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FreeBSD 4.9 Stability Update
Dan writes "FreeBSD Release Engineering Team's Scott Long would like to get a new poll on the stability and readiness of 4.9. The belief is that the last of the PAE-induced instability was resolved on August 31. Is anyone still experiencing unusual crashes, corruption, etc, on a system that is running with up-to-date sources? Now is the time to speak up and get the problems resolved. Scott is also requesting help with testing. In response to this, we are adding our own poll. Please vote and add comments as appropriate to help Scott."
The PAE manpage says it's about having more than 4GB of memory. What does that have to do with USB support? If there are known problems, do they affect systems with < 4GB? Pointers to PRs and mailing lists appreciated.
Programming can be fun again. Film at 11.
I, for one, am very pleased to see the release team err on the side of caution and make sure that stability issues have been resolved before releasing 4.9. It seems that too much software is release way too early - and while not intended to be a troll - especially Linux with it's libc and kernel du'jour. I'll use Linux when I have no choice, but the stability and ease of use of FreeBSD make it my top choice for my x86 servers.
Can't these Perl geeks figure out a way in slash to disable AC posting just in bsd.slashdot.org? Or even any topic that has the BSD topic assigned to it?
Okay, education point here (if you know, then it's cool. If not, here's something you should know).
The -STABLE branch is NOT STABLE! In the FreeBSD development cycle, the most stable systems run -RELEASE. Major development is done on -CURRENT. Working ideas are then moved into -STABLE (to stablize) -- a -STABLE system is a development system and is not guaranteed to boot. When the -STABLE branch proves itself to be very stable and contains enough new functionality, a -RELEASE snapshot is made. -STABLE should be renamed to -BETA or something similar (it actually was at one point, but this was retracted when a lot of people complained that they didn't want a -BETA branch, they wanted it to be stable).
For more information, please read about -CURRENT and -STABLE and what they really are at http://freebsd.org/handbook/current-stable.html.
Unless you're doing development and if these are production servers, I suggest that you run -RELEASE on them.
www.sitetronics.com/wordpress
Or perhaps the Freedom of a vendor/packager from [insert thing they'd hate] or to [insert thing they'd like].
Or perhaps the freedom of a developer from [insert thing (s)he'd hate] or to [insert thing (s)he'd like].
And how about a packager that also adds some code? Perhaps (s)he wants to sell addons. Perhaps (s)he wants to sell it the first year, then give it away unconditionally except for retaining copyright. To make a living by being able to gain financial reward for (apparently) being in the lead in some area or niche. A fool proof clickety GUI installer for example. Even LGPL could become tricky then.
As and end user you're certainly not going to have any less freedom from using a *BSD product. Unless you perhaps find less hand holding or lack of persistancy or IQ an infringement upon your Freedom. Even Marx would have laughed at that.
I am not an extreme evangelist(sp?) of the *BSD license, neither do I detest the GPL but we have gotten into a situation where people slap a GPL on it without really considering its fine print. It greatly restricts useful reuse of your sourceforge project. If you want that, fine, but do you?
It's a "them vs us" (MS anyone, SCO?) emotion and they sell it very well, especially to young idealistic people who view the world from their social/economical perspective.
Real world example: Ask a few big pr0n sites. Many of them used FreeBSD when "the www" became big and they made money. They still do I think, though it might be less now. They knew back then they needed a robust OS (1995-ish), they still know now.
:)
You apparently don't though
Is it an existing song or could we have a midi or something as to have a better idea. It might get less lame also.
You're probably right. But please understand that it's not the smarter people making the stupid remarks/generalisations/1337ism.
