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OpenBSD 4.0 Released
Undeadly Halloween writes, "On October 18th, OpenBSD celebrated its 11th birthday and ten years of punctual biannual releases. Now it's time for OpenBSD 4.0, which includes tons of new drivers for wireless, network, and storage chips. Consider helping the project by buying the new goodies (CD set, t-shirt, poster, Audio CD). And discover what's new and what battles developers must face daily to support new hardware in the traditional interview featuring nearly 20 developers."
Is this where all the active development is going on? The list of new/improved supported interfaces and the rest is staggering. Way to go OpenBSD!
Good stuff. Hopefully some of those free drivers will get spread around to Linux as well.
Care about privacy? Read this!
No, I'm yawning because I just woke up, I SWEAR!
Whew... On the press release, under "New/extended platforms", it says:
"OpenBSD/armish"
I read that as OpenBSD/amish. You can imagine the visions that swirled through my head at that point.
More
Biannual means every other year. Semiannual means twice a year. OpenBSD serves up punctual releases twice a year. Yet Another Grammatical Error on Slashdot (YAGES?)
Cool ! can I run it on my toaster ?
This is not an automated signature. I type this in to the bottom of every message.
What are the benefits of OpenRCS? Is it just that it's a BSD-licensed implementation? Have there been any performance, reliability or scalability improvements?
It kinda annoys me that I have to waste a whole 650MB CD-R disk on a five MB boot image... oh well. ...here I go...installing 4.0
TDz.
(and by the way, why can't OpenBSD boot from CD-ROM on the VAX architecture? OpenVMS can boot from CD-ROM just fine)
The whole documentation firestorm recently didn't seem to stop their progress. The issue remains, how to get the chip vendors to provide documentation that allows writing drivers for OpenBSD in this case, and all the other OSs. Maybe the pressure needs to come from a different side.
What would Broadcom or Intel do if Dell or Hewlett Packard told them to provide documentation for each of the chips in the laptops or desktops. If it became a business decision, no Dell laptops with a non-documented Broadcom chip, would it make Broadcom wake up? Or does this argument hit a brick wall, a) they are in bed together already and of one mind. or b) Dell/HP couldn't care less about what some minor segment of the market wants?
Still, I like the looks of OpenBSD 4.0 and my order is on its way.
imho, commercial OS's are just fascistware
open unix rocks, and so does freedom
Words to men, as air to birds.
I can't run any of the stuff I need to run under OpenBSD, so why the heck should I even care about it?
It's a specialized OS for an extremely small minority of users. What a waste of resources...
If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!
is that it can run Linux executables!
presumably this contains the installer, encoded into audio Commodore 64-style?
Turns out a specialized OS for a small number of users often ends up being something that can't be easily replaced. PF has availability features no one outside of Cisco can match, and they can't match them for what it costs us to use OpenBSD for the job.
For example, our Internet connection at work is managed by OpenBSD. If I rebooted our firewall, no one would notice, because the backup would kick in and it would preserve state for everything, even pre-existing TCP connections. You could be streaming music and it wouldn't even skip. How can I do that with Linux again?
"I can't run any of the stuff I need to run under OpenBSD, so why the heck should I even care about it?"
Hm. Whenever I have that problem, I just download the Linux version and run it under binary emulation.
I rarely criticize things I don't care about.
Has anyone actually gotten a straight answer from hardware vendors as to why they wont give out documentation? Can you build a modern x86 PC using only hardware that is fully supported by free software with no binary bits, blobs, non-redistributable firmware or missing functionality? Are there any hardware companies that DO give out documentation?
It's been released ?
That's a real shame. It'll never survive in the wild...../P
echo $SIGNATURE
T-Shirts - Hideous
CD Set - More toxic landfill
Posters - see t-shirts above
Audio - got to be kidding
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
By research, I mean the novel approaches they take to acheive new functionality in firewalling, routing, hardware drivers, and cryptography. They also have a reputation for coding "correctness" in improving the basic BSD/Unix utilities that are then used by other projects. I tend to think of the OpenBSD project as an extremely productive research institution run on the cheap. My opinion is that they are probably on a level close to Sun and its multi-million dollar R&D in pumping out Unix inovations.
No, I don't run OpenBSD myself right now (I have in the past), because I currently have no compelling need of its unique features that would justify me moving away from the comfort of apt-get for binary updates. The source-only updates are my only real complaint about OpenBSD, and even that is because I'm basically too lazy to deal with it myself.
I think a big part of these problems are not more complicated than Theo's breathtaking disability to relate to others, treat people friendly and helpful, and simply behave in an _adult manner_ instead of the childishly abrasive and arrogant way he's known by.
