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OpenBSD 3.7 Reviewed
busfahrer writes "Jem Matzan has written a review of OpenBSD 3.7 for Newsforge. He talks about their licensing issues, network features, upgrading packages and the new supported architectures."
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Opening line:
The operating system world has been blessed by another regular release of OpenBSD.
And, no, it doesn't get any more objective further down. Nor does he talk about the licensing issues or new architectures in any detail at all - less detail, in fact, than he talks about the theme tune.
I liked linux back when nobody knew what it was. Now my mom even knows what it is.
Good bye linux, hello obscurity, er, OpenBSD!
BSD is not dying at all. Most of the major operating systems are based on BSD, or have borrowed code from it.
It will happen.
"...an effigy of a crown-wearing penguin."
Sheesh. The prez in "Mars Attacks" said it best:
"Why can't we work out our differences? Why can't we work things out? Little people, why can't we all just get along?"
Mark
Is there *any* actual information in this article at all (useful information, anyway)? The only tidbits I could find boil down to things like "my on-board controller didn't work", "I couldn't compile KDE myself", and "this and that specific option to this and that program gives a warning when you use it".
Outside of these things, the only pieces of information I could find boiled down to "there's two new ports", "it still doesn't include Apache 2.x", and "you get daily (in)security reports mailed to you". If it wasn't for the irrelevant fluff mentioned above, I'd assume the author of this article hasn't even installed OpenBSD and instead just looked through the website and maybe Google'd for some extra information.
I really hope the author didn't get payed too much for this, because no matter how much he got, the article wasn't worth it.
quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur.
I guess BSD isn't dead after all.
It's now a zombie. Neither dead or alive.
Evolution or ID?
As someone who replied to the original article (see bottom of original link) mentioned, it would've been interesting to have seen a true comprehensive analysis of OpenBSD, rather than a lot of "I think" and "I liked".
I would have appreciated the article more if it were a lot more in-depth, but perhaps that would've ward off others. I would like to see him not just talk about the install process (initially), but also how easy it was to install applications (and not just "I had to type too much"), configure them (interface-configuration, or purely text-editing), and finally - how well they all interacted. Now, I know that sounds more like an analysis of the individual applications rather than the operating system, but what is an operating system if not a platform that you use to interact with applications?
We also hear about the "new wireless" stuff... where was that? Test with multiple cards? USB-Wireless perhaps? PCMCIA Wireless? To tout such things (even in the review) and then not do anything with them is rather disappointing.
From the article:
The theme of the OpenBSD 3.7 CD set is The Wizard of Oz, and the cute little CD jacket cartoon strip shows the OpenBSD mascot and friends on a journey to achieve better wireless card drivers. Their adventure takes them to the Emerald City to meet the great and powerful Wizard of OS himself -- an effigy of a crown-wearing penguin. The man behind the curtain turns out to be a Richard Stallman-like character with GNU horns. The characters are disappointed because the Wizard ends up being "all talk -- no action!" So they decide to code the wireless driver by reverse-engineering the device.
Actually, from an admins point of view, the BSDs are easier to learn than any linux distribution. That is not to say they are easier to use, but they are simpler when it comes to managing the system:
Less complicated init;
MUCH better documentation;
Less painful filesystem management (though LVM2 is really nice);
The downsides are significant however:
Bad support for esoteric hardware;
Less vendor support;
Fewer eyes looking over the code (though, to be fair, there is MUCH less code for them to look over)
the default install is essentially useless, as there have been holes in the services that most people would want to enable...
Well, this depends really on what you think *most* people want. The system contains a number of tools from the default install, including:
ntpd
pf
bgpd
isakmpd
spamd
OpenSSH
X.Org
Gcc
Perl
Apache
OpenSSL
Groff
Sendmail
Bind
Lynx
Sudo
Ncurses
Heimdal
Arla
Binutils
Gdb
Although I may have missed few...
As you can see from the apps mentioned, there are a number ways you could put a default install box to use. Basic web server, firewall, mailhost..?
When I ran RedHat, there were some pretty annoying things that got changed from release to release (inetd disappears, two different C compiler installs because of kernel problems, etc.).
This kind of stuff doesn't happen in OpenBSD. From an administration perspective, my first 3.2 install is very similar to the 3.5 that I run now, which itself is similar to 3.7. There are no large architecture changes (perhaps because things are well-thought-out from the start).
Because of this, you pretty much know what you're getting when a new OpenBSD release comes out. The installer is practically identical, and the running system yeilds few surprises. There will always be new features, but there won't be lots of things to unlearn.
So no, I don't really pay much attention to the reviews. The list of new features on the OpenBSD web page pretty much tells me all that I need to know.
>Now my mom even knows what it is.
Your mom knows a lot of other things you wouldn't suspect.
Oh, and btw BSD rules. So, you *please* stay away from it. Thanks
(No, I didn't forget the "post anonymously" blah blah)
--
Requiem for the FUD
I know this is slashdot, but please stop spreading FUD.
