FreeBSD used to generate Matrix effects

chris sent in a link to this story which reports on FreeBSD being used on 32 dual-processor machines to render special effects for The Matrix. With 32 dual-processor machines, I doubt there's much that they couldn't render.

Comments

Linux software on freebsd

[Anonymous Coward]

From my experience with running Linux apps under emulation on OpenBSD (not FreeBSD), is that the JDK and Quake2 ran faster. So I don't see where a performance hit would come in here. Since FreeBSD is probably more optimized for x86 than OpenBSD, I'd expect emulation of x86 linux apps to be even faster.

64 procs

[Anonymous Coward]

It's 64 processors, though. And remember, that's in addition to the SGIs they already had. I believe Titanic only used SGIs for modelling. Anyway, water is hard to do; does "The Matrix" have a lot of that?

Other operating systems, NT means licenses

[Anonymous Coward]

Not that there aren't other reasons to stay
away from NT, but 32 licenses for 32 machines
would probably make quite a dent in petty cash.

Other operating systems

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering that Irix is a BSD derivative, perhaps their code used some heavy BSDisms. At any rate, it would probably have taken significantly longer to get things up to speed on NT.

You have no clue. It's not emulation

[Anonymous Coward]

It's ABI compatibility.
That means it runs full speed, son.
There is 0 emulation done, as their is no need for it.
In fact, Linux threads run FASTER on FreeBSD than on linux because of FreeBSD's kernel.

So maybe you could explain how they take a major performance hit?
Oh wait, i'll just refer to some article that doesn't exist or was written 57 years ago.
That's the ticket.

x86 is taking the lead over other archs

[Anonymous Coward]

The fact is that x86 is becoming so powerful lately and the price is so attractive....

You wind up paying 2-5x more for non-x86 hardware for perhaps a 10% increase in speed, and that's only sometimes. In this case the people at "The Matrix" explained that the PII systems were actually faster than the SGI machines.

The funny thing is that if they had announced that they HAD used mostly SGI/Irix boxes, you'd be whining that they _hadn't_ used Linux.

Don't kid yourself.

afaik, ABI == Application Binary Interface

[Anonymous Coward]

ABI means how things are setup in the system, specifically, let's say you want to call a function in libc that the compiler knows nothing about which registers are destroyed and other funky platform specific nits...

An ABI specifies how to pass arguments to function, how the stack is to be setup, which registers are considered volitile and must be restored after a function call. It also specifies the size and alignment of structures.

Is this helpful?

Sour grapes

[Anonymous Coward]

:)

Whatever!!x86 is taking the lead over other archs

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yeah those dual PII's are soooo powerfull.
Whatever!

www.alphalinux.org

That wasn't FreeBSD's quote

[Anonymous Coward]

That wasn't FreeBSD's quote, and what's wrong with enjoying your OS?

Where is misinformation? Please expand on your FUD, there really isn't enough here to mock you successfully.

Just as a fact: it is REALLY easy to script a FreeBSD install, this makes it ideal for a setup and teardown clustering system.

Something must've changed between 2.2.x and 3.x...

[Anonymous Coward]

You are correct, most major releases of operating systems show _some_ change. For instance, the new 2.2 Linux kernels finally have a somewhat working NFS impelementation... :)

There are major, MAJOR improvements with 3.x and 4.x, if you want an interesting and harrowing experiance, try 4.0-current, it's quite a trip.

Hardware kiddie, thanks, but not impressed.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please, you have to be kidding me, here's two things make Alpha a bad platform:

1) gcc/egcs has terrible optimization for it
2) price/performance trade off

If you are going to build a cluster system, why grab the most the overpriced system for a measly gain in performance.

Like I said, other archs may have more performance, but at what cost?

oh, and if you do have alpha...

http://www.freebsd.org/

The alpha port is alive and well.

That wasn't FreeBSD's quote

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a difference between 'not being able to do it' and 'I believe would do it better'. Being objective, the software used was for *linux*. Now, I understand it isn't really emulation, but the thing is, I dont setup Linux on a sparc to run Sun bins. Just as I wouldn't setup Linux on a x86 box to run windows bins. As for script installs, redhat has had that feature avaible for a while (kick start installation), not sure about other distributions.... Exchanging the 'not possible on other os's' with price comparisons of costs on other os's would have been a better idea in my opinion. Sure it wouldn't beat Linux, but it would kill NT and SGI, and that is the goal at the momment.

API - not the same thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please read the:

"afaik, ABI == Application Binary Interface"

for the correct answer.

an API just defines how one is expected to use the programming enviornment, ABI specifies how structures are to be aligned, how to pass arguments to function, what registers mean what...

Other operating systems

[Anonymous Coward]

I saw the marketshare figures for the last three years. Each year FreeBSD has declined in marketshare. Only NT and Linux have shown growth. Overall, FreeBSD continues to be in freefall as other platforms and systems continue to eat away at what little marketshare freebsd had. The ongoing rise of BeOS may well be the final death knell for FreeBSD.

Could you elaborate on this?

[Anonymous Coward]

Could you elaborate on this?

>
> Exchanging the 'not possible on other os's' with
> price comparisons of costs on other os's would
> have been a better idea in my opinion. Sure it
> wouldn't beat Linux, but it would kill NT and
> SGI, and that is the goal at the momment.

FreeBSD has been known to outperform Linux even when emulating Linux appliacations...

Think of it as OS/2 VS Windows, except that FreeBSD is here to stay.

Chill Out! and RTFA

[Anonymous Coward]

To both Linuxers and BSDers, chill out. Why is it that we can't have a positive article about one OS without the other camp bashing it? So they chose BSD, good. Apparently it did the job.


Linuxers: But the article is pure FUD. Certainly FreeBSD couldn't be the best for the job!!!

Well, that's not what was said. From the article: Working with Dell, we purchased 32 of these systems on a Wednesday, and had them rendering in production by Saturday afternoon. It was truly an amazing effort on everyone's part, and I don't believe it would've been possible had we chosen to go with any other Operating System solution.

What they're saying is they couldn't have had things up and running that quickly with any other OS.

Now, as others have mentioned, the guy who set this up is a *BSD guru. I don't doubt for a second that he'd be much better at getting FreeBSD up and running than, say, Linux. Hell, he'd be a fool to try. If they'll both do the job (and I bet they would) go with the one you'll get up and running fastest.


BSDers: Well they chose it because even Linux programs run faster under *BSD's Linux "emulator" than under Linux itself because it has a superior kernel.

This may or may not be true. I doubt it is, but even if it were, we need some evidence. According to one friend of mine who was a Linux->BSD convert, the "emulation" was slightly slower. Not much, but it was. I don't know if it's slower, faster, or the same. Show me some evidence! I want real numbers from real applications. Benchmarks are not acceptable.


In summary, FreeBSD was probably the best choice for them. (RTFA to find out why.) Is it the best choice for everyone? Of course not. Neither is Linux. Neither is WinNT/98/95. Neither is IRIX, AIX or Solaris. It's just good we've got a choice. Let's focus on making that choice more fair (more drivers, software, etc.) and stop worrying so much about whose choice has the fastest this, or the best looking that...

OpenSource Renderings...

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course, it could be worse...

They might decide to commit blasphemy and run Linux or FreeBSD on their Suns!

The horror!

SGI Linux turnkey rendering

[Anonymous Coward]

SGI is using Linux as the key to its growth strategy. SGI has some big announcements coming up including Linux/SGI based render farms and animation systems. SGI wants to be one-stop shopping for all your animation needs. Expect the first announcements this week.

Never thought of this.

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, true or not it does make for an interesting reason to choose *BSD.

Maybe this is why..

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe you should grow up.

Chill Out! and RTFA

[Anonymous Coward]

The one item that hasn't been addressed is why freebsd is in so much trouble. That seems to have been glossed over.

Yay.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey Hey Hey, Teletubbies rocks!!!!

BSD speed

[Anonymous Coward]

In my experience with OpenBSD (never tried FreeBSD) everything was slower. I switched from Linux to OpenBSD for a few months to try out a free BSD OS.

I did like OpenBSD quite a bit, but I was not very impressed with the speed. Everything seemed to run noticably slower, especially linux apps.

I would have tried FreeBSD, but the install process was not as easy to figure out as the one for OpenBSD (unless installing directly off the net, which was not an option at home over modem)

After a few months, I switched back to linux to be more productive, mainly because I was already used to it and good at most of the things I was using linux for, and was having to spend more time relearning and less time being productive when using OpenBSD.