Theo, stop going about everything and everyone with a friggin' pair of blinkers on your head - others might just open up to you (and your projects') benefit by simply being nice, instead of being a jerk. It's called being a peoples person, and it usually gets you ahead instead of being set back.
Nice release, though! Just waiting for the recent 3.9 errata to be patched up for the stable branch...
I think most people already know the reason when they look at nVidia and ATI. They're violating an assload of patents. Anymore I'm not sure that most of these companies care so much about giving away the specs, as giving away information for patent infringement. And lets face it, if you make almost ANYTHING you are probably infringing. Why incur an additional cost just for some crazy hobbyist programmers?
Is anyone running the SGI port? I just got a couple of decommissioned O2s from work, and I'm wondering what to install on them.
(I've already got one running Irix at home, so that's covered.)
--saint
... but does it run linux?
Anybody else think its a bit of a coincidence that 2.9 was followed by 3.0 and 3.9 was followed 4.0? I mean, why bother with the "."? :-)
Yet another crippling bombshell hit the beleaguered *BSD community when recently IDC confirmed that *BSD accounts for less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of the latest 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.
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 hobbyist dabblers. *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 dead
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Previous usage of this article
The lessons of history teach us - if they teach us anything - that nobody learns the lessons that history teaches us.
openbsd sucks
OpenBSD 4.0 Released
Who really gives a shit?
But now that I'm older I want the stability and security that only OpenBSD provides. ;-)
Simple
WiFi cards. May run into issues with the FCC since they are are supposed to be not "easily modifiable by the end user".
Graphics cards. May use technology from another company that is under an NDA.
DMCA. Intel has released all the documentation for their graphics chips except for the MacroVision part.
And last but not least, cost. It costs money to release documentation. Frankly for most companies the Linux OpenBSD market isn't worth it.
The simple answer is no. If you build an all Intel system then you will be very close to your goal. If you want WiFi use a Proxim card.
You will be missing the ability to play DRM video but other than that you will be okay.
However the no binary bit is IMPOSSIBLE.
Sorry but unless you flash your Motherboard with a new BIOS and you do not have a single FPGA or other programmable logic chip on any board that you add to your system you will have some closed binary code somewhere, even if it is the in the microcontroller in your mouse and keyboards.
A totally open system doesn't currently exist. I don't see the big issue with some binary blobs. If they are just field upgradeable code for a PLD or an embedded cpu I don't see the problem.
Even such over the top zealots as Theo and RMS have never raged about the microcode in the CPU, the logic code in PLDs, or the masked code in microcontrollers.
So if you want a totally open system I suggest you get out your soldering iron. Otherwise pick the best compromise between open and function you can. As I said an Intel mother board with an Intel GPU is your best start.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Yuck.
CVS has already been replaced by subversion (SVN). CVS sucks horribly. Subversion only sucks a little bit.
I could see doing a BitKeeper or ClearCase reimplementation maybe. Let CVS pass into history.
OpenBSD/amish indeed...
They proudly announce a reimplementation of CVS.
Let me repeat: CVS. In 2006.
The CVS replacement is already here. We call it Subversion or SVN. It works like CVS, but with several nasty defects removed. Most of us are hoping that CVS will pass into history, to be remembered only on wikipedia.
If you want to reimplement a version control system, you could pick something non-free that doesn't already have a free clone. You could pick BitKeeper or ClearCase, neither of which are 100% sucky or obsolete.
So yes, "amish" fits well.
Just like OS/2 could run Windows executables. That didn't save OS/2 and I doubt this will do much for OpenBSD
:-)) and are religious only when it comes to security, not regarding platforms. As a matter of fact they tell newcomers to develop for Linux and let their app run under emulation, that it is pretty unlikely that the newcomer needs the performance advantage of running natively and should go for a larger market instead.
That is a silly comparison. OS/2 tried to compete against Windows, OpenBSD does not try to compete against Linux. OpenBSD does its own thing and doesn't really care what others do. It helps to keep in mind that the OpenBSD folks are a little more mature (obviously referring to the community at large and excluding Theo
BTW, Linux emulation is more of a *BSD thing, not OpenBSD specific.
Dell, et al. HAVE documentation. They signed legally binding NDA's and contracts. There is serious money involved. I still don't get why everyone thinks the community should be the ones to wirte the drivers. Make a stable ABI and allow manufacturers to write the drivers as they see fit and protect their IP.
