NetBSD 2.0 RC5 Tagged

ulib writes "NetBSD 2.0_RC5 has now been tagged. Changes since RC4 include fixes to various COMPAT_ emulations, IP Filter backward compatibility fixes, XFree86, pax(1), rsh(1), hp300 boot blocks, pthread fixes for amd64 and i386, documentation updates. Binary snapshots of NetBSD 2.0_RC5 are available in the daily builds directory on the main FTP site."

Comments

Re:How does NetBSD compare to OpenBSD?

[Nimrangul]

First, here are a few fundamental differences between the two operating systems, all the while I will list perceived pros and cons of NetBSD and OpenBSD in random spots.

OpenBSD broke from the NetBSD base over 9 years ago, that is nine years of code divergence in small ways even in the most similar of parts of the codebases.

NetBSD has a great deal of platforms that are supported, including architectures untouched by most other operating systems. OpenBSD supports only 14 platforms, with several discontinued ones as well. NetBSD's supported platforms however are not up to the same standard as OpenBSD's; OpenBSD requires that the port be compilable on it's given platform and many of NetBSD's cannot. This makes the overall codebase of NetBSD more portable and stable at the price of properly supporting it's platforms.

OpenBSD has in the past audited the codebase for it's entire system in order to remove as many programming errors as possible, this has lead to increased security as well as stability.

OpenBSD has in the past removed system tools and ports that it deems to be too insecure or bug ridden. NetBSD does not have this policy. Such as rlogin.

OpenBSD has in the past fought over licenses which they do not believe in having within their system; trying to relicense or replace code which does not conform with their level liberal code. NetBSD does not find this to be a priority. Such things include SSH/OpenSSH, IPF/PF, XFree86/X.org and GnuTAR/TAR.

OpenBSD integrates security minded protection into it's system whenever possible. NetBSD does not. Stack protection; stackghost on Sparc and propolice on I386 as well as taking them to other platforms in the future.

I honestly see no major pros to using NetBSD over OpenBSD on any of the overlapping platforms, but NetBSD is on more platforms.