OpenBSD Hackathon Underway

Triumph The Insult C writes "Aside from some stealth developers, the annual OpenBSD Hackathon, held in Calgary, is underway, according to Theo. They've been doing some recent work on SMP, and have some impressive AMD SMP gear there that they've got to hack around with. A few years ago, it was PF. Who knows what they'll come up with this time that knocks our socks off."

Comments

PF, now...

[Anonymous Coward]

If history repeats itself, it'd be an Apache clone.

Re:PF, now...

[lcde]

There has been a lot of babbling on the mailing list. Everyone is against it. They are sticking with 1.3.39 (i think) with all of their security fixes. There will only be updates for security reasons. To quote the general thoughts of the developers: "If you don't like it, don't bitch at us; Bitch at Apache"

Anyway, nothing is stopping you from running 2.x or any other apache. It just won't be supported.

I think that Carp/pfsync is more important than apache. Plus now there is some SMP to work with.

Just my 2 cents.

Re:PF, now...

[ArbitraryConstant]

A pretty big minority said "What about thttpd?"? The official word is that the default will not be changed.

Of course, if you want to install it out of ports...

Re:PF, now...

[lcde]

Or better yet, screw the default and install what -you- want.

That's fine. The whole point of free software is the freedom to do what you want. Make sure you know what you are doing though and don't expect help if you are on the mailing list saying:

"I compiled gcc 3.2 and apache 2.0..."

The reason I like bsd and why I feel it is so stable. It is the fact that the 'default' base system contains a group of tightly knit programs that have been proven to be secure and stable. Once you start adding programs that aren't default, (i feel) you lower some stability and some security.

it's scary

[ArbitraryConstant]

These hackathons always scare me a bit. Major functionality has a habbit of going from non-existant to solid before it's over.

Re:it's scary

[Anonymous Coward]

From the outside, it always looks as if it's been thrown together at the hackathon. But the developers have repeatedly made comments along the lines of "we'd been discussing this for months/years and had come up with a good design, which we implemented over the last 48 hours".

Good code always comes in about a 10:1 planning:implementing ratio.

Re:They will fix the OBSD "virus", + more sec stuf

[nacturation]

Accordingly, word on the street is that significant effort this hackathon will be put into fixing the first ever OpenBSD virus...

I think a fix has already been found for this particular "virus".

Re:They will fix the OBSD "virus", + more sec stuf

[HSpirit]

It's at times like this that we need a "-1: Idiocy of post only matched by idiocy of moderation" option for moderation.

Re:OpenBSD is a failure by any man's measure

[jpop32]

The record is clear on one thing: no operating system has ever come back from the grave.

Oh yeah? How about Amiga? How about BeOS? Hm... Never mind.

Re:A nice installer, after all?

[Clover_Kicker]

I installed 3.5 yesterday, oddly enough.

It only took 15 minutes to install the base system. All my hardware autodetected without problems. What's wrong with the installer?

Re:A nice installer, after all?

[Anonymous Coward]

i cant emagine an easier installer. i have yet to see a single os that can be installed as fast as openbsd without fast clicking the next and default buttons on some gui POS.

its just that most people dont understand how a hard disk works, and if you cant take the time to learn fdisk and disklabel, you probably wont be able to take the time to learn how to use an operating system without newbie user abstraction. openbsd is free, functional, and secure. i dont think ive ever seen any reference to advancement in mickey mouse hand holding techniques.

put two new users that understand OS concepts in front of a FreeBSD installer and an OpenBSD installer and see who goes from zero to puffy from a floppy before the other guy can start his package extraction.

Re:Let's hope for SMP

[ArbitraryConstant]

I dunno, biglock is the way to get it working. Portions of the kernel can then be multithreaded gradually over time.

Or who knows, they might decide to do it the DragonFly way.

Re:A nice installer, after all?

[curator_thew]

I actually hope they don't make the installer more user friendly: otherwise we'll have too many supercifical and clueless users coming to use the system. OpenBSD (and NetBSD is a bit like this as well, more in contrast to FreeBSD and Linux) tends to be directed to knowledgable technical users, which goes in tandem with its security ethos. If you like nice installers, try another O/S: OpenBSD isn't reall for you.

I'd much prefer them to be using their time on innovative security features, not pretty installers, SMP, apache-clones, etc. CARP, pf, privsep, etc.

In fact, the OpenBSD guys would probably like it people with good ideas raised them here, and who knows, these ideas may make it into current or future release.

If that wasn't elitist

[Korpo]

Actually all users could use a thoroughly code-reviewed system with a safe default install.

The net would be a bit safer for sure, even if it was just a bit.

More user-friendly installer => wider user-base => less zombies for DDoS. Maybe even more money for OpenBSD development? More OpenBSD related jobs? More interest in embedded ports? More positive PR?

Too bad you're so shortsighted!

FreeBSD is alive and kicking.

[SphericalCrusher]

Christ. I know this post is offtopic also, but what is the deal and all of these people bashing FreeBSD. I mean... if it's actually dead, new updates wouldn't be coming out, would they? You do know that FreeBSD 4.10 was released recently, don't you? I'm going to be throwing together a computer this summer just for installing FreeBSD on. As long as software has some users and continues to be updated, it's not dead. Hell, Windows 95 isn't even dead yet... it may not be updated any more, but a lot of people still use it.

Re:A nice installer? Not if the locks up

[Shanep]

The OpenBSD team needs to give their installer some more polish (from the functional standpoint not the prettiness standpoint)

It seems you have been quite unlucky.

I've been using OpenBSD since 2.5. The installer was a bit of a shock at first, but once it makes sense, it is wonderful (and it is sensible). I usually can install OpenBSD with X in under 5 minutes and I've only ever found one machine to not install for me (an IBM Thinkpad series 1300).

I've installed on tons of x86 machines, some MacPPC, a 68k Mac and a Sun Ultra 10. No problems. I cannot say the same for some Linux distros or the other BSD's.

I plan to have another crack at that Thinkpad, now that OpenBSD 3.5 has new boot code.

There are times when OpenBSD won't work, where some Linux distro does or vice versa. So try again. Don't write OpenBSD off because of a few bad initial attempts. I've been using Linux for about 7 years and tried lots of distros and the BSD's. I settled on OpenBSD (and Debian when I must use Linux).