Other options is for OS people sacrifice any ability to work in their field and sign life-long NDA's and non-com's to gain acess to the info or have bounties to raise the millions to BUY the information and form business contacts with manufacturers. Personally I would like to see a fully functioning HAL and pull nearly all drivers out of the kernel and rewrite the ABI to use Windows drivers. We would never have an incompatibility again.
[RIAA] says its concern is artists. That's true, in just the sense that a cattle rancher is concerned about its cattle.
...the fact it keeps the rest of the world from having to deal with Theo De Rat and his myopic band of anti-social retards!
Oh, you mean like how he got pissed off when certain companies started preinstalling OBSD on machines and then told their customers the BSD mailing list was their support forum, without even the courtesy to tell anyone on the list what they were in for? I can't blame Theo at all for how he responds to greedy bastards like that.
Although I prefer *BSD to Linux for anything beyond consumer desktop type usage (ok, maybe embedded too), think Apple made a wise choice to go BSD rather than Linux, believe that the BSD license is truly free while the GPL is restrictive but benevolent, I have to say I have little sympathy for Theo. This is the trade-off you make by going BSD. Freedom means everything does not go your way, that others have the right to be a-holes. Suck it up, explain what is going on to the new users, and try to sell them CDs, t-shirts, etc. Take the glass is half full view and look at these newcomers as potential future customers, or at least that they are growing your platform's market, increasing the network effect, making it easier to bring others in who will be your customers.
[ed. note: in the following text, former FreeBSD developer Mike Smith gives his reasons for abandoning FreeBSD]
When I stood for election to the FreeBSD core team nearly two years ago, many of you will recall that it was after a long series of debates during which I maintained that too much organisation, too many rules and too much formality would be a bad thing for the project.
Today, as I read the latest discussions on the future of the FreeBSD project, I see the same problem; a few new faces and many of the old going over the same tired arguments and suggesting variations on the same worthless schemes. Frankly I'm sick of it.
FreeBSD used to be fun. It used to be about doing things the right way. It used to be something that you could sink your teeth into when the mundane chores of programming for a living got you down. It was something cool and exciting; a way to spend your spare time on an endeavour you loved that was at the same time wholesome and worthwhile.
It's not anymore. It's about bylaws and committees and reports and milestones, telling others what to do and doing what you're told. It's about who can rant the longest or shout the loudest or mislead the most people into a bloc in order to legitimise doing what they think is best. Individuals notwithstanding, the project as a whole has lost track of where it's going, and has instead become obsessed with process and mechanics.
So I'm leaving core. I don't want to feel like I should be "doing something" about a project that has lost interest in having something done for it. I don't have the energy to fight what has clearly become a losing battle; I have a life to live and a job to keep, and I won't achieve any of the goals I personally consider worthwhile if I remain obligated to care for the project.
Discussion
I'm sure that I've offended some people already; I'm sure that by the time I'm done here, I'll have offended more. If you feel a need to play to the crowd in your replies rather than make a sincere effort to address the problems I'm discussing here, please do us the courtesy of playing your politics openly.
From a technical perspective, the project faces a set of challenges that significantly outstrips our ability to deliver. Some of the resources that we need to address these challenges are tied up in the fruitless metadiscussions that have raged since we made the mistake of electing officers. Others have left in disgust, or been driven out by the culture of abuse and distraction that has grown up since then. More may well remain available to recruitment, but while the project is busy infighting our chances for successful outreach are sorely diminished.
There's no simple solution to this. For the project to move forward, one or the other of the warring philosophies must win out; either the project returns to its laid-back roots and gets on with the work, or it transforms into a super-organised engineering project and executes a brilliant plan to deliver what, ultimately, we all know we want.
Whatever path is chosen, whatever balance is struck, the choosing and the striking are the important parts. The current indecision and endless conflict are incompatible with any sort of progress.
Trying to dissect the above is far beyond the scope of any parting shot, no matter how distended. All I can really ask of you all is to let go of the minutiae for a moment and take a look at the big picture. What is the ultimate goal here? How can we get there with as little overhead as possible? How would you like to be treated by your fellow travellers?
Shouts
To the Slashdot "BSD is dying" crowd - big deal. Death is part of the cycle; take a look at your soft, pallid bodies and consider that right this very moment, parts of you are dying. See? It's not so bad.
To the bulk of the FreeBSD committerbase and the developer community at large - keep your eyes on the real goals. It
lets set some definitions before we start talking.
