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FreeBSD 5.2.1 Released

Posted by michael on from the now-in-technicolor dept.

Kalev writes "The FreeBSD Release Engineering Team has announced FreeBSD 5.2.1-RELEASE. This is intended to address several bugs and vulnerabilities discovered in the FreeBSD 5.2 release. See the Release Notes. The release is now available for downloading. If you are currently running FreeBSD 5.x, you can easily cvsup to it or use binary upgrade feature of sysinstall."

110 comments

  1. FP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    First Post!!! Ha ha ha Ken Rupo, you suck!

  2. Point point releases? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Is it just me or are point point releases of FBSD pretty rare? Almost seems like 5.2 was a bit of a rush job.

    1. Re:Point point releases? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      No, it wasn't a rush, but people didn't test it enough.
      That is usually the problem, 5.1 ran so well that people didn't want to test the RC's, thus some bugs didn't get ironed out for _their_ hardware.
      The thing is, if these people had downloaded the livecd of RC2 and sendpr'ed this release wouldn't be needed.

      You should blame people for their lack of will to test but strong will to always complain.

    2. Re:Point point releases? by cperciva · · Score: 5, Informative

      Is it just me or are point point releases of FBSD pretty rare?

      You're right. The only other one was 4.6.2-RELEASE. (I'm not counting the 2.2.x releases -- 2.2 was a major version number :) ).

      Almost seems like 5.2 was a bit of a rush job.

      5.2 was right on the boundary between "experimental" and "stable". As such, lots of people started using it once it was released, but few people actually participated in testing it. I believe that 5.2 had one of the longest ever periods between code freeze and release.

      --
      Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
    3. Re:Point point releases? by rsidd · · Score: 2, Insightful
      You're right. The only other one was 4.6.2-RELEASE.

      Can't have been the "only" other one, since it implies a 4.6.1-RELEASE before that :) And there was a 3.5.1-RELEASE too.

    4. Re:Point point releases? by shlong · · Score: 5, Informative

      Almost seems like 5.2 was a bit of a rush job.

      As Colin pointed out in a peer post here, 5.2 had quite a long release cycle. If you look at the 5.2 release schedule you'll note that we spent almost 2 months on it. Add in that 5.1 was released in June of 2003, and you have quite a long dev cycle. We did the best that we could to manage risks in the 5.2 cycle, but shortly afterward it became apparent that there were some significant bugs in certain modules that didn't gain much attention until after the release was made.

      --
      Cat, the other, tastier white meat.
    5. Re:Point point releases? by cperciva · · Score: 4, Informative

      4.6.1 never existed. It was going to exist, but some security issues appeared, so it was aborted. But you're right, I forgot about 3.5.1-RELEASE, mostly because it was never tagged in the CVS repository.

      --
      Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
    6. Re:Point point releases? by shlong · · Score: 5, Informative

      4.6.1 never existed. It was going to exist, but some security issues appeared, so it was aborted. But you're right, I forgot about 3.5.1-RELEASE, mostly because it was never tagged in the CVS repository.

      FreeBSD 4.1.1 existed also, and was tagged. However, it was a branch off of RELENG_4 instead of RELENG_4_1 and turned into a disaster. But yes, ever since 3.0, we've had few point releases.

      --
      Cat, the other, tastier white meat.
    7. Re:Point point releases? by cperciva · · Score: 1

      FreeBSD 4.1.1 existed also, and was tagged.

      Umm. I knew that. I even used FreeBSD 4.1.1. Sigh...

      --
      Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
    8. Re:Point point releases? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      actually if you had looked at http:www.freebsd.org/releases/index.html

      You would have noticed that 4.1.1 was the first point point release in almost two years after the decision that they were unneccesary extra work.
      For 4.1.1 it was decided it was worth it because of the expiring of the RSA patents, it allowed the security pieces to be more easily merged in for US users.

    9. Re:Point point releases? by dohcvtec · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Funny, 4.1.1 was the first version of FreeBSD I used, and I was hooked right from then. Heh, even a "bad" release of FreeBSD is still pretty good compared, oh, say, a bad RedHat release (anyone remember the whole GCC 2.96 fiasco?)

      --
      -- Never hit a man with glasses. Hit him with a baseball bat.
    10. Re:Point point releases? by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 3, Funny

      Remember? I'm still dealing with it... Oi!

    11. Re:Point point releases? by cperciva · · Score: 2, Funny

      Heh, even a "bad" release of FreeBSD is still pretty good compared, oh, say, a bad RedHat release

      A "bad" release of FreeBSD is pretty good even compared to a "good" RedHat release.

      (In my defense re: forgetting about 4.1.1, I was thinking about point-releases-due-to-problems, not point-releases-due-to-added-features.)

      --
      Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
    12. Re:Point point releases? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      And some of us have crappy hardware, like Toshiba, Packard Bell or Compaq computers that simply have hard-or-impossible-to-work-around bugs.

    13. Re:Point point releases? by CaptainPinko · · Score: 0

      what was the gcc fiasco?

      --
      Your CPU is not doing anything else, at least do something.
    14. Re:Point point releases? by NuShrike · · Score: 1

      or the RH VM fiasco.

    15. Re:Point point releases? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

      Yeah that was a good one, they admit mistakes, learn from them, and try not to repeat them.

      Let's not bring up the ongoing (5 friggin years) FreeBSD 5 fiasco.

    16. Re:Point point releases? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Scott H Long ... shlong.. hah! You shlong. Or is that shlong spelled schlong?

    17. Re:Point point releases? by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 4, Informative

      When RedHat decided to release the 7.0 distro, they decided that 2.95 was too broken to serve as their system compiler. Too much C++ stuff was broken, not ANSI compliant, etc. So they grabbed a dev branch of 3.0 (at that time tagged 2.96) polished it, and called it gcc 2.96. Cool in some ways, because it was the first time the rubber hit the road for the 3.x branch. A lot of bugs got fixed. But it was a dev branch, and the code changed on the way to 3.0. So now you have a compiler that is C++ binary incompatible with anything before it, or anything agasint it. RedHat 7.x users (we support it at work) find it real hard to get 3rd party binaries compiled by 7.3. Either they use the more common 2.95, or they're finally trickling in to 3.2 or above (which are finally C++ binary compatible). Just a real PITA getting any C++ code using 2.96.