Overall I enjoyed BSD. But I don't see any real advantages of using OpenBSD instead of linux.

Having multiple OSes to choose from is very good though.

FreeBSD != OpenBSD

[Anonymous Coward]

Could you explain why you chose to look like a clueless weenie on such a large forum...

Unlike Linux, *BSD does NOT have the same kernel, please don't judge FreeBSD with a non related system.

This would be akin to me saying how dog-slow Minix is and saying "but perhaps Linux is better."

Overall I enjoyed Minix. But I don't see any real advantages of using Minix *cough* er, Linux over FreeBSD...

Put down the crackpipe please.

[Anonymous Coward]

Trouble??? Where???

*notices horde of linux users approaching spitting FUD*

ohhhhhhhh.....

"run away! run away!"

OpenSource Renderings...

[Anonymous Coward]

That must be why so many of the new suns are using PC architecture....

Hardware kiddie, thanks, but not impressed.

[Anonymous Coward]

> 1) gcc/egcs has terrible optimization for it

Right now Alpha doesn't have the compilers to do the job well but in the very near future compaq will be releasing their ported DU compilers for Alphalinux and their cost will range from very little to nothing. So that's on the way.

2) price/performance trade off

How does complete Alpha systems running at 500 -
800 Mhz starting at under $1000 sound? It'll be
a reality very soon.

>If you are going to build a cluster system, why >grab the most the overpriced system for a measly >gain in performance.

Measly? Yeah, tell the guys at Digital Domain that.

>Like I said, other archs may have more >performance, but at what cost?

The cost is comming down drasticly. You're gonna
see Alpha's for around the same price a PII 450 system real soon.

>oh, and if you do have alpha...
>
> http://www.freebsd.org/

I like *BSD and I've used Alphas for years. I like to have a X server too ;)

Teletubbies

[Anonymous Coward]

Teletubbies are cool. You can plug a keyboard and ethernet to them and use their built-in monitor.

FreeBSD Ad?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a Press Release, didn't you see? That's how PRs are written, and that's their purpose. Read a few Linux PRs and tell me it's any different...

BSD speed

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, you need to understand that Free|Net|OpenBSD all use a different kernel. It's not like different Linux distros which all use the same kernel and a different set of userland tools.

That said, the entire FreeBSD system from the kernel to the userland tools has been optimized for x86 machines.

I personally have used Free|Net|Open all on a 486 DX2/80. Open was the slowest, painfully so. Free was by far the fastest, and Net fell somewhere in between.

Finally, understand that each of the BSD's has a different focus. FreeBSD is optimized toward the x86 machines, specifically towards server applications (although it still makes an excellent desktop OS), NetBSD's goal is to run on every different arch under the sun, and finally Open's goal is to provide the most secure, out of the box BSD (or any UNIX) for that matter that you can find.

Knowing that you should go and give them all a second look.

http://www.freebsd.org/
http://www.netbsd.org/
http://www.openbsd.org/

Good luck.

Actually, it was Renderman.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, the 3D Rendering software they used was Renderman, not POVray.

It's about getting up to speed

[Anonymous Coward]

The line refers to how fast they could get from receiving the computers to have them all working. It must have something to do with not having to tweak arcane nameless settings in /proc to optimize memory usage, or something. Obviously, a Linux guru could get them up and running just as fast, but there is a steep curve in learning how to tweak Linux.

Me, I think tweaking FreeBSD is much easier, but that's just IMHO. My point is that they thought it easier, and that makes it so for them.

It is true

[Anonymous Coward]

Read again. They couldn't have the computers up and running so fast with any other OS. NT? Installing and tuning NT might be easy, doing so for 32 identical machines is quite tedious. Linux? Don't get me wrong, but Linux requires much more tuning than FreeBSD, and /proc is not exactly accessible or user-friendly. Same goes for Solaris, though because of the shear amount of tuning required.

it's cause they make money.

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux is generating profits for the some of the most important names in computing hardware and software. Here is a very incomplete list of Linux moneymakers: Corel, IBM, Informix, Oracle, Sybase, SGI, HP, Dell, Compaq, Cisco, Cobalt, Red Hat, Cyclades, Caldera, Pacific High Tech, Applixware, and Star Office. Companies from Hilton Hotels to the U.S. Postal Service, to the German National Lottery, to Virgina Power, are among the thousands of customers that rely on the power and rock-solid performa> Linux in mission critical systems.

There is no need for kludgey ``emulation layers'', because Linux software is supported by its vendors natively on the the raw hardware. This native software support devoid of kludges ensures that the Linux customer has the most stable and bugfree system possible. Linux is the Enterprise OS thanks to its support by the biggest and most respected names in enterprise computing. When it's time to make money, it's time to check out Linux. Linux.

FreeBSD not that stable

[Anonymous Coward]

For some applications it is important that your OS be rock stable. It has been our experience that FreeBSD device drivers are not as mature as they should be. Due to system crashes under FreeBSD we were forced to move our mission critical server to Linux. So far Linux RAID drivers have proven much more stable. We have never had a crash under Linux (something that we can not say about our trouble with FreeBSD).

FreeBSD Ok... I'll give it a try...

[Anonymous Coward]

As a result of getting lashed out at as a result of my OpenBSD observations, I'm downloading the lastest stable FreeBSD. (3.1) and am going to try it out.

Then I'll see for myself if all the ranting and raving is just hot air, or if you guys are really serious. If I like what I see performance wise on a workstation, I give it a try on a firewall/ internet router. (Currently that machine is a Linux IP masquerading box)

it's cause they make money.

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you *EVER* read the GPL? -- You need a lawyer
to understand it and even that may not help to
evaluate it's impact on your project.

Have you *EVER* read a BSD-style licence?
And have you *EVER* read Gartner's analysis about
Linux and BSD?

FreeBSD Ad?

[Anonymous Coward]

Odd.. having talked to people, and knowing people at USWest, I have never heard freeBSD mentioned.. I have however talked to the admins of several hundred (4-500 i belive) linux workstations at USWest.. (http://nerp.net/ufwest.mp3) (sorry.. had to plug that.. the phone company is allways a love/hate relationship :)

oi

[Anonymous Coward]

The special effects in matrix are pretty lame. I have seen Coca-Cola TV commercials with better special effects. As a FreeBSD user I find myself embarrassed.

*BSD in trouble?

[Anonymous Coward]

> Occasionally I see someone post that *BSD is
> "in trouble" and will disappear sometime in the
> near future as other OSes take "market share."

Ignore it. This is just Linux-FUD. Some
"enthusiasts" do the same dirty tricks as
Microsoft does...

Well, "world domination", you know.

Re:*BSD in trouble?

[cmc]

I just tried out a script I saw that apparently crashed Linuxen (unless login.conf restrictions are in effect, but I don't know if that even exists in that form) and it used up 115M of memory. And then some part of the kernel (or the swapper/pager) killed it.

I (heart) FreeBSD.

Right, and then we can get a...

[Anonymous Coward]

TELETUBBIES BEOWULF CLUSTER!

Only 32?

[Anonymous Coward]

Another reason that The Matrix might not have required as much processing power is that The Matrix was *trying* to look like a computer-generated world. I believe it could be more difficult to do computer generated scenes when you're trying to make the audience believe that they are real life like in Titanic

OpenSource Renderings...

[Anonymous Coward]

Or OpenBSD or NetBSD.

this is news? about 4 weeks ago...

[Anonymous Coward]

I read about this about 4 weeks ago. I guess all you linux evangelists were too busy spooging about how you've pissed off microsoft to notice all the rather fly things fbsd has been doing for so long.

How about a story on the alpha port? 3.0 release? 4.0 branch? About how easy it is to tweak the kernel? the kickass website? picobsd? the smp support? the extremely cool ports system?

take off the linux-only filtering glasses. we're all in this together.

cheers.

Blah blah blah - yeah, big deal

[Anonymous Coward]

Who cares what OS was used? It's not like the OS was responsible for the actual rendering process - that was done with the (fairly expensive) Pixar Renderman engine. (Although, I guess it is kind of interesting that they ran the Linux version of Renderman on FreeBSD.) It would also be interesting to know what modeling and layout tools were used to setup the scenes prior to rendering.