6 91304
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=127944&cid=10
Fewer eyes looking over the code
I don't know if this is really true. There are three major BSD "distributions" with subtle differences. Fans of each routinely look over the code for the others looking for good, "stealable" code. Not only does that mean that people are looking at the code, but informed "outsider" coders are looking at it with a critical eye. So, even if the code is reviewed by fewer people, it's reviewed by people who are more likely to notice, report, and fix bugs.
Forward, retransmit, or republish anything I say here. Just don't misquote me.
It has done this for some time now.
FreeBSD because of the number of ports, i386 optimization, availability of features that one day could turn out handy (like jails).
There are also other reasons related to the goals of the projects - I like FreeBSD for emphasizing the "tool" aspect of software, keeping policies/politics completely out of the door. But it's not that I don't respect OpenBSD activism, as a matter of fact I do, they have a point (and by pressing hardware vendors they've already got amazing results). It's just that the FreeBSD point of view happens to be closer to mine. (Btw this last issue influences which one I like better, not which one I use, since IMHO this is not a reason to use one over the other.)
Anyway, I think that what the *BSD projects have in common is far more important - that is, the academical spirit of the BSD license.
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Being able to read *other people's* source code is a nice thing, not a 'fundamental freedom'.
I simply told you which one I like better and why (i.e. what you asked for). I didn't tell you what are the differences between them, so your deduction is wrong.
h andbook/index.html
In fact, the main differences are technical, in their very goals: while FreeBSD focuses mainly on features and i386 performance, OpenBSD focuses mainly on code correctness and security.
>Do these two share between each other?
Sure they do - and massively.
For example, one little jewel that came from OpenBSD to the other *BSDs is pf (packet filter), that has an excellent reputation for its being very clean and easy to use.
>Is there a common BSD kernel or anything like that?
No.
The *BSDs are developed like OSes, not "distros". So, while they massively share code, they maintain their own kernels.
To better understand the differences, it helps to notice that OpenBSD was born as a NetBSD fork, 8 years ago - and even today, it shares more code with NetBSD than with FreeBSD.
But to understand even better, well.. FreeBSD and OpenBSD are renowned for their excellent documentation, that is well worth having a look at.
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/
http://openbsd.org/faq/index.html
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Requiem for the FUD
I linked to the FreeBSD Handbook, that is the user documentation. But for more general info about the FreeBSD project you might want to have a look at the FAQ firstf aq/index.html
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/
I also forgot: this is a very nice place to find competent and informative answers to BSD and Unix related issues
http://bsdforums.org/forums
Btw, one little thing that the forum above has, and IMHO Slashdot is missing *badly*, is the ability to edit comments to add things you forgot (damn it).
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Requiem for the FUD
OpenBSD is really more of a server OS. Sure you /can/ use it as a desktop, but there are better alternatives. I think its strongest point is how in /etc/rc.conf one can simply change say named_flags=N to named_flags="" (command arguments could go inside the quotes) and bam! BIND is up and running. Many of these services are available in /etc/rc.conf from the default install. Thus with OpenBSD it is possible to bring up a reliable and secure server fairly quickly.
Really? Have you heard of NetBSD? Do you not realize that FreeBSD has been not only on-par with Linux, but ahead of it in some areas for many years now?
That's debatable. There are fewer vendors for BSD-based OSes, but you get perfectly good support from those that do exist.
Saying that this is a disadvantage is dishonest. The idea is that more eyes makes code more secure... While that theory has been dismissed many times, even if you do believe it, you can't possibly deny that all BSD distros have a much better security tract record than Linux.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
"Being able to read *other people's* source code is a nice thing, not a 'fundamental freedom'."
I'm not a big RMS fan, but here's where I'd disagree with you -- how GM engineers their engines and why may be none of my business, but being allowed to tear it apart and replace parts myself for my own use should be a basic right. If I then want to tell others what I did to my GM engine to make it better, so they can do it to theirs, that should be fine too.
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
how GM engineers their engines and why may be none of my business, but being allowed to tear it apart and replace parts myself for my own use should be a basic right. If I then want to tell others what I did to my GM engine to make it better, so they can do it to theirs, that should be fine too.
I think we're talking about two different things: the right to see the software source code is like the right to have the *blueprints* of that engine (i.e., the right to have their knowledge and know-how, the "recipe" of their product).
OTOH, I think your example is comparable to be allowed to *reverse engineer* the software (according to the philosophy, with which I tend to agree, that since I bought it I should be allowed to do with it whatever the heck I want).
Anyway, it ultimately depends on the license/EULA that the software comes under. I think (and here's where my favouring BSD over GPL/GNU/Linux comes out) the ideal scenario is the one in which any vendor can choose for his code the license/EULA that he wants, with no GPL-like restrictions, and the *market* is the one that decides if he's gonna succeed or fail.
After all, according to history, this is the scenario that yields the best results for the economy - and not only in software production.
(Needless to say, all other things being equal, I prefer software that comes with no anti-reverse-engineering EULAs - and *much* more, of course, I like Free/Open software that comes with the complete source.)
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Being able to read *other people's* source code is a nice thing, not a 'fundamental freedom'.