  3. Second *BSD is dying post by keesh · · Score: -1, Troll

    I smell a corpse.

    (posting anonymously to preserve my precious karma)

    1. Re:Second *BSD is dying post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      LOL. j00 choad licker!

    2. Re:Second *BSD is dying post by kworthington · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      "(posting anonymously to preserve my precious karma)"

      Riiiiight... and you previewed your comment before you posted, huh?
      Isn't it great when a troll forgets to click that pesky little "Post Anonymously" checkbox, and you see his real username? Especially when it's such an old and stale troll about BSD dying?

      Anyway I have been running 5.2 for a while and it has been solid:
      Uptime: 11:30AM up 39 days, 20:47, 6 users, load averages: 2.04, 2.01, 2.00

      I have only tried FreeBSD once before, I believe it was in the 4.x series, and it was OK as a server, but I couldn't get X to work. I was still semi-new to the Linux/Unix world at that point, so that may have been part of it, but 5.2 works well as a server and a desktop, which was not very difficult at all to get running. So even though I didn't need to feed that trolls, I figured I'd chime in with my (good) experience with FreeBSD 5.2...

      --
      Hosting: as low as $5.95/Mo
    3. Re:Second *BSD is dying post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      i believe it is traditional to include the "posting anonymously to preserve my precious karma" phrase when intentionally posting logged in... maybe you're not oldschool enough to remember those days

    4. Re:Second *BSD is dying post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      It is official; Netcraft confirms: *BSD is dying

      One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered *BSD community when IDC confirmed that *BSD market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that *BSD has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. *BSD is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.

      You don't need to be a Kreskin to predict *BSD's future. The hand writing is on the wall: *BSD faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for *BSD because *BSD is dying. Things are looking very bad for *BSD. As many of us are already aware, *BSD continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.

      FreeBSD is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core developers. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time FreeBSD developers Jordan Hubbard and Mike Smith only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: FreeBSD is dying.

      Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.

      OpenBSD leader Theo states that there are 7000 users of OpenBSD. How many users of NetBSD are there? Let's see. The number of OpenBSD versus NetBSD posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 NetBSD users. BSD/OS posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of NetBSD posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of BSD/OS. A recent article put FreeBSD at about 80 percent of the *BSD market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 FreeBSD users. This is consistent with the number of FreeBSD Usenet posts.

      Due to the troubles of Walnut Creek, abysmal sales and so on, FreeBSD went out of business and was taken over by BSDI who sell another troubled OS. Now BSDI is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.

      All major surveys show that *BSD has steadily declined in market share. *BSD is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If *BSD is to survive at all it will be among OS dilettante dbblers. *BSD continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, *BSD is dead.

      Fact: *BSD is dying

    5. Re:Second *BSD is dying post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      It is official; Netcraft confirms: kworthington is a humorless retard.

  4. Cool! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Despite the claim that 5.x isn't yet the
    production branch, we've been running it on
    all our development machines and servers for
    6+ months now. Apparently the FreeBSD
    release engineering team has pretty high
    standards! We're really looking forward to
    FreeBSD 5.3, which has M:N threading and
    the new O(1) scheduler as the default.
    Thread creation in our application is
    blindingly fast *and* runs on many CPUs at
    once. After getting off the poor Linux 2.2
    and 2.4 threading, there was no turning back.

    1. Re:Cool! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      For the record, FreeBSD's scheduler was already O(1), it just didn't handle SMP extremely well. The new ULE scheduler handles the SMP case much better, along with other nice improvements. See Jeff's paper at http://www.chesapeake.net/~jroberson/ULE.pdf

      The release engineering team certainly does have high standards. Trying to live up to the stability reputation. But keep in mind that 5.x still is considered in testing and major changes can still be afoot that can cause instabilities. So please still keep in mind what -current means, http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/h andbook/current-stable.html, and read the early adopters guide.

      5.x will get better and better as it approaches 5.3R, so while some of the problems running a -current release are lessened, one should still be aware of all this and the higher standard for fixing one's own problems when running 5.x. RTFM is not an insult when running 5.x, its simply a price of entry to a great OS.

    2. Re:Cool! by Warped1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Lucky you.

      I downloaded this yesterday, and for the life of me, I could not get it to install on my laptop. It would either kernel panic while extracting packages - or shortly after, I was multitasking ;) - or it would freeze while extracting packages.

      I believe I had FreeBSD 5.1 on this laptop before so I don't know what's up. I just had OpenBSD 3.3 on that slice earlier, and it looks like I'll give OpenBSD 3.4 a shot now.

      And yes, I'll most likely be a bad person and not spend the time necessary to submit a decent bug report. *shrug* Time time time ...

      But anyway, I've used Free before and it's cool - infact I wanted to slap that on my laptop instead of Open.

    3. Re:Cool! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I had the same problem with installing 5.2-R on my laptop, however 5.1-R went on smoothly. Right now I got phlak linux on it but will soon return to 5.1 and try to cvsup. ;)

    4. Re:Cool! by HeelToe · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Well, I'm using it for a home server. It has been worlds worse than FreeBSD 4.8 ever was for me. I have had numerous hangs that I cannot explain, 3 of which resulted in a corrupted /usr filesystem.

      I just did a buildkernel/buildworld for 5.2.1. Here's hoping it is better, cause if it's not, I will have to roll back to 4.8 or heaven forbid, gentoo.

    5. Re:Cool! by Brandybuck · · Score: 3, Informative

      I didn't have any problems with 5.0 or 5.1, but 5.2 gives me the occasional kernel panic. Something I have never seen in my life on any OS until the last few months. Like you I'm building 5.2.1 right now, hoping that this will solve the problem.