Other operating systems

[Anonymous Coward]

The previous statement was made completely without reference to verifiable fact (which "marketshare figures", hmm? He must be in error though - "the marketshare figures" I've seen clearly shows the marketplace dominated by CP/M with a strong up-and-coming contender of QNX ;-).

David Greenman, principal architect of the FreeBSD project and an employee of Walnut Creek CDROM (the main download site for FreeBSD) said this in response:

----
FreeBSD continues to grow at exponential rates. I've seen a variety of figures that show this, not the least of which is cdrom sales numbers. I don't have any evidence to the contrary. Furthermore, download stats for Linux and FreeBSD on wcarchive have both been increasing rapidly, but the recent trend has been that FreeBSD is outpacing Linux. I think this is a valid statistic because wcarchive is the master site for Slackware Linux, and based on stats that people provided for Red Hat 5.1, is also the highest traffic mirror site for Red Hat (more copies of Red Hat are downloaded from wcarchive than from redhat.com plus all of the other mirrors of Red Hat combined).
----

Sorry to put facts in the story.

FreeBSD Ad?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds like you haven't asked the right people, then. If someone is a Linux zealot, they're not exactly going to say "look, we use FreeBSD for our core wugging system". Instead it will be "look, we're running Linux on this box in the corner! Viva Open Source!"

*BSD in trouble?

[Anonymous Coward]

I would not worry about the troubles of FreeBSD. As some have noted FreeBSD is losing market share. But then again so is almost everything else.

For a comprehensive answer, your question should be posed in an economics forum or news group. Variants of your question are topics of current economic research. Variants include "Why are there more right-handed people than left-handed people?" (not just a subject for biology), and "Why did one daily newspaper survive and the other perish?"

In biology, when two similar species compete for the same ecological niche, one usually prospers and the other declines. We see this today in the Americas as the Coyote expands its range into areas populated by various species of fox.

But in economics, it is not so easily understood why when two very similar entities compete for the same niche, despite similar capabilities, one comes to dominate and the other declines (e.g. why it is economically "better" to be right-handed than left-handed.). It is not what intuition would have use suppose--it is not the case that both equally prosper--one entity comes to dominate and prosper at the expense of the other. And what economists do know is that in all cases there are overwhelming economic advantages to being aligned with "the winner".

Many thousands of pages of research papers and dissertations have been devoted to this topic. Seek out the current economic literature for a fuller treatment of the subject.

Any other OS

[Anonymous Coward]

You took that statement out of context. The article states that the hardware was delivered on a Wednesday, and was in production by Sunday, and "I don't believe that would've been possible had we chosen to go with any other Operating System solution".

In other words, FreeBSD was quick to set up, not capable of doing something which no other OS can do.

Other operating systems

[Anonymous Coward]

Overall, FreeBSD continues to be in freefall

Freefall? What gives you this impression? FreeBSD is very healthy.

The ongoing rise of BeOS

???

Maybe this is why..

[Anonymous Coward]

Obviously you can do it with any Operating System, but FreeBSD is very easy to use and very powerful. For the most part UNIX is UNIX is UNIX, and their really isn't much you can do on one that you can't do on another, but FreeBSD has really good SMP support, is really stable, and it is really easy to set up. I personally use and like FreeBSD, and I think it is better than Linux, but I usually don't even mention that I use FreeBSD, if people use my computer, and they think it runs linux, it is good enough for me. Getting into telling people about how FreeBSD is diffrent from linux, and, then having to tell people how similar linux is to FreeBSD can take like 20 minutes so...

Why and where I use FreeBSD

[Anonymous Coward]

It's stable, has decent SMP, doesn't have a 'kernel of the week', and the ports tree is amazingly easy to use. I also tend to use it on all my high load database and net servers. I *might* have started using linux, but I hated the Firewalls that come with it and/or you can find. IPFilter by darren reed is by far the best firewall i've used and it only seems to be available to solaris/freebsd/irix platforms.

My home workstation is FreeBSD; I've converted all 14 of the servers at my day job to FreeBSD; My two co-located servers hosting over 650 virtual sites each run freebsd; I've visited uunet canada and they run quite a few freebsd boxes; and recently i've seen pair.com who run 110+ exclusively FreeBSD servers hosting over 50,000 virtual domains.

It's the value of powerful x86 machines, and the stability of FreeBSD that has led me to migrate from a purely sun/solaris platform to FreeBSD.

*BSD in trouble?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can you say bull shit? FreeBSD generally caters to a more high end server 'niche'. If there is going to be high load, I'm going to be using FreeBSD.

Why and where I use FreeBSD

[Anonymous Coward]

FreeBSD is losing market share and ISV support. The future does not look too rosey for FreeBSD. When you combine the technical problems of FreeBSD with its infighting and personality clashes, you have a recipe for disaster. It is probably too late in the day to salvage the FreeBSD project short of the resignation of several of its self-appointed wanna-be generalisimos. These clueless "leaders" are marching FreeBSD over the cliff of no return.

Thank you slash dot

[Anonymous Coward]

Great. The second FreeBSD is mentioned every Linux
advocate starts pointing fingers and making
arguments against the article.

A majority of us have absolutely no control over
the *BSD or Linux source but we still think we
should bash the other operating systems.

I'm a FreeBSD user. I think its neat "The Matrix" used FreeBSD, but really why can't we just applaud at an open source victory instead of point fingers and claim "World Domination" in utter stupidity?

We are geeks. We are smart people. Let us think critically and not act overtly. Nothing is lost if FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, or Linux triumph. Nothing. Everything is gained.

FreeBSD Sucks cuz im 12 years old

[Anonymous Coward]

My name is Ordway.

I like penguins, they are pretty and make me laugh.

FreeBSD sucks cuz it has a mean devil :(

mommy says that devils are evil. and dont perform
in bed as well as penguins, who are sanctimonious
and wholesome.

I soiled myself in gym class today.

bye.

Ordway Boriak

Re: FreeBSD Sucks cuz im 12 years old

[freetapes]

I forgot to login lasttime cuz i had to take a
dump real bad.

Have to go feed the dogs now.

later,

ordway

Other operating systems

[Anonymous Coward]

He was obviously refering to the fact that the cvs repository is stored in freefall.freebsd.org. I suppose. :-)

Why and where I use FreeBSD

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm curious. Exactly what "technical problems" are dooming FreeBSD? perhaps I should just chalk this up to another typical slapdash "FreeBSD sux cuz i'm 12 years old" post, but I just had to ask.

Figures...

[Anonymous Coward]

I reckon your figures are wrong. There are quite a few posts saying that they'd like to see more BSD on /. and I'd agree with them. Then there appears to be the BSD advocates bashing the linux guys, about bashing BSD. And there has been more Linux user bashing than BSD bashing by my count....

Chill Out! and RTFA

[Anonymous Coward]

*rofl*

Trouble? Evidence, please!

What's life like on your planet anyway?

Linux vs FreeBSD

[Anonymous Coward]

Hehe, about the one post in this thread with any facts in it - and where are all the slavering Linux hordes now, eh?

It's "inconvenient" when people put facts in the discussion..means you can't apply the brainless "mine is bigger than yours!" zealotry we've seen in some of these threads.

Linux is better than FreeBSD at some things, FreeBSD is better than Linux at some things, NetBSD, OpenBSD all have their strong points too.

It's about time people realised this and started learning from the successes of our sister projects (and even *gasp* helping them along) instead of trying to shoot them down.

There is no rational reason why Linux (or FreeBSD, or ...) needs to dominate at all costs and to the expense of all others. Down that road lies Redmond..

FreeBSD is Dying

[Anonymous Coward]

The panic among the FreeBSD zealots is pretty clear. Anytime time FreeBSD's slipping market share and attrition rate are mentioned, out come the FreeBSD zealots with name calling and childish attacks on the message bearers.

The fact is that FreeBSD has lost and continues to lose its user base. No amount of name calling can change the facts. the FreeBSD community owes an apology to Slashdot users . Slashdot users have been the victims of unwarranted and unfair venomous attacks by the FreeBSD zealots.

It is time for FreeBSD users to face reality and grow-up.

FreeBSD Community owe an apology to Slashdot?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is concerning the previous poster who seems to believe that the FreeBSD Community owes an apology to slashdot, and who even had the audacity to put it in bold (heh).

