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Debian NetBSD for Sparc
Dan writes "Matthew Garrett has demonstrated his success in building a Debian operating system on the Sparc architecture on top of the NetBSD kernel. Additionally Joel Baker reported about significant work for the NetBSD/x86 port, such as dpkg and APT, that will work without additional patches. NetBSD runs on hardware unsupported by Linux. Folks working on the project say that porting Debian to the NetBSD kernel increases the number of platforms that can run a Debian-based operating system."
In the begining :
There was nothing
then God said
apt-get install light
Trolling using another account since 2005.
i thought debian was a linux distro. if they make a distro for something other than linux, does that mean its done by the same people, with the same principle behind it, or something like that
or am i jsut really missing the point of what a distro is?
NetBSD can run on more platforms than you can shake a stick at. Also with the ability to run IRIX binaries as well gives it a bit more depth/reach. Just shows what portable code can do. Anyway time to boot my Dreamcast :)
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
...for when I argue against "Debian sucks because it's Linux" *BSD people. Debian is a "universal" operating system (well, let's say "packaging system") -- it's is not strictly Linux. Debian != Linux
On this topic, I remember reading a while back about a Debian FreeBSD project. Anyone know the status of that?
Join Tor today!
So, would someone care to explain why you wouldn't just use NetBSD instead of trying to run a Linux environment with a NetBSD kernel? What benefit does this give you? One of the benefits of BSDs is that they're coherent systems and not a hodgepodge of kernels and userland apps. So again, what is being gained here?
I had debian installed on my UltraAXI and it ran pretty good. NetBSD ran pretty good on it too. Not to get off topic, but UltraSparcs lack variety. Not many linux distros still support Ultra ports well (Redhat stopped at 6.2, MDK stopped at 7.1?, Debian is current!, Gentoo doesn't support X on Ultra (WTF, Idiots) Slack stopped at 6.x? and Splack just isn't bleeding edge). Back on topic, I'm glad to see progress. I'm not into OS flame wars, but I do like things about Debian (apt, dur), and NetBSD (mad portability), so I'm definately going to have to play with this. :-)
Can all fish swim?
Fire up Bochs on your new Debian kernel on your NetBSD OS on your SPARC system and run an i386 system on which you may choose to run ... oh, I don't know, maybe a copy of FreeBSD? Which itself could run Bochs---but in Linux emulation mode? And that could run MS-DOS?
Whatever you do, don't start a Java app at this point!
It is great to see Debian running on everything known to man.. However I have never understood why they are so far behind other distributions?
Gnu/Debian BSD
Why God, Why!?
In related news, scientists for the dairy industry announced that pouring milk into glasses will increase the number of glasses which contain milk.
It would be great to be able to run *BSD on these machines, especially the older ones we have where hp-ux just doesn't hack it anymore.
Who the hell told Carrot Top he was funny?
Or maybe FreeBSD port based (oh wait Gentoo)...
Debian is all about stability. The main branch, Woody, had old packages but they are know to work. You don't get a lot of crashes, things just work. You will find debian people put a lot of work into configs and such like, make sure things interact with each other.
For example say I install a new Apache Modules there are scripts that will automatically update my httpd.conf rather than just writing over it. To get a Debian system up and running is quick and easy as 99% of the tweaking has been done.
Even though things are old they do make sure they are secure. If there is an exploit you can upgrade your system by just doing
apt-get update
apt-get upgrade.
Thats it. Auto download and patch of affected programs
However there is also another unstable branch, Sarge IIRC, which has cutting edge stuff. Latest version of everything. However as implied by its name it could just get up and crash at any moment.
Hope that helps
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
Debian does Dallas.
One of Linux' big problems is a lack of modularity. Building an entire Linux system, from scratch, is an incredible pain; you have to buy books to explain how. This is particularly annoying when, say, you're building a Linux appliance and want to tweak things. You want to compile with -m686? On BSD you just change one setting, run one makefile and everything rebuilds. On Linux you have to configure a zillion packages independantly.
