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A Tale of Two Systems, Linux, xBSD
The monkey flying around in my butt writes "
In what has got to be one of the
better pieces
on the Linux vs. BSD debate
Wes Peters
talks about both OS's, the strengths and
weakness of each, and how they live
together to form a symbiotic circle. "
I have experience with both Linux and all three BSD systems. I'd like to share a couple of my opinions:
1. Linux and BSD are both very stable. None of them lack in this department.
2. It's really hard to compromise an OpenBSD system. I mean REALLY hard. This OS has been through a really extensive security audit. Have a look at the bugtraq archives... I realize that security issues in Linux vary from dist to dist, but all dists share a lot of the same packages - packages that have not been properly audited. Linux seems to be inherently less secure than xBSD because it contains more software from more sources. If you run BSD you get your packages from the BSD team, not from a third party developer. That leads me to my next point:
3. Getting everything from one place makes it easy. In BSD, ls is ls - not part of the fileutils. Basically, BSD is packaged better than Linux is. I really like having one big source tree for the whole system. CVS rocks. the ports rock. nuff said about that
4. Linux has great hardware support. In my opinion this makes Linux better for desktop or notebook computers. On my workstation, I throw crap everywhere. It's not like the more organized BSD setup helps me at all in this case. Security and availability is also less of an issue. That lets me screw around with all the latest gizmos without worry. It's more fun to play with the features of the Linux kernel than a BSD kernel.
I like BSD more on servers because it is easier to install and maintain than Linux. Its development is less chaotic, and I worry less about it. On a server, having less hardware support is not an issue. Multimedia support isn't needed.. Servers just don't need to do a whole lot of that fancy stuff. BSD can run pretty much any Linux application, so lack of big apps isn't an issue.
One downside of BSD on the server is the SMP support. (I haven't tried FreeBSD on an SMP box in some time.. it sucked last time I tried about a year ago, but I hear it's much much better now) Anyway, I think the whole Mindcraft thing has shown everybody didn't already know that SMP isn't a big deal for most applications. Rather than get a big SMP box for a high traffic server, I would choose to use several cheap single chip machines. If I needed to run a big database off one machine, and SMP was the only way to go, I'd happily run Linux (or hell, even Solaris on a big sparc). It wouldn't matter. Nobody would be able to access the system directly over the net anyway. Nobody but me would have a shell account on it.. and it would be sitting behind a BSD machine. BSD makes awesome www/ftp/name/mail servers.
By the way, does the RedHat installation drive anyone besides me nuts?
Sean Comeau
scomeau@obscurity.org
Really, Unix is Unix, sure there are differant flavors, I bet I could name 10 of the top of my head, but that fact is, they all both unix.
I got the impression that the author was giving the BSD is better than Linux speach, and with the replies I got the impression Linux is better that BSD speach.
That fact is, they are both Free, they both run on cheap PC hardware, and they are both Unix.
It's not BSD vs Linux vs Solaris vs AIX vs SCO vs etc, etc...
It is *nix VS the World. For the Last 30 years unix has been coming on strong, fighting everything to the high end mainframes to the lowly PC, and I don't see unix backing down.
They both are great unix operating systems, Free, runs on cheap hardware and both help fuel the massive war machine known as Unix.
Think of it this way, if the IT department give you a computer to run a network service, and you have a choice between MacOS 7.5 or some unix you never heard of, which would you choice?
Don't ask what unix can do for you, ask what can you do for unix?
Vote unix (any unix) today!
The first Unix I ever used was Ultrix (don't remember what version), the first Unix I was a sysadmin on was SunOS 4. I'm not a crusty old Unix guy yet but I've paid my dues.
Before becoming a Linux user and advocate, I had run systems and done development on SunOS 4, Solaris 2, HP-UX 9 and 10, FreeBSD, and OpenBSD. I was (and still am) a big fan of BSD, but one day I needed Unix on a particular laptop (probably one of those mostly useless doohickeys whatshisname was talking about, but it's no fun to travel on business as a sysadmin without a Unix box close at hand). I tried Solaris x86, OpenBSD, and FreeBSD before finally caving in and trying Red Hat Linux. It was the only one with which the laptop would function fully.