Please, inform me why the FreeBSD community owes an apology to slashdot. I've seen plenty of insulting comments from linux users about *BSD and the *BSD community, now does that mean these users are somehow different from *BSD users and therefore don't need to apologize? Not only that, the post specifically says the "FreeBSD community", community in particular annoyed me. The post says the collective users and developers of FreeBSD need to apologize to slashdot. I consider myself as part of the FreeBSD community, but I have never attacked a linux user for using linux, and you say I must be a part of some kind of public apology? Again, I ask again, why don't the linux users who post insulting comments and attack *BSD users apologize if you want the *BSD users to apologize? This whole business of apology to slashdot offended me because of its obvious bias: FreeBSD Users=BAD, they must apologize, Linux Users=can do what they want.

Post also says: " Slashdot users have been the victims of unwarranted and unfair venomous attacks by the FreeBSD zealots." What about all the same attacks from linux users? Are they exempt for such a criticism?

Also, about "losing market share." Do you have any facts? The people who run the main download site seem to contradict the "FreeBSD is dying" idea. And does it matter anyways? FreeBSD is an open source project, so as long is people want it, it will likely still be around (Linux survived and managed to get off the ground and create a user base before businesses used it. So the market share argument doesn't fly with me.) Also, why can't Linux and *BSD get along? All technical arguments aside (most of which are religiously biased and many are have truths), is there some reason why they can't get along? I personally have no problems with linux, as I haven't really used it. I chose FreeBSD because of a couple of big things: Linux Emulation, The Ports Collection, high centralization. I couldn't care less about the licenses, I'm not a developer.

But if you seriously want an apology from the "FreeBSD Community", why doesn't the "Linux Community" do it first, and not only apologize to slashdot, how about to the "Windows Community" who i'm sure users of linux (and other freenix users) have be rude to before, and as a matter fact apologize to all users of other OSes. I can't believe you had the audacity to ask for an apology (and go to the trouble to put it in bold) when every "community" of every other OS is guilty of the same thing.

Other operating systems

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, if you search the FreeBSD chat mailing list archives or go to http://www.freebsd.org/~jkh/matrix.html you'd find the answer to your question.

Better performance under heavy VM load. A lot of machines with a GB of RAM can get swamped when working with multi-GB data sets. FreeBSD boxes don't tend to bind up with performance falling through the floor in such situations.

Re:it's cause they make money. Gartner?

[Anonymous Coward]

Where is Gartner's analysis?

Linux software on freebsd

[Anonymous Coward]

Here is a quote of a quote by pestal on the last /. article.

According to Charles Henrich who works for Manex he chose FreeBSD over Linux because he prefers it and found it more stable. I was trying to find his post describing this but the mailing list archive on www.freebsd.org hasn't been updated recently enough. Ooops - I found it, at least one of them. Here's a quote:

Basically we used a collection of 32 Dual Proc P-II/450 systems w/ 1GB of memory and 9GB Ultra2/LVD drives (Dell Precision 410's), as well as 40 MIPS R10k processors (the P-II's in general outperformed the fastest R10k). We used Pixar's Renderman under Linux emulation (yeech, maybe next time I can get them to give me a native FreeBSD port) on the FreeBSD systems. With the exception of some wackyness caused when our renders started to exceed 1GB of memory (FreeBSD got real grumpy then) things were pretty darn smooth. Easily as good as the IRIX machines, , and infinitely more simple to maintain IMHO.

It is a Press Release. It is not a News Report.

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be helpful if the students running Slashdot took a journalism course as an elective. People who run "news" sites should know the difference between an advertisement/press release and a true news story. An example of a responsible news site that knows the difference is the Linux Weekly News. There you will find the hype press releases segregated from true news stories. It is made clear to the reader so that the reader knows s/he is not being suckered by advertizer/advocacy agit prop.

it's cause they make money.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm surprised nobody's commented on the fact that a big reason why a lot of companies like bsd's for their projects like this is that the effects house can take their whole freebsd-based shooting-match, box it up, and SELL it to the next bunch of people who want to buy their rendering-farm franchise.

It's the license. Depending on what you want to do with the product down the line, your choice of operating systems just might come down to "can i sell a product i produced based on this?" With GPL, an entrepeneur's options are limited... especially if the BSD can run the same (non-gpl'd) linux software under emulation... renderman's not gpl'ed...

The Matrix is Awesome!

[Anonymous Coward]

The Matrix is the coolest because of the people involved and not because of pieces of hardware or software.

Let's not forget the human factor!

It's the Hong Kong and Kung Fu movie style with the sci-fi and human elements that made this film a successful film.

Maybe this is why..

[Anonymous Coward]

Ummm... might we recall Titanic... I don't remember seeing many (if any) posts on here saying "Guys, this really doesn't mean anything. This could be done on other OSs."

In fact, quite a few people who post on here seem to feel Linux is THE one perfect OS and everything else is worthless and/or flawed.

The media happened to choose Linux as the OS to focus on and consequently it's gotten much more popular. They may have choosen Linux over *BSD at random, there are multiple flavors of *BSD which could make it difficult to focus on one, or because Linux is an entire new thing developed more recently... while *BSD has older roots (although they are all based off of UNIX to some extent). Basically, what I am saying is that this site, and a lot of people on here may be using and advocated *BSD over Linux if it wasn't for all of the media exposure it got. As far as I can tell from using Linux and several BSDs, there really is no large difference between the two that would justify one being much more superior to the other (I am in no way an expert though). Meaning all of the recent things going on could have just as well happened on FreeBSD.

And anyone who judges the quality of an OS by it's more outspoken and biased advocates is a fool. There are plenty of Linux bigots, Mac, bigots, Windows bigots, *BSD bigots, Solaris bigots, etc. The wise thing to do is evaluate the OS for your own personal needs. Does it do what you want it to do? Does it do it better than the other choices available? Does it have the software available for you to do that? (This last one is an unfortunate one for BeOS which may never be able to get off the ground now that Mac OS X, Windows 2000, Win NT5, more user friendly Linux, revival of Amiga (?) are all around the corner).

Linux vs FreeBSD

[Anonymous Coward]

Here are 2 postings on comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc and comp.os.linux.advocacy by Matt Dillon (I believe he's a FreeBSD kernel hacker). I think it's a pretty good comparison. Sorry Matt I didn't ask you for permission to post it.

===First post========================================
:In article ,
:Navindra Umanee wrote:
:>
:>I never realised that it was possible to sysadmin Linux fully from a
:>GUI these days, what do they use? Linuxconf or something? Most (if
:>not all) sysadmins I know who do Linux don't use a GUI. Besides,
:>aren't these GUIs supposed to be a frontend that simply modifies the
:>underlying text files?
:>
:>-N.

You can't, really. You can configure the major pieces ... enough
for a typical user to configure his linux box. But for any serious
work you have to get under the hood just like with other UNIXs.

The configuration files needed by Linux are very similar to the
configuration files needed by FreeBSD and other UNIXes. Surprise
Surprise! Maybe it's because both platforms use virtually the same
servers. inetd, popper, imap, sendmail, fingerd, bind, talk.
Ifconfig, route, pppd, samba, XFree86. Etc etc etc.

Most of the differences at this level are superficial. Linux puts
config files in different places. The startup script works
somewhat differently ( though not as different as some people seem
to believe ).

The biggest differences are under the hood -- the kernel core itself.
While the syscall set is similar between the two OSs, the kernel cores
are very different from each other. I think this is one of the greatest
strengths of the open-source movement. Protocol interoperability gets
very well-tested in mixed environments, and this has resulted in many
bugs being found and fixed on both platforms ( and vs Solaris, too, when
it comes to NFS V3 interoperability ).

Linux is, in many ways, a cleaner design. But FreeBSD pays more
attention to detail. KISS is the mantra, but that doesn't mean that
simpler is *always* better. Linux often goes for algorithmic simplicity
to the detriment of performance. FreeBSD uses multi-stage queues for
buffer cache ageing for a damn good reason, and multiply-linked structures
as well - getting an O(1) result to any operation is as important as
choosing the right page to push out. Because every wrong decision made
has a terrible price to pay in performance. Making the right decision
(e.g. what to page, how to order I/O, when to start async I/O, how much
to do, how to balance memory between RSS, discrete I/O, and VM, when to
eat a page fault in order to get better useage stats on the page, etc)
is worth a modicum of extra complexity.