      --
      Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
    6. Re:Cool! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's odd because I've had the exact opposite. I've been running FreeBSD 5.x since October on my personal server/firewall/sometimes workstation and it has been remarkable. I moved from a previously abused Mandrake 8.1 system that more closely resembled NetBSD than Mandrake. I've experienced most FreeBSD releases since 4.0 and I can say that 5.x has been the best experience yet.

      No crashes, no headaches (once I figured out patching the kernel to unbreak ppp (FreeBSD needs to sync with the OpenBSD ppp) and get altq), although ULE seemed to slow things down on my single-processor machine so I reverted to old 4BSD scheduler.

      Thanks for the great release FreeBSD team and keep up the excellent work!

      Brandon

  5. Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    We really have to admit that FreeBSD is in decline. In all likelihood, there may be only one more (or possibly two) releases before FreeBSD goes away forever.

    I know it is now almost a mantra set in stone that "FreeBSD is dying". Unfortunately, the abuse of that fact by trolls has obscured the truth, that truth being that FreeBSD really is dying.

    My main reason for moving away from FreeBSD has been twofold. First, to avoid the constant political infighting and bickering. And secondly, to investigate more promising and viable entries in the operating systems sweepstakes. FreeBSD is no longer a legitimate player, I'm sorry to say.

    1. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll
      He's right. The various user-land utilities are swapped back and forth between the various *BSDs like a free-love hippy girlfriend. However, the limited number of kernel developers is severly limiting kernel devlopment.


      FreeBSD and NetBSD are currently in discussions to combine kernel development and possibly even merge back together. Even Theo deRadt is talking about a combined *BSD userland utility team.


      BSD won't "die", but I think we will see a merger within the next 2 years.

    2. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wow, if true, that would run counter to years worth of BSD propaganda. Sounds like a excellent engineering decision, because truthfully, all the BSDs are just about equally portable and secure, and FreeBSD has an enormous performance advantage.

    3. Re:Unfortunately by anthonyrcalgary · · Score: 4, Funny
      Even Theo deRadt is talking about a combined *BSD userland utility team.
      oh god I hope not. They'd kill each other over philosophical issues.
      --
      When someone might yell at me, it has to be OpenBSD.
    4. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Even Theo deRadt is talking about a combined *BSD userland utility team.

      oh god I hope not. They'd kill each other over philosophical issues.

      He just wants to be back on the netbsd team!

  6. Again! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    I just fucking upgraded from 5.0 to 5.2!

    Motherfuckers. thanks.

    1. Re:Again! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      Praytell, how can one upgrade a rotting corpse?

  7. Updating from 5.2-RELEASE to 5.2.1-RELEASE. by cperciva · · Score: 5, Informative

    [I posted the message below to -current and -security, providing an easier upgrade path from 5.2-RELEASE to 5.2.1-RELEASE]

    In order to provide an easy update path for i386 systems from
    FreeBSD 5.2 to FreeBSD 5.2.1, FreeBSD Update will now update
    systems running FreeBSD 5.2-RELEASE to 5.2.1-RELEASE. To take
    advantage of these updates, install and run FreeBSD Update, and
    reboot into the new kernel:

    # cd /usr/ports/security/freebsd-update && make install clean
    # cp /usr/local/etc/freebsd-update.conf.sample /usr/local/etc/freebsd-update.conf
    # /usr/local/sbin/freebsd-update fetch
    # /usr/local/sbin/freebsd-update install
    # shutdown -r now

    If you have recompiled any files locally, FreeBSD Update may
    not be able to update them automatically (it will complain).
    With the latest version of FreeBSD Update (version 1.5), you
    can use one of the following commands:
    # /usr/local/sbin/freebsd-update --branch crypto fetch
    or
    # /usr/local/sbin/freebsd-update --branch nocrypto fetch
    depending upon whether you installed the "crypto" distribution,
    to force files to be updated. (If you're not sure if you
    installed the "crypto" distribution, you almost certainly did).

    FreeBSD Update will update a 5.2-RELEASE system to the exact
    binaries distributed with 5.2.1-RELEASE, with the following
    exceptions:

    1. Files under the following directories will not be updated:

    /usr/ports
    /usr/share/doc
    /usr/share/man/cat*
    /usr/src

    The ports and src trees can be updated using cvsup; the files
    in /usr/share/man/cat* are rebuilt from (updated) man pages
    automatically.

    2. FreeBSD binaries include, in their headers, the value of
    __FreeBSD_version on the machine where they were compiled.
    This value was bumped from 502000 to 502010 as part of the
    release engineering process; binaries for which this is the
    ONLY change will not be updated.

    As always, this is something I'm providing personally; it is
    in no way endorsed by the Security Officer, Release Engineering
    team, or the project as a whole.

    Colin Percival

    --
    Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
    1. Re:Updating from 5.2-RELEASE to 5.2.1-RELEASE. by __past__ · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Completely offtopic question: Do you have any idea how many people actually use your service? Are there any plans to make it an "official" offering of the FreeBSD project?

      Thanks for offering it, by the way. It is both technically interesting and good to have (even if I personally don't use it).

      --
      Programming can be fun again. Film at 11.
    2. Re:Updating from 5.2-RELEASE to 5.2.1-RELEASE. by cperciva · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Do you have any idea how many people actually use your service?

      Yes. Around 100 systems per day; in total, somewhere around 2500 systems have been patched.

      Are there any plans to make it an "official" offering of the FreeBSD project?

      Yes. I recently joined the FreeBSD security team, and now that 5.2.1 is out of the way, I'll be pushing to get the integration underway.

      --
      Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
  8. What a shame by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    It is a real shame that while Linux 2.0 still remains alive and well, *BSD is in a state of utter and complete decay.

    It's ironic that despite the best efforts of Theo and the FreeBSD core team that the *BSD is slowly rotting and decaying into a morass of filth and gore; meanwhile the Linux bazaar is brimming with newfound hope and glory.