What I found was that in spite of my prejudices, I really liked Linux. It's a perfectly good system, better than old SunOS 4, that's for sure. It is NOT Unix with training wheels! Any training wheels that might come with a particular distribution can easily be unbolted and removed. It is true Unix in the sense of the book "The Unix Philosophy".
BSD fans, please just admit it: It quacks like a duck. Deal with it. That doesn't make BSD any less valuable.
Besides, if you want to see Unix with training wheels, take a look at any commercial "real" Unix. HP-UX has training wheels that can't be easily removed at all.
I have a few things, actually.
:)
1. SMP on FreeBSD is quite good for what it is: a stepping stone to a properly multitasking/multithreaded kernel, running on multiple CPUs. That is being crafted in 4.0 (no, not vaporware, but something being developed.) SMP is better in Linux because they've already gone through many of the issues beign solved here now.
2. SMB "mounts" are done using Sharity Light.
3. As per ease of configurability, FreeBSD is VERY easy. But why do things have to be SysV-like? That's a matter of preference, anyway.
4. The NFS has had major problems plaguing it for years. Matt Dillon (and some others) have fixed all of them that I can think of.
5. Our portability is not bad; just because many ports haven't been done doesn't mean FreeBSD is not portable.
I hope I cleared up a few misconceptions
Brian Fundakowski Feldman
That's setting your system up wrong. If you will have heavy load, you raise maxusers, etc. You don't keep the defaults when they're incorrect for you.
One size doesn't fit all. This problem is a user error unless there's some kind of mbuf leak. None are known in FreeBSD.
Brian Fundakowski Feldman
> How long did you use NT for?
About 10 seconds. I was there as a linux consultant, but they wanted to show me the windows version. As I sat down and hit something, it lost control of the windowing system. I asked, "but can't you kill things now." Not if the program you use to kill them is out of control . . .
I've also used it to download onto floppies for initial linux boot disks, and to transfer files since the floppy on my desktop went south. The P90's in that lab under wfwg (oops, not NT; haven't checkec again) had 20-25% of the networking performance of a 486/66 under linux.
Hmm, that's not why I'm posting this, that was a sidenote.
10 seconds of really trying to use NT, one crash.
Three years of linux, macbsd, and now freebsd:
macbsd: 1 kernel panic in 4-6 months of use. Apparently related to using a not-quite-ready driver for X.
debian: 2.5 years on my desk, no crashes or panics in 24/7 operation. We did have some panics while setting up scsi, but that's because we had no idea what kind of card it was, and had to use trial & error (insmod, then read). With the card identified, no more crashes.
debian: 1 year, we thought we had a crash on my boss's machine, but there were no logs indicating this after we reset it. When I went over to reset it when it happened again, it turned out that the problem wasn't a crash, but that half that building had dropped of the campus network.
freebsd: last three or four months, my desktop, I've found that accessing the defective floppy drive can clobber the kernel. It takes a couple of hours, but it never stops trying to access it (linux returns an error), and it slowly dies.
OK, so my NT sample is quite small, but in those 10 seconds, I had more real crashes than in 3 years of bsd & linux.
This article, while vainly attempting to sound even-handed, comes off as Linux bashing. He trivializes Linux developers for writing drivers (though, he not-so-deftly attempts to take it back) and he passes Linux off as a 'mini-BSD.' He fails to address most of the strengths of Linux other than Hardware support. (What about software? I didn't see a Code Warrior for xBSD)
Since when is supporting affordable hardware an unimportant goal? I don't feel like buying the most expensive, and only supported device X, when I can have full support under Linux.
If anything, this article is thinly veiled Linux-bashing by a holier-than-thou BSD user, and as much as I like FreeBSD for running Apache, I've found xBSD users to have an air of distain for all things non-BSD.
Linux is not xBSD on training wheels. It's an alternative, original implementation of classic UNIX concepts. It happens to run Quake3 accelerated on my Voodoo3? Does that make it less valid? I can run it on my desktop, and run a web server, sshd, and ftp.
