quite work, so we repeat the procedure 5 times until it works exactly the way we think that it should and then I send him the final code. Two years later, he still has all 5 binaries that I sent him and src to the 5th one. He asks me for src to the 3rd one, which I don't have because I editted it to make the 4th one. Now, I am in flagrant violation of the GPL and my [ex-]friend may be able to start legal proceedings and what not against me.
It simply isn't worth my time dealing with any of that crap for free, so I will only work on GPLed code if I am paid a lot of money to do it. No sane person assumes a liability without compensation.
Nyah nyah
Gentoo has a ports-like system. I just switched last night into today. Security isn't too bad either, because you have to actively turn things on, instead of turn them all off.
There are four boxes used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order.
BTW, give GPL some freaking credit, it spawned the opensource movement and created many programmers and hobbiests that release some of the best software, FOR FREE.
:)
Good lord, the kiddies think they invented sharing code, next they'll think they invented sex.
The GPL and OpenSource are over-credited. People shared source, wrote missing pieces for others, helped others debug, shared executables (legally), etc. without the GPL or the OpenSource movement. OpenSource did not spawn a movement, it named and branded something that already existed. The only thing that has really changed over the decades is that average people can communicate and share more easily than before. When 300 baud modems ruled the land a lot of sharing was done face to face with a bunch of diskettes. This slowed things down a little. The modern internet made sharing trivially easy and OpenSource and the GPL were swept up and taken along for the ride. They are effects, not causes.
I guess you could give the GPL credit for something else, it politicized sharing. If it never existed we have different acronyms and different politics, but we would probably have similar software.
Dear Editor:
This isn't news. I remember reading this message a year ago. The topic being a lack of java, this message is completely off-topic. It's flamebait. So what the f*ck are you doing posting it?
I see a future when all the hackers can run apt-get from their Debian GNU/Camaro dashboards.
my old sig used to be funny, but then slashcode ate it and now it's not funny anymore
Does it run www.compiere.org's 9 meg jar?
Not to be confused with LaO: SUV- the vehicle most likely to be soon chasing the Method Man Jeep.
Yeah, I saw that show. I cried when the kid killed himself/brain dead.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
i pray that you never see an hp-ux or solaris box..
oh my god.. SLICES!!!...