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OpenBSD 6.4 Released (openbsd.org)

Posted by BeauHD on from the come-and-get-it dept.

The 45th version of the OpenBSD project has been released, bringing more hardware support (Radeon driver updates, Intel microcode integration, and more), a virtualization tool that supports the disk format qcow2, and a network interface where you can quickly join and switch between different Wi-Fi networks.

Root.cz also notes that audio recording is now disabled by default. If you need to record audio, it can be enabled with the new sysctl variable. An anonymous Slashdot reader first shared the announcement. You can download it from any of the mirrors here.

12 of 121 comments (clear)

  1. Re:No Code of Conduct yet? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    OpenBSD actually does have a code of conduct:

    "Shut up and hack!"

  2. Re: Is anyone using OpenBSD? by DaMattster · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I use it for everything I do. It's my desktop, server, topper, and firewall. If it won't run on OpenBSD, I'm not interested.

  3. Anyone switch from Linux to BSD? by tgibson · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I can very much understand preferring BSD if that's the environment you cut your teeth on. Is there anyone who didn't have that history who looked at both Linux and BSD and decided the latter better served their needs?

    1. Re:Anyone switch from Linux to BSD? by thegarbz · · Score: 5, Funny

      Based on the Slashdot comments from the anti-systemd crowd everyone here now runs BSD and Linux is officially dead.

    2. Re:Anyone switch from Linux to BSD? by SigmundFloyd · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I tried, but hardware support in the BSD world was frankly pathetic. NetBSD doesn't support ACPI suspend-to-disk and needs special kernel configuration just to show readable characters on the framebuffer console, on my old laptop. FreeBSD and NetBSD wouldn't even finish booting on one of my systems -- a run of the mill, 12 year old amd64 desktop PC that never had any problems with Linux.

      I haven't tried OpenBSD lately. Although it's really high quality, its upgrade schedule is unacceptably hectic for me. I like stability on my systems; whereas, with OpenBSD, you must reinstall the whole system at least once a year, if you want to keep it secure (and if you don't, I don't see why you're running that particular OS in the first place). What OpenBSD really needs are long-term support releases.

      What the BSD world needs is BETTER HARDWARE SUPPORT if they ever want to be serious, viable contenders. I'd love to switch away from Linux, which is getting more and more fragmented and unstable. But the simple fact is that, today, there is no serious alternative in the Unix[-like] world.

      --
      Knowledge is power; knowledge shared is power lost.
    3. Re:Anyone switch from Linux to BSD? by worf_mo · · Score: 3, Informative

      I first installed Linux in 1994 (Slackware), and soon began to use it professionally. Over the following years I tried various distributions, Red Hat, SUSE, Mandrake, until settling for Debian around 2001, for my workstation, laptop, and servers. In 2011 I noticed that I was spending way too much time tinkering around to keep my laptop in a stable state (wouldn't resume from sleep, audio was hit-and-miss, wifi worked under one kernel but not the next one). I bought a MacBook Pro and haven't looked back ever since.

      On the server side, over the past few years I have replaced all Debian installations with FreeBSD. Not "because systemd", but things were heading in a direction I didn't much care about. So if I have to re-learn a bunch of ingrained things I might as well take the plunge already. And I found out that I love FreeBSD; and the way things are done and worked with seems to be more natural to me. To list just a few:

      - pf firewall
      - package versions do not depend on OS release - I can have the latest packages running on an older release, and I can upgrade releases without upgrading all your userland binaries
      - I can run the current (or a recent) version of the packages I need without having to resort to an unstable OS branch (see above)
      - /etc and /usr/local/etc are separated for a reason
      - jails

      So to answer your question: (Free)BSD definitely better serves my needs.

      I'm not writing this to disparage Debian or any other Linux distribution. I appreciate the work so many people have put into this (and have donated over the years). With FreeBDS I just found a system that I am more productive and feel more at home with.

    4. Re:Anyone switch from Linux to BSD? by TeknoHog · · Score: 2

      Systemd is not Linux. There are Linux distros that don't use systemd by default. My personal choice is Gentoo, which I've been using since 2003 or so, and it never adopted systemd (though you can install it if you really want).

      --
      Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
    5. Re:Anyone switch from Linux to BSD? by TeknoHog · · Score: 2

      I tried, but hardware support in the BSD world was frankly pathetic.

      This was my experience with NetBSD too. There were some distro aspects I really liked about BSD -- generally, a kind of clean traditional Unix feel -- but I was spoiled by Linux on the hardware side. Fortunately, I soon found Gentoo which takes the best of BSD into a Linux distro with GNU userland. The bit about having to compile everything? That's straight from BSD Ports.

      --
      Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
    6. Re:Anyone switch from Linux to BSD? by grub · · Score: 2

      "with OpenBSD, you must reinstall the whole system at least once a year, if you want to keep it secure"

      Nonsense. There is an upgrade option when you boot from the ISO or ISO image. Here how you upgrade from 6.3 -> 6.4. I have gone this route for years and it has never failed me. Just be sure to check what it is suggesting and watch the diffs.

      --
      Trolling is a art,
    7. Re:Anyone switch from Linux to BSD? by grub · · Score: 2

      Yep, I've done it countless times. I've upgraded from 3 versions on one machine in little time. Granted it's not pluuratiog-and-play and does require some oversight.

      I misunderstood your comment to mean you need to do a full reinstall from scratch, meaning configuration and setup. That is not the case.

      --
      Trolling is a art,
  4. Re:Is anyone using OpenBSD? by Anne+Thwacks · · Score: 3, Informative
    Just had a look at my notes - I have been using it for over 20 years. Mostly on Sparc/Sparc64 servers and Thinkpad notebooks.

    In that 20 years, I have had at most 2 software related crashes.

    That does not mean I don't also use other OSes. I do - none has been anywhere near as reliable, but many can do things OpenBSD can not.

    In a database server (which is behind a front end) for a billing system which is 150 miles away, 2 years uptime is more important than supporting a graphics card (it runs headless). The Internet facing machine is duplicated, so one machine can be updated while the other handles the traffic, If the update goes wrong, it can stay like that til a routine visit. If the database engine (or even the switchover) went wrong, someone has to go there and a lot of money is lost before he gets there.

    You are already in front of your gaming machine. If it goes BSOD, you press the reset button. Its not the same scenario.

    --
    Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
  5. Unfortunately... by emil · · Score: 2

    ...I must run Oracle databases, and they have not run on OpenBSD since Linux emulation is removed.

    I do have a soft spot for the OS, and I upgraded my home system last night. I'm wondering if I should upgrade the SPARC at work without telling anyone.