Tell me...if BSD is dying, then how come FreeBSD is running the top five internet servers in speed and reliability? According to Netcraft, which you so frequently post, the top fifty servers with the longest up time are running FreeBSD. And even your beloved Netcraft is running FreeBSD. Additionally, there is an estimated 2,000,000 websites running FreeBSD, and that does not include all of the work stations. You will note that Yahoo uses FreeBSD. All though just a small gallery, the FreeBSD website has a listing of people that are running FreeBSD and have registered it on the website. So forgive me for being cynnical, but to the person that has said repeatedly that there are only 36000 FreeBSD users, go to hell. Honestly, if you are going to post bad numbers, at least get some of them right. According to the gallery of people that announced their FreeBSD use, 3831 are servers if you believe the guy that has said that there are 36000 users. Second the moron that says that there are only 36000 FreeBSD users fails to realize that Usenet postings are not a reliable way of figuring out how many people are really using FreeBSD. Heck, using that logic, I would say that, by Usenet postings, Microsoft Windows is only run on 150,000 machines. Where did you get that 93% of developers have abandoned FreeBSD? If you are going to post give us some evidence.
The SysAdmin magizine survey did not say that FreeBSD was dead last. Rather it said that FreeBSD is 6x slower than Linux in Disk IO functions, but is not nearly as bad as Solaris or Windows (which had a 10x improvment). The SysAdmin maginzine title was "Which OS is Fastest for High-Performance Network Applications?" and Linux won. It did not state that FreeBSD is falling in disarray -- that was a flawed conclusion reached by the annoymous coward. The article says that FreeBSD is not well suited for High-Performance Network Applications. Go to HELL bastard.
Additionally -- how come all you trolls out there have to hide behind annoymous coward? Everytime there is some BSD news, you guys come out of the wood work, make some smart-allick remark and post the same trash. Look, FreeBSD is just as good as Linux and vice versa. FreeBSD has some strong points, and so does Linux. Just because you belong the cult of the Penguin does not mean that you have the right to use the same tactics as SCO -- FUD.
The views expressed are mine own and do not express the views of my employer.
Dude, dont take the BSD trolls so seriously. They KNOW that BSD isnt dying.
They prey on the common arrogance and over-protectionistic attitudes you guys have and it just FEEDS THEM TO POST MORE CRAP.
Wow, the folks who created ext2 and ext3 telling the BSD people that they do not know what a good file system is. It took me 10 minutes to stop laughing at this post.
-sirket
Folders? I could have sworn they were called directories. Are you sure you are not running Mac Os 8.6?
***There is no point in asking, you'll get no reply***
You guys keep feeding the trolls!
Everytime someone posts the same copy-and-paste bit for the 2334th time, some idiot responds as if the troll poster thinks what he is pasting is true.
Want to make them go away? Then don't reply! Pretend they don't exist. Just let moderators take care of then and you'll have much less of a troll problem on your hands.
Well, at least that is out in the open. My main concern is that, like you and I both know that BSD is not dying, some person who might try it out would be deflected. That is why I posted. The other thing that burns me is that it is the same post over and over again. At least have the sense and the common curtisy (sp?) to vary your lies from time to time. At least entertain us folks. I think that I would not have gotten so miffed if you guys would post some stuff that has a hint of orginality.
The views expressed are mine own and do not express the views of my employer.
I have it running on a Panasonic CF-35. The only problem that I have is that the PCMCIA support is nominal. The notebook will support CardBus, but FBSD will not, otherwise a solid OS. Just my thoughts, so disregard if necessecary.
OK, Linux leads in the server world, but BSD is more stable and surely isn't any more difficult to set up and configure.
What is the reason? All the effort that goes into security and stability in BSD doesn't seem to be getting it very far (in the sense it's mind share is probably falling if one ignores OS X), which is particularly odd when the core concept of the system - Unix - is through, OS X and Linux, reaching bigger and bigger audiences all the time - not bad for an OS that was pronounced dead when Win NT was launched more than a decade ago.
Is it just the larger enthusiast base for Linux? Or what?
I am a linux person, and when I switched from the beast's offerings I chose Linux because that was all I knew about and though I'd heard of BSD it was the BSD/OS... so is it just hype? Or is there something missing with the free BSDs?