;)
microcode: a binary piece that is loaded directly into the hardware
binary blob: a binary piece that is loaded directly into the kernel
microcode is fine. any OS on any arch can do that (provided it has the appropriate hardware, natch). you bought a kick ass RAID card? sweet. Vendor 'designed' it to run only on i386. you want to put it into your sparc box.
if the vendor requires a binary blob, you're screwed. so you take it back and get your money back.
if it requires microcode, your OS may already have a driver for it. add a few ntoh(), sprinkle with 32bit alignment, and you're in buisness. same driver works on a few dozen other archs than what the original vendor designed it for. glories of glories its fast and stable.
in binary blob land, the vendor made it work with a few dozen OSs, with strange little quirks all over the place. not the most stable, not the fastest.
with microcode, a developer can get a burr in his ass, and rewrite the entire driver. 10% the size, speed is now limited to how fast the platters move and how fast the PCI bus is. and also magically works with device independant code (read: bio, sensors, etc). oups, now it happens to be 64-bit clean, and can swap endians.
hmm. its offtopic from the parent post, but this is slashdot, not like anyone will notice
Is anyone using a hardware encryption accelerator with OpenBSD? I'm considering a purchase but finding good information has been somewhat problematic.
Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.
I love OpenBSD, and now its time to build a couple of new, shiny pfsync boxes!
Congrats on a great new release!
You create your own reality - Leave mine to me.
I do understand. The thing is I don't think Theo does.
He was complaining about the WiFi chipset that the one laptop per child program was using. At run time it loads a binary file into the wifi chipset that gets executed on an arm core. He was using the term binary blob for that even though it was NOT being loaded into the kernel or even executing on the host CPU. I don't see the difference between this and the code being in flash except it is cheaper and will run faster out of ram than flash. So you see it is related to the idea of binary free hardware in relation to OpenBSD.
I still stand by my statement that if you want a somewhat modern open system your best bet is to use an Intel video card which means an Intel CPU.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
is a useless driver when the main focus of your OS is security. Remember the local root exploits in NVidia's drivers?
HAND.
They don't seem to offer any torrent downloads, which I think most people would find somewhat odd in this day and age. In addition, they don't even seem to publish MD5 and SHA1 checksums of the discs, which I personally think is especially odd due to the security focus of the OS.
Did you mount a military-grade, variable-focus MASER on an unlicensed artificial intelligence?
She can give you the shit I took on her face last night.
I mean, look at how all the vendors are giving docs to the friendly happy teletubby OSs right? Oh wait, they aren't. They treat their paying customers like shit. Just because you like being treated like shit, doesn't mean those who don't like it shouldn't do something about it. These companies have had plenty of friendly requests for docs. Only after lying for months does it get to the point where Theo resorts to publicly displaying these companies lies, and asking their customers to help request docs.
It doesn't take more than a 5 minute search to find evidence of Theo outting Intel, and more recently sun for NOT donating enough to make Theo happy. So what does he do? He outs them in a public forum in an accusatory fashion. I don't feel you can claim your OS is free if you harass the people you've told it's free too, for money.
Subversion only sucks a little bit? What alternate universe did you get your subversion from? Subversion is a huge bloated pile of crap, with almost no benefits over CVS. CVS with renaming is all most people wanted from svn, and instead we got a mess. If opencvs replaces the buggy and security hole filled GNU cvs, that's great.
I read that same interview, and in it de Raadt accepts the use of firmware/microcodes in binary form as long as they are permissible to be distributed by OpenBSD. What he was railing against was the fact that the documentation for the chipset was provided under an NDA.
Except that keepalived can't do that. Its just a very simple, and not very good load balancer. It doesn't sync states, and it pukes and loses existing connections when you try to reload its configuration. When I got here one of my first projects was to replace the terrible keepalived setup they had been tricked into using by a linux zealot. They were planning on coughing up the money for a commerical solution, but I just reinstalled those same 2 boxes with openbsd instead and they have been working perfectly ever since.
And Pufferix? Come on, wasn't there a Linux distro that got into major trouble over the -ix postfix? And that was without the visual representation of the cartoon character.
So, anyway, what I'm saying: get rid of the stale Puffy, get back to the roots with The Daemon.
!ERR: Signature not found.
Theo does understand it.... With respect to binary firmware, the issue he has is that the companies do not allow OpenBSD to redistribute the firmware, not that it needs a binary firmware. The binary blob issue is not with firmware, but with closed source binary only drivers, like the ATI/nVidia card drivers in linux.
I'm using OpenBSD, but then again, I'm dying.
All chip docs suck, and it costs money to finish them and clean them up for public consumption. Vendors probably just don't see the business case.
i haven't even had time to install 3.9 yet!
Can anyone recommend a good therapist for me.. er.. my schizophrenic network card?