-Matt


--
Matthew Dillon Engineering, HiWay Technologies, Inc. & BEST Internet
Communications
(Please include original email in any response)

=======Second Post==================================
:In article ,
:Navindra Umanee wrote:
:>Matt Dillon wrote:
:>> Linux is, in many ways, a cleaner design. But FreeBSD pays more
:>> attention to detail. KISS is the mantra, but that doesn't mean that
:>> simpler is *always* better. Linux often goes for algorithmic simplicity
:>> to the detriment of performance. FreeBSD uses multi-stage queues for
:>
:>Ahh, but has anyone proved this detriment of performance by actual
:>testing and comparisons? Nice article, btw.
:>
:>-N.

Yes. There are a number of well known facts about both FreeBSD and Linux.
It's not a matter of 'proving' anything -- these are things that the
developers tend to agree on ( verse the 'rabble' who like to argue over
everything ).

Lets see if I can drag up a few.

* Linux syscall overhead is lower then FreeBSD's. e.g. 1uS vs 2uS,
roughly.

* FreeBSD VM management tends to perform considerably better when
memory is stressed. Mainly oweing to better selection of pages
to page-in and page-out. ( FreeBSD's reputation for running
well under load is not exaggerated ).

Under 0-stress situations, Linux's simpler algorithms provide a
small benefit.

(i.e. FreeBSD does more work figuring out what to page out or clean,
but it gets it all back by choosing the 'right' pages whereas Linux
does less work figuring out what to page out or clean, but loses
the advantage by choosing the 'wrong' pages).

* FreeBSD scales I/O load better, mainly oweing to clustering and
dynamic readahead. Linux does a little read-ahead, but it isn't
smart about it. For example, it does not attempt to avoid extra
seeks on read-ahead blocks. FreeBSD goes overboard trying to avoid
extra seeks ( a little too overboard in some cases :-) ).

* Linux VM management currently depends on mapping physical memory
into KVM, which limits the amount of physical memory that can be
accomodated on 32 bit machines to approximately 2G. FreeBSD will
operate on 32 bit (Intel) boxes containing up to 4G of memory.

* A number of core Linux VM routines depend on scanning page tables,
which is very inefficient due to two things: First, shared pages
are scanned more then once and, second, scanning for page
classifications ( such as 'clean' or 'dirty' ) across the entire
set rather then keeping track of page classifications via separate
lists or queues. This is probably the single-biggest problem the
Linux VM system has.

This rears its ugly head when running programs that fork a lot,
such as web and news servers, sendmail, popper, and so on.

FreeBSD uses VM algorithms that are, roughly, independant of
its page tables and which tend to be O(1).

* Linux has been ported to a number of platforms. FreeBSD currently
only runs on Intel and Alpha, and the Alpha port still needs a lot
of work.

-Matt


--
Matthew Dillon Engineering, HiWay Technologies, Inc. & BEST Internet
Communications
(Please include original email in any response)

*BSD in trouble?

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's a question for the some posters out there.

Occasionally I see someone post that *BSD is "in trouble" and will disappear sometime in the near future as other OSes take "market share."

Why do people make such claims? Is there any really strong evidence to support this? Please explain why *BSD is "in trouble."

Keep in mind that having little market share doesn't mean it will die. Imagine linux in .01 days, before all the commercial support. It still survived. And OpenBSD and NetBSD seem to be still alive, although they seem to be less popular than FreeBSD. Also, FreeBSD does have commercial users, and a more flexible license for businesses.
Aside from the often quoted examples of Yahoo! and Walnut Creek, there is a list of some others at the FreeBSD Gallery . And of course, this is not a complete list.

Please, just use the OS you like for the job you want to do, and don't pray for the death of excellent operating systems (OSes from unscrupulous companies like M$, bash all you want).

Good for FreeBSD!

[palpatine]

This is definitely good news for FreeBSD. I long to try it out and see its advantages for myself. I currently use Linux, and looking into FreeBSD is always a good idea. Linux helped render Titanic's CGI, and now FreeBSD helped render the Matrix's CGI. This is great for both operating systems!

I don't care too much for the differences between Linux and *BSD. They're both Unix-like systems (*BSD more so), they're both completely Free Software, and they're not Microsoft!

The only thing I noticed about the press release was the fact that they said it wouldn't be possible with another OS. It would probably be possible with Linux, but not practical if the people they hired are more familiar with FreeBSD.

Something must've changed between 2.2.x and 3.x...

[Wakko Warner]

...because, for example, running the linux binary of Netscape on freebsd 2.2.x was *extremely* slow. Not to mention the shockwave plugin, which was at least 10 times slower than it was on my Linux box (it got like 1 frame per second. I could watch it redraw). I imagine things have changed, though.

(Before people tear my head off for dissing their OS, yes, I did do everything right with regards to setting up binary compatibility, no, the slowness wasn't my fault, and, no, I haven't used 3.x much.)

- A.P.
--

"One World, One Web, One Program" - Microsoft Promotional Ad

Well...

[Wakko Warner]

The line that goes something like "we couldn't have done it with any other operating system" seems a little suspicious.

- A.P.
--

"One World, One Web, One Program" - Microsoft Promotional Ad

Other operating systems

[Jeff Lightfoot]

"I don't believe it would've been possible had we chosen to go with any other Operating System solution."

I wish they would have elabortaed on this a bit so that I could understand where Linux would have not worked or explained why FreeBSD shined.

Maybe this is just PR and I should remember that.

Only 32?

[HoserHead]

Is that the evolution of rendering algorithms, of computer systems, or the fact that the Matrix required less computational power than Titanic? After all, weren't 100+ Alphas used for Titanic?

POV? I heard it was Renderman.

[cduffy]

As the subject says. You sure it was POV?

Yay.

[gavinhall]

Posted by FascDot Killed My Previous Use:

I don't know if getting credit for such movies as Titanic and The Matrix is really all that great. What's next? Teletubbies?

oi

[valis]

[quote]With 32 dual-processor machines, I doubt there's much that they couldn't render.[/quote]

Actually thats a very small amount of power considering the effects in "The Matrix."

Very interesting...

Linux not stable enough

[heroine]

Having worked with video on Linux, I see why they went with FreeBSD. Linux got really fast with the memory management in 2.2 but at the expense of stability. Any video compositing, large memory usage, or sneezing for that matter around a Linux box crashes it.

I'd like to see..

[Thomas Charron]

I'd like to see a comparison of NetBSD, Linux and even Solaris x86, amongst others, for use in rendering farms.. I'm not sure how much the OS actually MATTERS in these cases, and it would more depend on the software running on the OS then the OS itself.. Most OS's could connect to a network and do something over and over without much of a problem..

Other operating systems

[Thomas Charron]

I'd like to know what basis there is for that as well.. I'm betting NT could have done it, not to mention Linux, Solaris x86, etc..etc..

FreeBSD Ad?

[Thomas Charron]

Tell me about it.. I'd like to see some technical information as was published when they used Linux on Alpha's to do the Special Effects for Titanic.. The guy in charge must have been a BSD lover to start with..

Dust in a dirt pile..

[Thomas Charron]

Lesse, 32 x 200$, that'd be 6,400$? Now, what was the budget for the matrix? Millions you say? ;-P

Why FreeBSD? Maybe Ports?

[Thomas Charron]

The 3d Rendering software they are refering to is PovRay, and is available on every platform imaginable, so that was a pretty dumb thing to say..

POV? I heard it was Renderman.

[Thomas Charron]

Software used = Renderman. Software refered to with 'Thousands of freely available ports, includeing 3D software' = Povray..

Why FreeBSD? Maybe Ports?

[BadlandZ]

The FreeBSD operating system is a powerful, completely open-source system based on the Berkeley Software Distribution of UNIX. It is available free of charge from numerous Internet websites and also on CD-ROM from Walnut Creek CDROM, and includes thousands of ported applications including 3-D graphics rendering and many other equally powerful tools.

That's my guess why. Even if it was just source in ports, something as complex as 3-D graphics rendering software can be a bytch to compile... But, port's always seem to compile.

Linux on the other hand... :-) Well, I must say it's getting a little better lately, and I'll just shut up now...

PovRay Did all of it?

[BadlandZ]

Sorry, didn't know. Didn't read that. Never used it.

Suddenly I Understand....

[BadlandZ]

"was truly an amazing effort on everyone's part, and I don't believe it would've been possible had we chosen to go with any other Operating System solution."

*SMACK*, suddenly, I understand EXACTLY what FreeBSD users feel like when they read about Linux in the news....