I've read more unbiased opinions from NT supporters, and that's really sad.
----------------- "I have a bone to pick, and a few to break." - Refused -------------------
This article failed to answer the question that I've had for a while: if the two communities have so much in common, why is there a need for one or the other? According to the author, the Linux community handles the "newbies" and the oddball hardware, and the BSDers concern is security, portability, and stability. Why can't we combine the forces we have and come up with a platform that is secure, portable, stable, and well-supported (not to say that any one of the mentioned platforms does not yet fit this description)? To me, it seems as if the only thing that separates Linux advocates from *BSD advocates is the philosophy of software and the respective licenses that the platforms have been placed under; nothing more, nothing less.
The other thing that troubles me is the common thread that I saw running through the article and that I also see in some of the comments made so far here on Slashdot. That thread is the idea that Linux exists for new users to learn UNIX on, and if they want to actually do anything serious with their hardware, they need to "move on" to the *BSDs. This, to me, says that the common image of Linux in the UNIX community is that it is nothing more than "UNIX on training wheels." Does no one take Linux seriously outside of the Linux community?
That is, not. Even if Linux gets no more userfriendly, it will still be around because it's better for some of us.
Too often, linux advocates just say "Micro$oft fscking sucks!"
I would not call such people real Linux advocates. This article, and the Linux/NT (by c'n', or something, wasn't it?) are both examples of fair, well-written articles, and also counts as Linux advocacy, evne though perhaps it wasn't originally meant as such.
Every OS has pros and cons, and if you neglect that, you won't make a very good impression.
I think more people should read the Linux Advocacy HOWTO, and stick to it.
/* Steinar */
(This comment is of course GPLed.)
He characterizes Linux as non-BSD non-UNIX. Now it might be "historically" accurate to classify any BSD system as "UNIX", but I thought UNIX was a trademark of somebody, and an OS had to be certified before using that trademark. Have any of the free BSDs, or BSDI, been so certified? In general terms though, only quibblers would call Linux non-UNIX; seems to me like a chip on his shoulder.
In another annoying poke at Linux, he says BSD systems shine at this, with their ability to provide a usable email server for numerous users on a castoff 486 PC. Uh, pardon me, Linux too, excuse me. Chip on his shoulder again?
I'm also annoyed at the somewhat patronizing attitude that Linux is our most fertile recruiting ground, and When they move on to BSD, as if Linux is merely a step in the path to true enlightenment with BSD.
Well, well, not bad overall for a BSD fanatic. I suppose Linux has raving Anonymous Cowards, and BSD has patronizing snobs. Not sure which is worse. Wouldn't it be a nice world without both?
For what it's worth, I chose Linux because the development seemed more open, so to speak. Not so tightly controlled. Plus, there are 3 BSDs, and I often wonder how well BSD-specific code ports from one to the other. I imagine that if I settled on one of them, it wouldn't really matter much at all, but I want my system for exploration, not production, so it changes all the time, and I am not interested in monolithic upgrades. I expect I would be perfectly happy with the "UNIX-ness" of any them. But a choice had to be made, and I am not interested in remaking that decision for "just another UNIX system".
--
Infuriate left and right
All very reasonable apart from the rules on installing new apps - why on earth should installing apps break an OS? With NT, this is unfortunately sometimes the case, but it shouldn't be.
We use NT systems extensively at my company, with quite competent administration, and the servers and workstations still occasionally crash (or become ultra slow and require a reboot - probably a memory leak or similar).
I have yet to see a Linux system crash, and don't even know what an 'oops' message looks like - by contrast, my mother, who is retired, has had to become horribly familiar with NT BSODs so that she can accurately report problems...
My one criticism of Linux as a server is its recovery from power failures - maybe our Linux boxes weren't set up properly, but they took a long time to be recovered after a power failure, even the one with an ICP Vortex RAID controller.