    1. Re:What a shame by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Comments about BSD dying are biased blabberings of blithering linux losers.

      Repeat after me, "BSD creates, Linux leaches, Microsoft profits"

      I feel pretty secure with FreeBSD, given that since the 5.2 release on January 12th eight people have committed as contributors, 1 to documentation, 1 to ports and 6 to src. During which only one member resigned. Indication that FreeBSD is growing, not dying.

      FreeBSD will chug right along as it has for over ten years. Linux on the otherhand will bloat, splinter, and implode.

    2. Re:What a shame by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, that about the commits, well, there have been quite a few commits.

    3. Re:What a shame by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      FreeBSD will chug right along as it has for over ten years. Linux on the otherhand will bloat, splinter, and implode.

      Who's the troll now?

    4. Re:What a shame by flynns · · Score: -1, Troll

      Y'know, I was just thinkin'...

      ...if you made a live CD off of FreeBSD...

      ...you'd be able to boot from the living dead!


      *ducks*

      --
      'If you're flammable and have legs, you are never blocking a fire exit.'
    5. Re:What a shame by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

      Oh yeah I suppose Linux must have ripped off FreeBSD's shitty SMPng to enable it to run on 512 CPU systems, right?

      Yes sir, FreeBSD is really creating a big steaming pile of shit since branching FreeBSD 5 oh, about 5 years ago. Yep, they've basically been going backwards in terms of speed and scalability and stability for the entire life of FreeBSD 5.

      I don't know if you call that chugging along or not. I rather thing it is the collective egos of the FreeBSD team bloating, splintering and imploding. They've alienated most of their capable developers, and the only people left sit around all day and brag to each other about how much better they are than Linux.

    6. Re:What a shame by tarius8105 · · Score: 1

      Oh yeah I suppose Linux must have ripped off FreeBSD's shitty SMPng to enable it to run on 512 CPU systems, right?

      If there were a real need for 512 CPUs then you could get FreeBSD working with it if you wanted to compile it and modify it for that specific architecture, considering that architecture is not i386.

      Yes sir, FreeBSD is really creating a big steaming pile of shit since branching FreeBSD 5 oh, about 5 years ago. Yep, they've basically been going backwards in terms of speed and scalability and stability for the entire life of FreeBSD 5.

      With the fear of feeding a troll, first off the 5 branch has only been around for like 2 years. And on top of that FreeBSD is more stable then Linux in the fact that when I type "reboot" after rebuilding the Kernel, I know that FreeBSD will boot back up while Linux its more of cross your fingers and pray.

      I don't know if you call that chugging along or not. I rather thing it is the collective egos of the FreeBSD team bloating, splintering and imploding. They've alienated most of their capable developers, and the only people left sit around all day and brag to each other about how much better they are than Linux.

      They dont only sit around and brag, but they have earned the right to brag since they made a rock solid kernel.

    7. Re:What a shame by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If there were a real need for 512 CPUs then you could get FreeBSD working with it if you wanted to compile it and modify it for that specific architecture, considering that architecture is not i386.

      Umm, FreeBSD 5 would have terrible scaling problems past 8 CPUs. Probably even at 8 CPUs. Sorry, the amount of timer interrupt traffic alone is enough to livelock an otherwise idle box if your interrupt handler isn't extremely scalable. FreeBSD is not very scalable.

      With the fear of feeding a troll, first off the 5 branch has only been around for like 2 years. And on top of that FreeBSD is more stable then Linux in the fact that when I type "reboot" after rebuilding the Kernel, I know that FreeBSD will boot back up while Linux its more of cross your fingers and pray.

      FreeBSD 5 branched in '99, so you must have a time machine.

      No, I know Linux will boot up.

      They dont only sit around and brag, but they have earned the right to brag since they made a rock solid kernel.

      That's what they say, yes.

  9. hey by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    what's this, i used sysinstall to upgrade to 5.2.1, but when i rebooted it all seemed the same? did i miss something?

    1. Re:hey by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      uname -a

      does that look the same?

    2. Re:hey by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      They changed the default theme to "Luna".

  10. FreeBSD's Soul Released by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    "The FreeBSD Release Engineering Team has announced FreeBSD's soul has finally been released from its rotting cadaver. This is intended to sever the binds which keep FreeBSD chained to the material world in an neverending state of undeath. See the Release Notes. The soul is now available for eternal judgement. If you are currently running FreeBSD 5.x, you can easily pray to it or pay your respects at the viewing on Saturday."

  11. How's FBSD on AMD64? by scrytch · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I've been pondering getting an AMD64 box, but I'm wondering how well it supports AMD64, what the performance is like, etc. Anyone running such a setup have any stories? Linux is the alternative here, but I would much prefer FreeBSD if it's feasable.

    --
    I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
    1. Re:How's FBSD on AMD64? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There are AMD64 release notes and ISOs for 5.2.1 on the FTP site, as well as a full set of application packages. Looks pretty well supported...

    2. Re:How's FBSD on AMD64? by eht · · Score: 5, Informative

      The AMD64 platform is currently a Tier 1 FreeBSD platform.

      Current Tier 1 platforms are i386, Sparc64, AMD64, PC98, and Alpha.

      Current Tier 2 platforms are PowerPC and ia64.

      Current Tier 3 platforms are S/390(R).

      All systems not otherwise classified into a support tier are Tier 4 systems.

      All information lifted verbatim from the FreeBSD website most of it from Section 10 of the Committer's Guide, Support for Multiple Architectures

      So expect as much support for AMD64 as you would for the standard PC version, the only thing keeping AMD64 back is it's not a widely distributed and therefore not as well tested.

    3. Re:How's FBSD on AMD64? by mi · · Score: 4, Informative

      It works, except for the kernel modules. Currently, you need to compile everything you need into the kernel. kldload-ing does not work yet.

      The 32-bit emulation is supported and turned on by default, although some 32-bit binaries, may have problems controlling some hardware with ioctl-s, because the sizes of structures are often different.