This is impressive, and, they deserve the credit, both the Manex Visual Effects and FreeBSD. If I might add, SGI deserves historic credit for pioneering this stuff (hope they can make a comeback to the way I remember them with thier new Linux/Intel project, and porting OpenGL, etc...)

Dell, well, uh... Dell did deliver the boxes speedy, I guess :-)

Figures...

[Exanter]

You know, it figures that some good press for FreeBSD gets into slashdot, and half of the idiot posters either put the OS or the movie down, because dammit, IT WASN'T LINUX!!

Cripes.

When are idiots like these going to learn that just because the OS name isn't Linux that it doesn't suck. I myself am happy just using Unix, whether it is *BSD, Linux, Solaris, etc... some of you idiots are beginning to sound like Microsoft advocates ("Everything but our OS SUCKS!!!").

Screw world domination for any platform, I'm glad I have a choice.

OpenSource Renderings...

[Exanter]

(start sarcasm)

Yeah, because we all know that solaris is EVIL, and that the PC architecture is SO MUCH BETTER than that of a Sun machine.

(end sarcasm)

cripes...

OpenSource Renderings...

[Exanter]

Um, one word: price. They didn't make the "ultra" sparcs have ide drives and pci buses because they are better than SCSI and S-BUS, respectively. They wanted to get more sparcs on the desktop, and dropping the price (and crippling the systems, in my book) was a good way to do that.

Actually, he's got a point...

[Millennium]

However, it's one which I see in a lot of platforms. They claim many things but won't (can't?) back it up with anything specific. *BSD users aren't the only culprits of this; all of the Unices do it to each other (though Linux is better about this than most). The Windoze crowd sort of does it too (they do say stuff to back their claims up; it's just that all of it's wrong).

Other operating systems

[Paul Jakma]

nah, IRIX is BSD flavoured...

Hardware kiddie, thanks, but not impressed.

[Paul Jakma]

That's nice, and the makers of "The Matrix" should have waited for the new compilers or written them themselves?

even though ecgs isn't as optimised as DU cc, Alpha binaries it creates will still be 1.5x+ faster than a same generation P11.

"The Matrix" is already a reality, in business you just can't wait.

and when was the alpha cluster used for titanic a reality? when was the avalon cluster a reality?

Perhaps the performance gain isn't "measly" but it just can NOT compete price/preformance ratio

rubbish. you can buy 533MHz Alpha's for the price of a P11 300MHz. You can buy 600MHz alpha's
for less than the price of a P111-500. Both of them kick Pentium11's into park when it comes to floating point. a 533MHz alpha has nearly double the floating point power of a p11-450.

Sure alpha is faster and really cool, but when people are concerned about price and performance.

An Alpha 533MHz and motherboard with onboard network and scsi costs approx £600. (~$900) which is comparable to the cost of a p111 500 and motherboard. plus most 533mhz alphas will clock to at least 600mhz reliably (i'm told).

the only excuse for going with a high-end p11 setup instead of alpha is ignorance.

you can't beat cheap intel hardware for clustering, get over it.

you clearly havn't checked out prices. go to the alphalinux site and follow the links to the vendors, and ask them for quotes. I think you'll be surprised.

Why and where I use FreeBSD

[getafix]

Most open source projects dont need large
market share to survive. As long as there is
a critical mass of users that are willing to
maintain and contribute to the project,
it will survive. Most open source projects
can survive without market share (thats how they
all started, isnt it?). And I dont see BSD
interest falling below that critical mass.

Synopsis

[luqin]

This article appears to be based on a different article that I saw about two weeks or so ago. The original article said that they specifically didn't use linux because it couldn't handle the load or something to that effect. If i find the url, I'll post it.

---

Time!

[Bruce Perens]

Hey folks, FreeBSD is Free Software. Linux is Free Software. KDE is Free Software (Qt's license has been fixed and I endorsed it). GNOME is Free Software.

What the heck are you fighting about??? FreeBSD and Linux should have good natured competition that goads their developers into further improvements, as should KDE and GNOME. Let's save the nasty messages for non-free software.

Bruce

Hardware kiddie, thanks, but not impressed.

[Alfred Perlstein]

note to self, quoting a message on slashdot stinks... :)

>> 1) gcc/egcs has terrible optimization for it
> Right now Alpha doesn't have the compilers to do the job well but in the very near future compaq
> will be releasing their ported DU compilers for Alphalinux and their cost will range from very little to nothing.
> So that's on the way.

That's nice, and the makers of "The Matrix" should have waited for the new compilers or written them themselves?

>> 2) price/performance trade off
> How does complete Alpha systems running at 500 -
> 800 Mhz starting at under $1000 sound? It'll be a reality very soon.

"The Matrix" is already a reality, in business you just can't wait.

>> If you are going to build a cluster system, why
>> grab the most the overpriced system for a measly
>> gain in performance.
> Measly? Yeah, tell the guys at Digital Domain that.

Perhaps the performance gain isn't "measly" but it just can NOT compete price/preformance ratio

>> Like I said, other archs may have more
>> performance, but at what cost?
> The cost is comming down drasticly. You're gonna
> see Alpha's for around the same price a PII 450 system real soon.

Interesting, "The Matrix" came out 2 weeks ago right? So instead of promising all these features... how about using a platform that offers it all right now? Sure alpha is faster and really cool, but when people are concerned about price and performance.....

>> oh, and if you do have alpha...
>>
>> http://www.freebsd.org/
> I like *BSD and I've used Alphas for years. I like to have a X server too ;)

diffs to get XFree to compile on alpha:
http://www.freebsd.org/~dfr/

Stop with the hype, you can't beat cheap intel hardware for clustering, get over it.

Please research or think twice about responding to my posts. It'll make for more interesting conversation. :)

-Alfred

Other operating systems

[Alfred Perlstein]

Perhaps FreeBSD isn't keeping up with the internet growth, but I doubt that the userbase of FreeBSD is shrinking.

Here, have a cookie, can I have some real statistics now?

Good to see some a BSD "success"

[Daeron]

Feels good to see a BSD-related "success"-story again ... ;-))

It's hard for the Daemon .. to Live in the Shadow of the Penguin ...

and would this actually be my first chance to have an actual first post !?

Linux and FreeBSD are among the best OS!!

[Ken Shiro]

I don't care which OS is better, but, for me both of its are very good OS, way way way better than M$ Window$. I hope both OS developers learn from each other, unite ideas and improving both OS kernel.

By the way,
No one and nothing is perfect.

Linux software on freebsd

[dvdeug]

Charles Henrich uses FreeBSD in preference to Linux. He's contributed code/docs to the project, but he doesn't have commit access. This is a somewhat strange definition of "hardcore freebsd guy" you seem to be using.

No, it seems like a natural one. While contibuting code to a project doesn't mean you're "hardcore" (neither does commit access), it does indicate that's a definite possibilty.

http://advocacy.freebsd.org....

[doomy]

That URL states it all right :)

--

Linux software on freebsd

[doomy]

If you follow the anonymous posting above by me (see one article above this) you might see the exect posting abot renderman. This was posted on the last freebsd posting (click on more freebsd postings here on slashdot to see that :) )
--

Linux software on freebsd

[doomy]

If i'm nost mistaken the rendering software used was linux based and thus emulated on the freebsd machine. Doing so was just cause the main person in charge was a hardcore freebsd guy and didnt really like going linux. They did sacrifice a lot of preformance due to that (refering to an older /. article on this subject). Also, that article went on to state that if they had freebsd based tools it would have done a better job.


Now, the fact that freebsd was used was just cause the guy in charge has a hardon for it, nothing more nothing less. It would have been different if Rob was in charge of that project. (I believe he'd use Mac OS ;) )
--

Why did you reply to that comment?

[calx]

Usually, reply to a comment in order to, well, reply to a comment.
The guy was just saying "Oh I use FreeBSD, and here's the places I see FreeBSD being used", and you reply: "FreeBSD is going nowhere, it's going to die." Really, were you trying to reply to that post to make the poster say, "Wow, I better stop using FreeBSD!", or, did you really mean to post this as a separate post?

Other operating systems

[sinator]

AFAIK IRIX is System V.
I run a FreeBSD system and I have been very satisfied with the performance, btw.

FreeBSD Ad?

