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.
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.
The best of FreeBSD? Well some would say the best of FreeBSD is the BSD part (license and architecture). Another advantage (and what I like a lot) is the ability to keep track of the CVS tree and "make world" any time you want and have a completely upgraded core system. The ports system is also in my mind infinitely preferable to binary package hell. Ports has been tried in some linux distributions I believe (Gentoo? not sure). So in a way, some of the best parts of the BSD's are going into linux
On the other hand, linux because of it's size and diversity will never have the core development group, and central design that the BSD's have.
Why is that a good thing? Hell, once you install a FreeBSD distribution, you never have to install another one on the same computer again (assuming you don't mess it up :-). Just point your cvsfile at the branch you wish (RELENG_4 in this case) and do a buildworld, and voila! You will have FreeBSD 4.7.
No matter where you go... there you are.
The advantages of FreeBSD over Linux is:
Yes, linux is nice
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
I suggest trying it out. If by support you are referring to hardware, it is true that FreeBSD is not as heavily advanced as Linux. FreeBSD is built more as a server operating system than a desktop operating system, and as such, the developers are more worried about producing a stable operating system and hardening the actual core than providing driver support for the latest and greatest soundcard. Don't get me wrong, they do have an excellent list of supported hardware. In my experience, FreeBSD has been able to utilize my system a heck of a lot better than Linux ever has. Large X processes seem to always have no problem running simultaneously with 3-4 builds taking place in the background. Even binaries built for Linux run at incredible speed; as stated on the FreeBSD website, Linux binaries can even run faster on a FreeBSD machine using Linux emulation than Linux itself can run it. I'm not going to get into a holy war over which operating system is better, because they both definitely have their ups and downs. I do suggest, however, to give FreeBSD a try if you are interested in seeing what it can do.
While I agree with most of what you said, I dislike tracking -stable.
It's far better to track the latest release. Setting the tag to "RELENG_4_7_0" would allow you to grab the exact sources used to build the 4.7 cd, AND any security updates as they come out.
Stable is fine, for home users, but some of the patches MFC'd aren't quite as stable as they should be for production equipment.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
the entire source heirarchy, if need be
Check out SourceMage. This is a linux distro that, with a little work, is always the most up to date Linux distro Ever. You get the source from many different locations, and it's the latest stable version. It also has a nifty theme to it, Magic. You "cast"(install) "spells"(programs) and it downloads the source and compiles and installs it, and creates logs of all that happens. You can "dispel"(uninstall) it. you can "gaze" into the "grimoire"(list of spells). Even if you only get it because you can cast xfree86 or cast linux itself, its fun!
ok made my monthly advertising requirement... :P
find ~your -name '*base* | xargs chown
CURRENT is going to rock when it goes STABLE.
> There's no RedHat FreeBSD, SuSE FreeBSD, Debian FreeBSD, etc. It's just FreeBSD.
Um. Actually there *is* Debian/FreeBSD. You can find more details here: http://www.debian.org/ports/freebsd/
That said, I do agree with your original point.
Slashdot? Oh, I just read it for the articles.
Um, there was an article awhile back on the highpoint driver being stolen. Stolen, meaning that the BSD license wasn't adhered to, as credit wasn't given to the original author.
I can't say that I don't give a fuck. I've just run out of fuck to give.
It is better to track RELENG_4_7, as you then get all the bugfixes and security updates, but none of the tweaks that accompany RELENG_4.
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.
FreeBSD code cannot be "stolen"
Completely untrue... Taking the code and not adhering to the license is stealing. This is what happened when FreeBSD code made it into the linux ATA driver and the copyright was dropped from the source code.
Dinivin
The CVS tag you want is
RELENG_4_7_0_RELEASE
See FreeBSD:CVS Tags
Another day closer to redwood heaven
Just the "stable" branch is sticking around with gcc2.95 the newer more cutting edge "current" branch has gcc3.2. And the reason behind this is gcc 3.2 isn't stable yet and gcc2.95 is and has been stable for quite some time.
ahze@ahze(~) gcc --version
gcc (GCC) 3.2.1 [FreeBSD] 20020901 (prerelease)
ahze@ahze(~) uname -v
FreeBSD 5.0-CURRENT #34: Sun Sep 22 20:30:11 EDT 2002
Comment removed based on user account deletion
/stand/sysintall
Under the Options selection, change the
Release Name: to the appropriate version you want to install.