      I wouldn't recommend it as a workstation, because too much stuff out there (open source and not) is poorly written and thus unportable and will break during compile time (at best) or at run-time (at worst). Think about all the foolish assumptions, that sizeof(int) == sizeof(void *) and shudder.... I don't think NVidia offers their drivers for amd64 either, and so on.

      Makes a (very) nice server, though...

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    4. Re:How's FBSD on AMD64? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

      Hmm interesting. So the various tiers must mean something like this:

      Tier 1: A few people have reported booting up OK.
      Tier 2: Completely broken.
      Tier 3: Somebody somewhere said they'd like to start a port.

  12. FTP mirrors [FreeBSD 5.2.1] by n0dez · · Score: 1

    I've just started downloading FreeBSD 5.2.1 from

    FTP site:
    planetmirror.com
    remote directory:
    /pub/FreeBSD/ISO-IMAGES-i386/5.2.1/


    Happy Unixin' ;)

  13. Thank Apple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    I have been running FreeBSD since the 3.x days. Right around this time Linux became popular but I stuck with FreeBSD for several academic reasons. At that point one was as good as the other, but as time went on this changed. Linux started gathering a huge following and it really hit its stride. The developers made leaps in bounds in hardware support. Meanwhile, FreeBSD crawled from 3.x to 4.x, which was a great improvement to be sure, but not as rapid or large as what Linux had been offering.

    Being locked into FreeBSD by familiarity and investment at that point I wistfully watch the GNU community race ahead. I wish something would start a similar firestorm of FreeBSD development. I thought nothing of it when Apple bought NeXT in 1996. The Rhapsody project, which was basically just adding some Apple technology to OpenStep, didn't interest me. When Steve Jobs announced Mac OS X in 1999, however, my ears perked up at the mention of my favorite Unix. Apple was going to update the very cores of OpenStep into something new FreeBSD was going to be a huge part of that.

    Since Mac OS X v10.0 was released in 2001, Apple has been filtering BSD code in and out of their kernel, userland, and libraries. This code then makes its way back to FreeBSD. Apple's pattern is to sync every major Mac OS X release with the latest major FreeBSD release. For example, Mac OS X v10.1 corresponded to FreeBSD 4.4 and Mac OS X v10.2 matched up with FreeBSD 4.7. By the time Apple released Panther, their contributions back into FreeBSD had amassed into a new FreeBSD milestone, the 5.x branch. Mac OS X v10.3 contained bits of both FreeBSD 4.9 and FreeBSD 5.1.

    Look at it this way, only after Apple started modifying FreeBSD 4.x and submitting their modifications did FreeBSD progress to the 5.x branch. The advanced VM and SMP code that allows Mac OS X to run so efficiently is the very same code that finally put FreeBSD on the level with Linux. I run FreeBSD 5.2 on a four-way Xeon box at work and thank Apple every day. If it weren't for the Mach micokernel from Apple we wouldn't be able to do these nice things with FreeBSD now or probably ever.

    It's also kind of ironic how such a big deal was made by Wind River Systemd buying out both BSDI and Walnut Creek Software. (Does anyone remember this?) The plan was to merge BSD/OS into FreeBSD and sell a special enterprise edition of the operating system while still maintaining the Open Source project. Sadly this fizzled out. No one ever predicted that Apple, of all companies, would ride in with the cavalry and pick up the pieces. Apple has done much more than Wind River ever managed to.

    After such a long and precarious history FreeBSD is finally going somewhere and we no longer have to worry about the latest hardware support of when the next release will be. We're firing on all pistons now, and within a couple more years there will be more FreeBSD installs than Linux or Solaris! I'm not so proud that I can't see what is behind this. Apple saved FreeBSD and I have no problem admitting or accepting that. I doubt many others who use FreeBSD do, but I just wanted to point it out.

    Thank you, Apple, for saving FreeBSD.

    1. Re:Thank Apple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      What an odd troll...

      Apple has made no significant code contributions to the freebsd codebase to date, AFAIK. Certainly not the scheduling and SMP code. You guys are slipping.

    2. Re:Thank Apple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What an odd troll...

      Could just be an ignorant user.

    3. Re:Thank Apple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      I think the parent of your comment is the ignorant user. Apple has hired several FreeBSD folks and actively submits changes to code not only to FreeBSD but the KDE group, Apache, and others.

    4. Re:Thank Apple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The comments about the SMP code and the 'birth' of 5.0 is wrong. 5.0 had more to do with the BSDI/Walnut Creek merger than Apple's "involvement".

    5. Re:Thank Apple by Ricin · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Please name 5 specific examples of important contributions from Apple to the FreeBSD kernel or userland.

      Hint: "The advanced VM and SMP code that allows Mac OS X to run so efficiently is the very same code that finally put FreeBSD on the level with Linux" is sheer nonsense. But I'll let you humor me and come with some example commits. Links to cvsweb or something would be nice.

    6. Re:Thank Apple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, it appears to be some sort of troll. The exact same post just appeared in another discussion (and got modded -1: Offtopic)

  14. WARNING: PATCH YOUR BSD NOW! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    CERT SecAD NBSD4536A746
    Advisory: Olfactory disturbance during *BSD use
    Affected: NetBSD all versions
    FreeBSD all versions
    OpenBSD all versions
    Description: The dead corpse of a *BSD operating system emits a foul, disgusting smell which reduces the
    productivity of the users.
    Recommended activities: - use nose plugs
    - removal of *BSD operating system, replace with Linux or Windows XP

    1. Re:WARNING: PATCH YOUR BSD NOW! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      How much do I treasure a true idiot. All I can say is that you made me smile before I have to get ready for work.

      XP or Linux? You do have some sort of sever disorder that has yet to be identified by the medical community. In the mean time please lite up a fat one and chill.

    2. Re:WARNING: PATCH YOUR BSD NOW! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      I think you are the one with a disorder: you reply to a troll expecting them to become offended and stop posting. lol

  15. Fuck Apple. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    Thank you, Apple, for saving FreeBSD.

    Apple did not "save" anything. FreeBSD was in no danger of dying and was quite healthy before Apple came along and cherry-picked the codebase (something they could quite legally do given the BSD licence).