OTOH, one of BSD's big problems is hardware. I have a Hauppauge Nova-T DVB card. Is it supported under BSD? Need you ask? (Although, surprisingly, BT8x8-based TV cards are supported by OpenBSD.) I have a long-term project to build a PVR. If I could use BSD, I'd go for it like a shot --- it's just so much easier to configure. As it is, I have to go for Linux, which is so much of a pain that I haven't been able to muster the energy to get started yet...
However, then, it wouldn't be "Debian/NetBSD" but rather "Debian GNU/NetBSD" (Debian, at least, having already accepted the GNU/Linux moniker).
I really think there are practical advantages to distinguishing between 1) kernel, 2) "everything else", i.e. portable packages ported to run on that kernel, and with each other, and 3) who did the porting/distribution bundling.
Of course, when there is only one varient of one of those three components, i.e. the bits and pieces of what would be GNU, we tend to leave it out, as cumbersome, redundant, and unwieldly, RMS protests of the need to pay hommage (or at least use terminology that conveys GNU roots) notwithstanding. Thus, "Red Hat Linux": there is no other kind of "Linux" packaged by Red Hat (and since they did the bundling, they get to call it pretty much whatever they want (personally, I would have preferred "Up Yours, MS"/OS, but anyway...)), and no techical need for a "Red Hat GNU/Linux" designation.
RMS may want to see us embrace a phisosophical basis for free software, but, without the economic benefits that open source exemplifies, I doubt free software would have the contributions it does. Similarly, without a technical argument for "GNU/Linux", the moniker will likely not be popular. It would be nice, though, if the technical argument were there, so the philosophy and history could get some recognition and representation in common use.
I expect that might come in niche markets: where Linux is combined with severly scaled down portions of GNU, and non-GNU software, particularly in the embedded market: look at BusyBox -- a combination of utilities in a single executible for space reasons. We are seeing attempts to standardize "Linux" for the desktop (LSB), as well as for the embedded space. I, for one, wouldn't mind seeing LSB (Linux Standard Base) become GSB (GNU Standard Base), with LSB dealing solely with a kernel standard, in this vein.
O.K. ObGNU/Linux rant over.
You could've hired me.
Come to think of it, on many levels GNU/FSF has led the charge. Look at how many GPL'ed programs already run on several OS'es. I mean, all that really matters is that nethack works on your os of choice, right?
I wonder how long before we see RedHat XVII for windows..
So long, and thanks for all the Phish
Maybe this will make people stop and think about what "linux" actually is, and where else credit might be due. If you switch out that component, what do you have?
Of course the marketing machine likes the word linux quite a lot, it's catchy, it has panache, it sells, which is why people say things like "wow, how did you get that linux software running on MacOS?" when refering to things like bash, gcc or gnome apps.
>Since when has Debian been ok with BSD licenses?
Like FSF, Allways, BSD is as free as you can get it.
Everyone always complains and bitches about what OS is better, whos has the l33ter OS, who is running the most current kernel, and then proceed to get in bitter flame wars over which OS is better.
This guy has created a product to satisfy one thing for him, which is his curiousity. Isn't that good enough these days? A project based on curiousity should be respected on general the general premise that something creative is being done in the name of innovation.
Maybe if we stopped wasting time arguing and insulting each other about what OS we run, and spend all that time doing something productive like this man has done, we will actually accomplish every goal we set.
Just a thought.
-kalle
the 'main' distribution is, when you add security.debian.org to your /etc/apt/sources.list, updated with backported security fixes and such. so you get the best of both worlds from an admin standpoint: stable software (as the OP said) known to work and work well, plus security updates. subscribing to the debian security list is also a nice, low traffic way to keep up on debian security things. the combination of these factors make debian a damned dream to run as a sysadmin if you have, say, a huge thundering herd of web and database servers to keep happy.
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You'll find quite a bit of GNU software on a default FreeBSD install
Yes, but not so much in a NetBSD install. To take your example of tar(1) for instance, that's now handled by NetBSD's pax(1). The way things are going, the toolchain will be the only GNU software on Net eventually.
Chris
God, being a perfect being, must be using debfoster, the perfect package management tool. So assuming that the only fostered package is man, only packages man depends on should be keepers. If man were to no longer depend on lucifer, it would be automatically unfostered. So either man depends on satan, or God has fostered satan. (I think I've heard both arguments from modern theologists...)