UserBSD vs. UserLinux - Is It Feasible?

A not-so-anonymous Anonymous Coward asks: "Someone has suggested to make a UserBSD instead of a UserLinux. From what Bruce Perens' anonymous 1-million-$ backers seem to want (no GPL-/Commercial dual-licensed development toolkit like Qt in any library, but only gratis LPGL stuff), this seems to make a lot of sense. After all, only the kernel would be different, the rest of the stuff (including the KDE or GNOME desktops) runs pretty much the same on BSD as it does on Linux. Is it possible to get the legal problems solved with licenses and still create a usable enterprise Unix desktop system on *BSD?" The idea, in and of itself, sounds fine, but does the choice of kernel really matter? What advantages would BSD have over Linux in such a project, and vice-versa?

Comments

This Already Exists?

[fuzzybunny]

MaxOS X, no?

Seriously, I've been using FreeBSD as my desktop in various forms for about 4 years now. It's nice, although my experience became a lot more agreeable once I partitioned my work into two bits--the "hardcore" stuff, like scripting, testing, compiling, sniffing networks, etc. and the "soft" stuff like doing presentations, writing docs, etc.

I do not like Star/OpenOffice, and the lack of something like Crossover Office (from CodeWeavers) running nicely on FreeBSD, despite Linux binary compatibility, has made me keep an XP box around. For some things, FreeBSD is just faster and better, and for others, XP involves a lot less knob-dicking around to get application xyz working.

So in short, yeah it's doable, yeah, it'd be nice (I've had _no_ stability issues with FreeBSD at all, and the whole thing is organized nicely) but it would need a lot of work to get it all prettied up for the masses.

That's honestly why I'm considering buying a Powerbook...

UserBSD is a better idea than UserLinux

[dublin]

This is a great idea. There are a huge number of technical advantages to building atop a BSD, rather than a Linux base for this sort of project, entirely aside from licensing issues. I've used both extensively, and even the best Linux distros are dramatically less stable and robust than the BSDs. (I've also found that those arguing otherwise have usually never really tried the BSDs - just managing to have installed them doesn't count - use in actual production does.)

But it's also quite clear, given Bruce's requirements for the UserLinux project, that BSD would be a better fit, since it is not a commercially hostile license. It's great that even a guy like Bruce now realizes that GPL-only licensing is the kiss of death for the kinds of large-scale commercial support such a venture needs.

I personally would be in favor of a modified BSD license that would add only one stipulation: that the code can never be placed under another more restrictive license, preventing the modified-BSD-licensed code from being relicensed (and thus effectively "stolen" from the community) under the GPL or similar viral licenses. In this way, it can be assured that truly free software remains that way and cannot be co-opted and limited to Stallman's twisted idea of "free".