    And Microsoft copied BSD code into Windows - and that certainly doesn't mean that they like or want to help FreeBSD.

    and we no longer have to worry about the latest hardware support

    Tell me - what x86 hardware does Apple sell?

    If it weren't for the Mach micokernel from Apple

    Windows NT / 2000 / XP runs on a variant of the Mach kernel. Mach is a fairly standard, well documented design principal. Apple did not make the FreeBSD kernel.

    They only thing that Apple "saved" was money when they killed NeXT in favor of using BSD code.

    If there's anything worse than a "*BSD is dead" trolls - it's the Steve Jobs-humping Apple morons like yourself.

    1. Re:Fuck Apple. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Wow, you're an idiot.

      The kernel Windows NT/2K/XP runs on is in no way shape or form related to mach. It came from work IBM and Microsoft started in the early Eighties to replace DOS. It eventually became OS/2 and Windows NT and the rest is history.

      Windows XP does not run on Mach or any variants thereof.

    2. Re:Fuck Apple. by Chreo · · Score: 1
      The kernel Windows NT/2K/XP runs on is in no way shape or form related to mach. It came from work IBM and Microsoft started in the early Eighties to replace DOS. It eventually became OS/2 and Windows NT and the rest is history.
      Well, if I remember correctly then the work IBM and MS did together was based upon Mach so OS/2 is based upon Mach. However, that work did not carry into the NT-kernel as MS modelled the kernel "after" VMS when they broke the collaboration with IBM on OS/2.
      Windows XP does not run on Mach or any variants thereof
      Agreed
      --

      Life is what happened when Good Intentions met Harsh Reality (the brother of the more infamous Chaos).
    3. Re:Fuck Apple. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, you're thinking of OS/2 for PowerPC. IBM used a form of the Mach kernel in the early Nineties that ran on PowerPC and ported OS/2 to it. This Mach version was also going to be the basis of Apple's Pink and Taligent efforts which failed.

    4. Re:Fuck Apple. by cant_get_a_good_nick · · Score: 4, Informative

      If it weren't for the Mach micokernel from Apple
      Mach is from Carnegie Mellon, by way of NeXT.

      Windows NT / 2000 / XP runs on a variant of the Mach kernel.
      XP does not run on Mach. It was a microkernel, made with a lot of input from DEC VAX guys. Over the years it has shed a lot of Microkernel attributes and become more of a macro style kernel.

      Mach is a fairly standard, well documented design principal.
      Microkernels are a fairly standard, well documented, design principal. Mach is an instance of them.

      I actually agree with some of your other statements, your parent poster was an uninformed fanboy. Apple has contributed to BSD though, check out the BSD project list and see where.

    5. Re:Fuck Apple. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      I cant find it, or ANY contribution????

      ace:/usr/src/sys$ find . -type f -exec grep 'apple.com' \{} \; -print
      * http://gemma.apple.com:80/dev/technotes/tn/tn1012. html ./dev/bktr/bktr_tuner.c
      ace:/usr/src/sys$

  16. YOU GODDAMN FUCKING KARMAWHORE! *BSD IS DEAD! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    *_g_o_a_t_s_e_x_*_g_o_a_t_s_e_x_*_g_o_a_t_s_e_x_*_
    g_______________________________________________g_ _
    o_/_____\_____________\____________/____\_______o_ _
    a|_______|_____________\__________|______|______a_ _
    t|_______`._____________|_________|_______:_____t_ _
    s`________|_____________|________\|_______|_____s_ _
    e_\_______|_/_______/__\\\___--___\\_______:____e_ _
    x__\______\/____--~~__________~--__|_\_____|____x_ _
    *___\______\_-~____________________~-_\____|____*_ _
    g____\______\_________.--------.______\|___|____g_ _
    o______\_____\______//_________(_(__>__\___|____o_ _
    a_______\___.__C____)_________(_(____>__|__/____a_ _
    t_______/\_|___C_____)/______\_(_____>__|_/_____t_ _
    s______/_/\|___C_____)_*BSD__|__(___>___/__\____s_ _
    e_____|___(____C_____)\______/__//__/_/_____\___e_ _
    x_____|____\__|_____\\_________//_(__/_______|__x_ _
    *____|_\____\____)___`----___--'_____________|__*_ _
    g____|__\______________\_______/____________/_|_g_ _
    o___|______________/____|_____|__\____________|_o_ _
    a___|_____________|____/_______\__\___________|_a_ _
    t___|__________/_/____|_________|__\___________|t_ _
    s___|_________/_/______\__/\___/____|__________|s_ _
    e__|_________/_/________|____|_______|_________|e_ _
    x__|__________|_________|____|_______|_________|x_ _
    *_g_o_a_t_s_e_x_*_g_o_a_t_s_e_x_*_g_o_a_t_s_e_x_*_

    Important Stuff: Please try to keep posts on topic. Try to reply to other people's comments instead of starting new threads. Read other people's messages before posting your own to avoid simply duplicating what has already been said. Use a clear subject that describes what your message is about. Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated. (You can read everything, even moderated posts, by adjusting your threshold on the User Preferences Page) If you want replies to your comments sent to you, consider logging in or creating an account.

    Important Stuff: Please try to keep posts on topic. Try to reply to other people's comments instead of starting new threads. Read other people's messages before posting your own to avoid simply duplicating what has already been said. Use a clear subject that describes what your message is about. Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated. (You can read everything, even moderated posts, by adjusting your threshold on the User Preferences Page) If you want replies to your comments sent to you, consider logging in or creating an account.

    Important Stuff: Please try to keep posts on topic. Try to reply to other people's comments instead of starting new threads. Read other people's messages before posting your own to avoid simply duplicating what has already been said. Use a clear subject that describes what your message is about. Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated. (You can read everything, even moderated posts, by adjusting your threshold on the User Preferences Page) If you want replies to your comments sent to you, consider logging in or creating an account.