Then, perform an 'Upgrade' from the main manu.
This will do a binary replacement upgrade.
If you did a custom kernel, it will NOT install the new sources, so before you do this, copy your kernel config file somewhere else and nuke the src directory, or learn about cvsup.
Update your source:- 1/books/h andbook/cvsup.html
- 1/books/h andbook/makeworld.html
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859
Compile your source and kernel:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859
Run cvsup using stable-supfile and ports-supfile, edited as you like, from /usr/share/examples/cvsup. Then "make world." (Much more detail on both of these is available in the FreeBSD Handbook on the FreeBSD web site.) Depending on the capabilities of your box, you'll have a brand-new up-to-date 4.7 system in 30 minutes to 3 or so hours.
FreeBSD had 32bit UIDs quite a while before Linux did.
Please refrain from discussing that which you obviously know nothing about.
FreeBSD boots fine with grub. FreeBSD also comes with its own bootloader; I believe that'll work with Linux (with root on ext2fs).
I have a dual-boot system with FreeBSD -current and Debian Sarge; I have to use grub because my Sarge installation is on XFS.
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
linux_compat on FreeBSD has always been a bit of a guessing game, it certainly is not plug and play.
Generally large scale software upgrades are avoided in a -STABLE branch. That means prefering to backport patches than upgrade to the latest and greatest (OpenSSH was somewhat of an exception because patches were not available at the time). Those who need to version chase can use ports and have a much greater choice and level of control over how things are set up and which versions to go for (gcc3, 3.1, 3.2 and 3.3 are in ports, perl 5.6 and 5.8 too, as are latest OpenSSH, OpenSSH, sendmail, etc).
This keeps cvs deltas down as imports are much more rare (hence making updates smaller) and helps keep only well tested and well known code in base.
I started using FreeBSD a few days ago myself. I've used Linux for several years previously.
The thing that amazed me most about FreeBSD was the speed and response time of the networking. FTP and Samba are near instantaneous in response time on my local network. I have all my mp3s and oggs on there and I play them in Winamp across the network. Previously it would take 5-7 seconds to start an mp3 up, but now since I switched to FreeBSD the startup time is 1-2 seconds.
I don't know about other OS's but I installed my FreeBSD satrting off with just two floppies, now that is cool! Two hours later I had a complete system and never burned the first CD.
Although it may seem to you that some versions of software used in FreeBSD are a few versions behind linux there is a very good reason for this. The FreeBSD ethic values stability before anything. If something works, and the 'newest' version is not stable enough for the Release Team, than the older version will be used. This is the first FreeBSD release to include XFree86 4.2.x as a default package - which you have all been using for a while. As of 4.6, it wasn't considered stable enough, so 3.3.x was used.
FreeBSD's concept of 'stable' it about 10 times more stable than that of most code in various linuxes. That is a conscious, conservative choice made by the core team. And I like that choice.
Insanity is contagious. - Yossarian
Well you can build only portions if you want--the kernel for instance, that's pretty easy. Another option is if you have multiple systems just build on one and then install on all your others from that system (assuming they are the same arch etc...cross-compiling doesn't always work I think). Also, buildworld USED to be an extremely time consuming thing, but now it's not so bad.
Wasting bandwidth? How do you figure? I imagine that downloading text diffs (cvs) to keep your soruce tree in line is quite a bit less impressive that downloading large binary packages for every update?
You have SOMEWHAT of a point with space, but otoh I don't know too many servers anymore that don't have 1GB to spare (for source and compiling--and that is more than needed!)
Overall even given your valid points, I prefer compiling updates--I can tweak options, only compile what is need, compiler optimizations, etc.
gcc-3.2 was released less than two months ago. gcc-2.1 was released less than five months ago. And gcc-3.0 was released not much longer than one year ago.
How many -release- Linux distros can you name that were using gcc-3.2 even thirty days ago?
Face it, gcc-3.2 has not been around "for quite a bit of time now". It is in their -current (unstable) branches, and if you wish to live on the cutting edge, feel free to use them. But two months is nowhere near the amount of time required to properly test the inclusion of a new compiler in a system with a reputation for stability.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
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
I don't think Linux qualifies as a System V,
though it has borrowed some concepts from System V.
There is a formal definition of what is and is not
a System V unix. Last I checked it was called the
SVID (System V Interface Definition), but that may
have changed by now.
Ben "You have your mind on computers, it seems."
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.