[Accipiter]

The FreeBSD operating system is a powerful, completely open-source system based on the Berkeley Software Distribution of UNIX. It is available free of charge from numerous Internet websites and also on CD-ROM from Walnut Creek CDROM, and includes thousands of ported applications including 3-D graphics rendering and many other equally powerful tools. FreeBSD is optimized for use on the Intel x86 processor line that is the heart of today's versatile commodity personal computers. Infinitely customizable, FreeBSD is at the heart of such Internet powerhouse applications as Yahoo! and U.S. West because is unencumbered by commercial license restrictions and can be copied and modified freely.

Is it my imagination, or does this 'article' seem to be more akin to advertising?

-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?

You have no clue. It's not emulation

[Chris M. Costello]

Normally I hate it when people argue like you do. But at this point, I agree profusely.

It is a Press Release. It is not a News Report.

[Chris M. Costello]

I hope you're not trying to say that there is false information being provided in the press release.

Figures...

[Chris M. Costello]

45% of it is denial.
45% of it is ignorance.
5% is sheer and utter stupidity.
5% is unexplainable/unknown.

That's roughly correct regarding the posts that are against this press release.

I'd like to see more FreeBSD stories on slashdot. Hopefully one of these days those who knock FreeBSD without a very good reason will realize how wrong they were.

Yeah, screw being fair

[Chris M. Costello]

Is it because you're in denial or is it because you're jealous that you (you being all of the people who have had negative comments) decide to post such things about this press release?

I hope to see more FreeBSD-related articles on slashdot.

OpenSource Renderings...

[Chris M. Costello]

Don't worry, when FreeBSD finishes (or starts? I don't know anything about the sparc progress...) its Sparc port, we can have more quality movies made on quality hardware. :)

Teletubbies

[DavidTC]

Aren't you talking about iMacs?

Or are they the same things? ;)

64 procs

[toriver]

It's 64 processors, though. And remember, that's in addition to the SGIs they already had. I believe Titanic only used SGIs for modelling.

For modelling, yes, but IIRC there were articles at the time stating that LinuxAlpha was used for the (CPU-intensive) rendeing.

(And Sun/Solaris for Toy Story... notice a decisive lack of NT here? :-) )

Other operating systems

[nikc]

Overall, FreeBSD continues to be in freefall

Very true. freefall.freebsd.org holds the master copy of the CVS repository, and runs the web server. We used to have a machine called thud as well. This is because Rod Grimes is/was a skydiver (I think it was Rod that was responsible for the names, but I could be wrong).

Now they have names like beast, kickme, and bento.

N

Linux software on freebsd

[nikc]

If i'm nost mistaken the rendering software used was linux based and thus emulated on the freebsd machine.

Correct. Renderman.

Doing so was just cause the main person in charge was a hardcore freebsd guy and didnt really like going linux.

Charles Henrich uses FreeBSD in preference to Linux. He's contributed code/docs to the project, but he doesn't have commit access. This is a somewhat strange definition of "hardcore freebsd guy" you seem to be using.

They did sacrifice a lot of preformance due to that (refering to an older /. article on this subject). Also, that article went on to state that if they had freebsd based tools it would have done a better job.

False. A cite/URL for this /. article would be appreciated so I can respond to its FUD. If you don't have one, please don't bother repeating these allegations, because they're false.

And to others who've pointed it out; the description on this /. post is deceptive -- it's not a story about the Matrix, it's a Press Release (the words "Press Release" in the title of the web page and in the heading should have been a tip off to the more alert amongst you). This is why it's light on technical details. A more detailed story will hopefully be forthcoming for DaemonNews.

N
nik@freebsd.org

hooray for linux users

[Lx]

Great, so FreeBSD gets some decent press, and all the linux ditto-heads come out of the walls to say how much better linux could have done, how FreeBSD is "in trouble", and not offering any evidence to back up their claims. Even though I generally dislike Linux(for political and technical reasons), I'm happy when I see an article about corporations switching from NT to Linux, or Linux sneaking its way into the workplace. It's good to see at least SOME open-source coverage, that people are beginning to realize they have choices when it comes to OS, and that people are getting away from Micros~1 products.

It's reactions like this that ruin the Linux community's credibilty, and why I find Linux so distasteful. Maybe if the community can grow up a little and start LEARNING from other open-source projects, and sharing with them, you'd be able to make a killer OS. Right now, your close-mindedness does you a disservice.

-lx

Linux: the Windows of the UNIX world.

FreeBSD vs. Linux

[Rayban]

It's good to see other open-source OS's getting some spotlight too. I love Linux, but BSD is also a really good OS to run. I just hope that one day the war between distros/Linux/BSD calms down to the point where we can all just get along. :)

ABI?

[saska]

What's "ABI compatibility"?

--

OpenSource Renderings...

[Amoeba Protozoa]

It will be a fantastic day when the next Pixar flick is done on an OpenSource platform. Somebody tell 'em to loose those Suns.


-AP

Very Funny

[Gerund]

So many things to laugh about in this one...

The bizarre claim that freeBSD was the best possible OS choice. Somehow I think they might just have done a little better with IRIX/SGI. I mean, that's what it's for. Buy a couple of nice cray systems, go nuts. Why FreeBSD should outdo everything is beyond me. Am I missing something? Or many things?

Linux users (and I am one) getting irritable because someone elses OS gets praised. Stop me if I'm completely crazy, but if this looks to you like a blatant plug for FreeBSD, what must you think when people say nice things about Linux...damn advertising. Can't get away from it...

x86 is taking the lead over other archs

[Gerund]

Nope....can't say that I would be. If they'd used SGI/IRIX, I would have thought nothing of it. It seems to me to be a reasonably intelligent move. I don't think Linux can compete with a higher end Cray (not that 5.5 million dollar Cray that it equalled). If I was doing 3D rendering for a $100 million dollar movie, the first thing I'd think of doing, hardware-wise, is see if I could rent a Cray.

Any other OS

[webster]

Meaning no criticism of FreeBSD itself, it does no good to an OS to include as absurd a statement as "I don't believe it would've been possible had we chosen to go with any other Operating System solution", even in an advocacy piece. This is so patently false that the kindest thing one could say about the speaker (assuming that he was quoted accurately) is that he had been carried away by his enthusiasm for his favorite OS.

Misinformation is not good advocacy. All it accomplishes is the destruction of credibility. I suggest it would be best for the entire Open Source community if we were to leave such tactics to the commercial world.

FreeBSD not that stable

[keepper]

Just as future advice, for mission crital, and for ANY server that's inportant, you BUILD the machine for the OS, not the other way around.

FreeBSD's raid is quite mature, just does not support every damn card. As a radi example, look at the 12terrabyte raid setup over at ftp.cdrom.com

FreeBSD Ok... I'll give it a try...

[keepper]

You won't be sorry ;) btw, if you want help trying to setup a firewall, router for a small network, try FreeBSD Diary and also try FreeBSD Zine

FreeBSD not that stable

[keepper]

Sorry i meant 1/2 terrabyte

Ok this is pathetic...

[keepper]

What the hell has happenned to slashdot, this used to be an INFORMED forum. These days is nothing more than a bunch of kiddies arguing how linux is superior over something they HAVE NEVER USED.



DISCLAMER

( sorry if this offends the people that do not fit in the description above, i know there's a great deal of very smart and knowledgeable people still left here in slashdot and i hope that number grows
because we need you)


On the comparison of "LINUX" Vs " FreeBSD" you are all pretty wrong, FreeBSD is both a Distribution AND a kernel, not one like linux. if you want to compare distributions then go ahead, compare Redhat 5.2 versus fBSD 3.1-RELEASE.

The fact of the matter is that Linux distributions are for the most part ( with the exception of Debian all the way ) still bleeding edge and not the most stable systems without a GREAT deal of tweaking. As you can see from FBSD, this is way different as there are three current distributions
aimed at different purposes. ( -RELEASE , -CURRENT, and --STABLE )

Say all you may, but my experience with both a customized redhat with the 2.2.x kernell versus a 3.1 -RELEASE has shown me that FreeBSD still handles networking load quite better than a normall linux distribution. How can i tell this...
well, from about 25 hsoting servers that i administer. a great deal of them started as Linux boxes but, we only needed to test one freeBSD machine with the load of TWO linux boxes and we were converts.

as for the linux emulation in freeBSD....
first, is not "emulation " persay, is much more closer to what wine does, which is binary compability. To this day linux threads still perform better in FreeBSD. Of course some things are a bit slower, but , hey, this are things that were not originally aimed at freeBSD, is a god damn good show at the prowness of FreeBSD programmers.