  17. Netcraft confirms: *BSD is dying by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    It is official; Netcraft confirms: *BSD is dying

    One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered *BSD community when IDC confirmed that *BSD market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that *BSD has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. *BSD is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.

    You don't need to be a Kreskin to predict *BSD's future. The hand writing is on the wall: *BSD faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for *BSD because *BSD is dying. Things are looking very bad for *BSD. As many of us are already aware, *BSD continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.

    FreeBSD is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core developers. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time FreeBSD developers Jordan Hubbard and Mike Smith only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: FreeBSD is dying.

    Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.

    OpenBSD leader Theo states that there are 7000 users of OpenBSD. How many users of NetBSD are there? Let's see. The number of OpenBSD versus NetBSD posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 NetBSD users. BSD/OS posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of NetBSD posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of BSD/OS. A recent article put FreeBSD at about 80 percent of the *BSD market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 FreeBSD users. This is consistent with the number of FreeBSD Usenet posts.

    Due to the troubles of Walnut Creek, abysmal sales and so on, FreeBSD went out of business and was taken over by BSDI who sell another troubled OS. Now BSDI is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.

    All major surveys show that *BSD has steadily declined in market share. *BSD is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If *BSD is to survive at all it will be among OS dilettante dbblers. *BSD continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, *BSD is dead.

    Fact: *BSD is dying

    1. Re:Netcraft confirms: *BSD is dying by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      A recent article by samsun? That was back in 2001 and not to mention that it wasnt tweaked by any freebsd users. Linux comes with a optimized kernel. BSD comes out for max stability.

      And yes there was a follow up to the article in which there were suggestion on tweaking the kernel and BSD was inline with performace with the other OS'. However, they never mentioned the alterations that were dont to the OS'. There could have been way more that would have increased the performance.

      Perhaps reading more that just the first page and looking at the pictures would be of more benefit to yourself. Even better, try installing it or are you afraid of a text based installer......

      Trolls are soooo cute.... and probably fuzzy...

    2. Re:Netcraft confirms: *BSD is dying by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      I can't believe this, somebody fell for the BSD is dying troll that has been floating around here for 4 years. that is almost as bad as falling for the 17 meg file troll.

  18. Re:Thank Apple (err correction) by Ricin · · Score: 1

    Correction to the hint above: should have included the sentence before that one as well that claims that this is because of Apple's contribution to the codebase.

  19. What is it about by coughski · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Operating Systems that invokes such spite between proponets? IMHO FreeBSD works very well I run 4.8 for my server and have never had a problem never crashes and it does what I need it do. For my Desktop I run SuSe 8.1 and it works very well for most everything I need. I suspect I could use both as a server or a desktop with few problems. I am not a developer or sys admin but I do enjoy tinkering with networks and computers and *nix or *bsd based systems. I just wonder why I see posts like "FreeBSD is dead" from a supposed linux user when clearly both operating systems are actively growing. cough

    --
    two cans and a string, now that's innovation
    1. Re:What is it about by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Who says they are from Linux users? How do we know this is just not a attempt by BSD users to smear Linux by getting people like you to become more sympathetic to the BSD side?

    2. Re:What is it about by DashEvil · · Score: 1

      Maybe what you said was an attempt to smear BSD users by claiming that they want to smear Linux users by getting people like you to become more sympathetic to the Linux side!

      Seriously though, I find the BSD trolls to be quite amusing. Regardless of their association one can hardly dispute the fact that they have unmitigated social issues and I derive some kind of cold satisfaction from that.

      --
      -If God wanted people to be better than me, he would have made them that way.
    3. Re:What is it about by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They have "social issues"? You're there sitting at your computer, reading about BSD and getting worked up about claims that it's dying, and THEY have social issues?!?

      Heavens!

    4. Re:What is it about by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      finding something amusing is, in your mind, "getting worked up" about it? what a sad, sad life you must live.

    5. Re:What is it about by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      I think its sad that you take time out to worry about trolls. as the saying goes, YHBT YHL HAND

  20. Simply question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    If I want production stable as recommended by the FreeBSD team, I should use 4.9-RELEASE because 5.2-RELEASE is still being tested.

    Will there be a point where the FreeBSD team says "go for it" or is it going to be a judgement call as it is with a Linux kernel?

    1. Re:Simply question by thdexter · · Score: 3, Informative

      Yes, probably with FreeBSD 5.3, the 5.x branch will become -STABLE and 4.9 will only be supported for critical security flaws. (4.9-STABLE, not -RELEASE, it's what's out, and 5.2.1-RELEASE.)

      --
      I'm on a road shaped like a figure eight; I'm going nowhere but I'm guaranteed to be late.
  21. Your .sig by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    Scott, you're a fucking idiot.

    Troll Glass

  22. IPSEC still broken by dokebi · · Score: 4, Informative

    It looks like the KAME implementation got borked between 5.1 and 5.2. ISAKMP packets get filtered even when they're not supposed to.
    see here.

    --
    In Soviet Russia, articles before post read *you*!
  23. I'm confused... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I thought -STABLE was pretty much a snapshot of -CURRENT and that, after testing, it becomes -RELEASE.

    1. Re:I'm confused... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      Then be enlightened.

    2. Re:I'm confused... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So -RELEASE follows -STABLE which follows -CURRENT.

      That's what I said but the explanation to my top-level post implied -STABLE follows -RELEASE.

    3. Re:I'm confused... by hondo_san · · Score: 1

      For an even better explanation, try this Google Groups post.

  24. YHBT YHL HAND by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    you fell for a cut and paste troll

  25. So they released the body already? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    That was a quick autopsy.

  26. BSD Starting by SphericalCrusher · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I've never been a big BSD fan, as I've only used it a few times. I'm more of a Linux person. I truly respect BSD though, and for that, I'm going to be throwing together a box just to install this new version of FreeBSD on.

    I feel that it will better help my knowledge in UNIX to learn it. I don't want to dualboot.

    --
    "Instant gratification takes too long." - Carrie Fisher
    1. Re:BSD Starting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Thank you for sharing these factual statements of personal intentions. /. is better place because of it.

      And now, I'm going to close my browser and go home, then I will watch TV or eat something.

  27. Perfectly normal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Dead bodies can retain gas for several days or even weeks after death, leading to periodic releases. Users installing this new release are advised to equip Hazmat suits with appropriate filtration.

  28. The Status of the Sux0ring by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic


    In a startling turn of events today, a previously little-known fact came into the public eye: "*BSD Sux0rs". This came as a complete surprise to the BUWLA, or BSD Users With Large Assholes, as they previously thought that *BSD 0wned.
    "You see, even though I have never contributed code to any BSD project, I thought it was my duty to be a big asshole to others which don't use the OS I do, because it just 0wnz.", said one FreeBSD user. "Now that I know it sux0rs, though, I have to go find something else to be an asshole about."

    One notorious OpenBSD fanatic known as WideOpen, told reporters, "I have to kill myself. This isn't how it was supposed to happen. My BSD has always been the best, and shouting that opinion in other people's faces at every chance I got has been my only hobby. It was all I ever did. It was what got me out of bed in the morning. Now I have to die. I will jam my bedpost up my ass until I hit my brain. It is the only way to go: BSD style."

    In the volatile world of operating systems anything can happen. "At least we don't sux0r as much as Windows users", BigAzz, a relatively well-known NetBSD user said. "Screaming things in people's faces is my calling. Now I need to scream that BSD sux0rs. What a sad world. At least I won't kill myself like those uber-asshole OpenBSD guys. They are just way over the top. Or were, at least."

    Nobody knows for sure what the future holds for the state of operating systems, but with Netcraft confirming the sux0r status, *BSD users all over the world will have to stick something else up their asses from now on or risk looking even more gay than they used to.

  29. Shameful Moderation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why is this type of anti-Linux drivel modded up but anti-BSD trolls are modded down?

  30. Yes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    The -BURIAL always follows the -WAKE.

  31. Problems with BSD 5.2.1 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1


    I don't want to start a holy war here, but what is the deal with you BSD fanatics? I've been sitting here at my freelance gig in front of a BSD box (a PIII 800 w/512 Megs of RAM) for about 20 minutes now while it attempts to copy a 17 Meg file from one folder on the hard drive to another folder. 20 minutes. At home, on my Pentium Pro 200 running NT 4, which by all standards should be a lot slower than this BSD box, the same operation would take about 2 minutes. If that.
    In addition, during this file transfer, Netscape will not work. And everything else has ground to a halt. Even Emacs Lite is straining to keep up as I type this.

    I won't bore you with the laundry list of other problems that I've encountered while working on various BSD machines, but suffice it to say there have been many, not the least of which is I've never seen a BSD box that has run faster than its Windows counterpart, despite the BSD machines faster chip architecture. My 486/66 with 8 megs of ram runs faster than this 800 mhz machine at times. From a productivity standpoint, I don't get how people can claim that BSD is a "superior" machine.

    BSD addicts, flame me if you'd like, but I'd rather hear some intelligent reasons why anyone would choose to use a BSD over other faster, cheaper, more stable systems.

  32. The Feeding Tube by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    Oct. 23 -- BSD resumed receiving life-sustaining care yesterday in a
    Florida hospital room, but many experts said there is virtually no hope
    that it will ever recover, despite it fan boy's desperate hopes.

    "IF IT'S over a year, BSD's not ever going to get up," said Fred Plum, a
    professor emeritus at Weill Cornell College in New York. "You'd just
    don't see it. It just doesn't happen."
    BSD, 39, has been in a persistent vegetative
    state since its heart stopped for unknown reasons in 1990. A feeding
    tube in BSD's stomach was removed this past Wednesday after its husband,
    Theo De Ratt, who said his wife had told him she (BSD) would not want to
    be kept alive under such circumstances, won a long series of court
    battles to have life-sustaining nourishment withdrawn so she (BSD) could
    die.

  33. FreeBSD 4.5, February 2002... by Anthony+Boyd · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ...was the last release of FreeBSD that I've purchased. I got the 6-disk toolkit to go with it -- tons of apps, it made for a great installation. I have no idea if 4.5 is considered a "good" release relative to the other releases, but it made me (mostly) happy. However, I did have one system -- an old laptop with a panel that needed WD drivers -- that just seemed to miss the FreeBSD sweet spot. It used a PCMCIA card to connect to my LAN, but FreeBSD 4.5 had only "early" PCMCIA tools then (which seemed weird, considering it was only a couple years ago). So I couldn't ever get the network up and running. Later releases had better PCMCIA, but they also used Xfree86 4, which couldn't handle my old LCD with its Western Digital chipset.

    Soooo... now I'm wondering. The new 5.2.1 is surely excellent at PCMCIA. But does it have Xfree86 version 3 as an install option? If not, does Xfree86 4 have support for the WD chipset now? I'd really like to get FreeBSD running on my old laptop(s), but it seems that just as the PCMCIA started getting good, Xfree86 went modern and left a bunch of systems in the dust.

    --
    My Greasemonkey scripts for Digg &
    1. Re:FreeBSD 4.5, February 2002... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      XF86 v3 is in ports, you can install it with pkg_add too.

      Check the XF86 v4.4 release to see if your chip is supported, if it is, install that.

  34. Lights out, pard by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    Somewhere, in a lonely hospital room,

    *BSD is dying

  35. A prediction. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    I predict 5.x will become the stable branch of FreeBSD before the 2.6.x kernel gets adopted by any major Linux distro >:)

    1. Re:A prediction. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      I predict that when FreeBSD 5 becomes stable, its performance and especially SMP scalability (which is one of the main things they've been doing for the past 5 years) will be below even Linux 2.4.

      I predict FreeBSD 5.3 won't be a stable branch.

      I predict FreeBSD 5 won't become stable in 2004.