I love linux, i use it a smy personal workstation at both home and work, but there's no question in my mind that in terms of squeezing that last drop of performance out of a x86 machine, fBSD does it much better than linux. Not only is the kernel more mature, but, even linux zealou shave to agree with this, linux distributions to date just plain suck ( for lack of a better word).
I mean, when was the last time you used a system as clean as the ports collection ... when was the last time you TOTTALY rebuilt all the programs in your system quite flawlessly with one command.

Linux has a lot of promise, but , FreeBSD still handles load better, because it is a kernel totally tuned for the x86 arch.

RTFC

[corB]

Thomas was pointing out that FreeBSD's claimed support of 3D rendering packages is in reference to povray, which is obviously not what they used. He said this because the poster before (BadlandZ) quoted this support as a possible reason that they chose FreeBSD. No one suggested that they used PovRay to render the movie scenes.

Maybe this is why..

[rullskidor]

Maybe this is why so many(at least some) feel BSD sux, not to bring up the previous BSD discissions again but BSD people are very bad at proving their os is as good as they say, and they never fail to promote it as THE BEST in the world.

I for one beleve it definitley could be done with any UNIX system, especielly linux but any would do just as well, hell maybe even NT or Win95 or MacOS could have done it, the BSD attitude is the thing that is damaging BSDs reputation most I would say...

Well, i guess I should know betten than get offended by this but...............

Maybe you

[rullskidor]

Well well well, who is the "coward" - you or me:)

if you only beleve *BSD can do anything you should open your eyes and trie to look beyond the propaganda. To say it should not have been possible to do the rendering with any other os is just stupid, imature and at least pisses my off.

Good to see some a BSD "success"

[Tony-A]

Agreed.
*BSD is an extremely valuable resource.
One size does NOT fit all.
Expect to see a transition: NT to Linux to *BSD.

API

[Tony-A]

Application Program Interface.
This is how the application program interfaces to the operating system.
AFAIK, *BSD can be compiled to accept system calls from native SystemV and Linux binaries.

API - not the same thing.

[Tony-A]

Thanks for the correction.

Software?

[pavon]

hi,
What type of software was used for these profesional projects? I heard they had renderman running on the freeBSD boxes. What did they use for the modeling? SGI stuff?

Linux software on freebsd

[schon]

Can you tell me what software they used? - was it a commercial product,
or someting OSS-like?

Very nice.....

[flesh99]

Great article, and good pblicity for OpenBSD, however the length of the article was lacking, as was the whole of it. It lacks mention of the software used for the rendering, the technical aspects of the systems udes versus the SGI's. All around it look like a newsbyte not an article. Even though it was on the FreeBSD advocacy site, you'd think they would have hyped the programs used or maybe the technical superiority of FreeBSD.
________________________________________ ________________
Can We trust the future - Flesh99

Other operating systems

[flesh99]

I know NT couldn't have done it. I work for a large company and all of our CAD and rendering work is done on Unix/Linux machines because our NT evaluation showed that it crashed to frequently, did not handle multiple processors as well as Unix/Linux based solutions. The software available for NT is by no means comprable to the software available for other OSs. So in answer to at least one of your suggestions, nope NT could not have handled it.
_____________________________________________ ___________
Can We trust the future - Flesh99

PC vs. Sun

[flesh99]

I will commnt on one piece of architecture, SCSI vs. SBUS SCSI, I can max out a PC SCSI controller with two DLT drives and a single strem to each, SBUS will handle 3 drives with four streams. Get real, SUN beats PC any day
_____________________________________________ ___________
Can We trust the future - Flesh99

FreeBSD is Dying

[CaptnZilog]

Here it is again... "FreeBSD is dying".. and what, prey tell, great all-knowing source of information are you getting your "facts" from?? Other than that Linux's user base is increasing, as told in many IT magazines in many forms, where did you see some numbers that show that FreeBSD's user base is decreasing?? I very rarely see the BSD's mentioned in the mainstream press... much less any mention of number of current users of any of the BSD's.

Sorry, but it sure seems to me that there are calm and rational responses to this thread from both the Linux and *BSD people, and then there's people like *you*... from both sides, I admit... that lash out with "venomous" "name calling and childish attacks on the message bearers" as you so aptly put it.

Its time for *you* to face reality and grow up. You may drive a Ford, I drive a 4WD Chevy... if you think your Ford is God's gift to the earth, so be it.. but I like my car, and don't try to shove yours down my throat. There's room in this world for both. I'm not going to use my old '82 280ZX to haul a trailer, and my 4WD truck isn't exactly a nice "night on the town" car. Each has their uses, and there is room for both in my life.

I use Linux, NetBSD, and OpenBSD for UN*X boxes at home, plus a Mac/OS system and a Win/95 system. Each has there purpose, and each does some things better than others.

NetBSD is by far the most portable, and widely ported, although Linux is getting better. Before someone jumps down my throat over this, I should add that I have two VaxStation 3100's, two MicroVAX's, several DecStations, two 68K Mac's, a Sun Sparc 1+, and several old Sun/3's, and NetBSD supports them all, today. Yeah, I can wait for a working Linux/Vax to show up someday... I can wait for a Linux that runs on my DecStation 5000... or Linux support for my Sun 3/260... or I can run NetBSD now, full multi-user support.

Linux is more mainstream, and has more available apps for it (although a good # of them run under the BSD's compatibility mode). Like M$ Windows, more available apps does *not* necessarily mean a better OS, although I hate to make that comparison since Linux is a far better OS than M$'s. My biggest beef against Linux to date is not the speed, the underlying code, or anything to do with the software, its the "Linux zealots" that think that their "Ford" is the best there is.

I just installed OpenBSD a few weeks ago, and haven't had time to play with it much, but the codebase forked from NetBSD, so I presume its fairly close (w/ better crypto, being out of the US). My NetBSD systems have been rock-solid.

I haven't tried FreeBSD, but from the "non-zealot" comments I read on these threads, I may give it a try. The comments about better VM usage seemed knowledgeable.

To those of you who want to blow off "zealot" steam at me about how Linux is the "best" kernel, I have only one question:

How many of you have a programming background and have looked at the actual kernel code for Linux and the BSD's? (I have).



One of these days I'll try out FreeBSD...

Figures...

[Damned]

I somewhat agree with this. I personally use Linux, but I am not going to put another OS down simply because I don't use it, and especially if I haven't had any experience with it (if someone wants to send me an hd or two and a cd i'm willing to try whatever UNIX derived OS you've got). I think the more important issue here is that UNIX and UNIX clone OS's are getting favorable media exposure. I believe that the good press will lead more people down the, IMO, right road in computer OS's. Just drives home the point that you don't need proprietary code to make great sfx.

FreeBSD Ad?

[virid]

hahaha, true...maybe some one should make a BSD Advocacy HOWTO...

Answering: 'could Linux do it?'

[NovaX]

Because of many of the posts I've seen, some quite disgusting as ill-informed linux advocates bashed freebsd (as if it was another microsoft), I'd like to set the track straight.

A friend of mine saved the thread on the FreeBSD lists on the Matrix (unfortunatly, I was not on that one at the time), and I have uploaded them, and for anyone still squabbling, I encourage you to read them. There are 55 in total. Unfortunatly, they are in Netscape's format (yeah, I use pine so its pretty sad..). If even one person asks, I'll convert to text.

So, for all of those bsd-bashers (as I saw no linux bashers), please read. Some of you knew what you were talking about, some had no clue. I personally am a member to both a LUG and FreeBSD listings, and run fbsd, linux, and Solaris (personal copy) on my desktop. So, I understand every view, but open-source "advocates" bashing open-source is just plain sickening.

In any event, please go to http://www.crl.com/~anarchy/download/ for the 55kb zip file (for win users, put it in x:\Program Files\Netscape\Users\anarchy\Mail, and rename it from matrix to inbox/drafts/etc).

And remember, people, if you want to truely support the cause (GNU/BSD/OSS), just fight the uninformed media and make the software second to none - just don't get in petty ego wars. It will be worse enough when we get in fights about who has the best 'sex robot'. =)

FreeBSD growth

[bodl]

It's just the usual FUD from the kids here on Slashdot everytime a *BSD story/news is posted.
Sad really but what do you expect from a Linux advocacy site like Slashdot.
FreeBSD is in fact growing and using the download stats and CDROM sales, the userbase is
growing tremendously.
I also think that it isn't just about apples and oranges ;)