However, logging/journalling filesystems a la XFS should solve this, and we probably didn't have enough UPS capacity to allow a clean shutdown, so it could probably have been avoided. I don't know all the details as I'm not a sysadmin, but we do have a very competent BSD/Linux sysadmin here.
You have to include the cost of ownership. Nobody will convince me that Linux is cheaper to maintain than NT.
You may never believe it, but this is simply a fact for many of us. Generally, the Linux user is a more computer-saavy person than the Windows user. They're more likely to fix their own machine than to incur costs in paying someone else to come and do it.
Many of us who have run both kinds of servers believe that Windows is less reliable than Linux, and this really does affect support cost. There are other more measurable means to make this argument though. I have a Mac at home, and I run a remote Linux box that does DNS for 8 domains, a web server, ftp server, mail (SMPT/POP), etc. If this machine were a PC, I'd have to buy Timbuktu to do any remote maintenance from my house or work. As it is, I just log in via a rhs/ssh/telnet/whatever, do my work, and log out. No cost incurred save my own time.
Hardware is another issue. Because of Linux, I can get a server-quality OS for free that will run on the hardware I already have. This box is a PowerPC Linux box, so I couldn't put Windows on it anyway. I saved a good bit of money right there.
What?! NT is just as stable as Linux. My NT box at work has now an uptime of something like 8 months. As long as your hardware is up to scratch and you don't mess up the registry by hand NT is rock solid. How long did you use NT for?
I have an NT4 box at work. The registry is corrupted, and I never edited it by hand. I can't get it to run Flash content, because it seems to believe that all Flash content is some kind of inheirently unsafe ActiveX control, and it won't let me. Admittedly, I'm not a Windows guru, but I'm pretty competent. Because NT is commercial, and I don't want to turn the corporate support guys loose on the machine I depend on to get work done, I have to use a much slower Mac to do all my Flash/Generator testing. Reliability means more than the lack of a BSOD/kernel panic. In Linux, the web browser is an application. If it gets corrupted (not likely, since I can't modify it unless I'm root), I just reinstall. In WindowsNT, the browser is "integrated", and reinstalling it doesn't fix the problem. It's not like a Mac either, where I can just go find the offending file and delete it. You're stuck relying on "Uninstall", which doesn't work reliably.
On a side note, my NT box generally goes about a month between reboots (usually a crash), compared to about every two months for the Linux box (getting a new kernel, etc). Both are acceptable uptimes for what I use them for.
- Vincit qui patitur.
Ahhh, Wonko, back again are we? I'm not sure I should bother making a serious reply to your post, considering that you're not exactly known for your impartiality, but:
1) Many people using Linux/*BSD have tried Windows and found it painful/bloated/expensive/etc., and are thus not particularly interested in a comparison.
2) Many Linux/*BSD users are quite simply not interested in a non-free OS.
3) Any such comparison would eventually deteriorate into "Linux/*BSD has this - Windows doesn't", "Windows has this - Linux/*BSD doesn't" discussion, simply because Un*x systems and Windows systems were originally designed for very different purposes. Windows was designed as a graphic shell to DOS; Linux was designed as a Un*x replacement; the *BSD design comes from the original Unix, aiming for a proper multiuser OS.
And last of all:
4) I find your comment about Windows - "most aspects of it suck" - to be a more than sufficient answer to your question.
This was a pretty good artical - although I felt it implied that Linux wasn't as good a server. They both have their good and bad aspects and I look forward to more sharing of code from both camps. So far, my experiance has shown me (caution, opinions start here):
Linux
-NFS server: not so good (is there any work being done on this?)
-SMB client: good
-SMP: good (could be better)
-Portability: good
-Ease of configuration: good (I love System V and kernel modules)
-RAID: never tried
-TCP/IP: good (I add this just because the older Linux kernel didn't do TCP/IP near as well as FreeBSD)
FreeBSD
-NFS server: good
-SMB client: not so good (I don't think kernel level support exists - ie smbmount. does it?)
-SMP: not so good
-Portability: not so good (use NetBSD - whole other topic)
-Ease of configuration: Ok (but I really wish they would move to System V - is it possible to make a disto that is System V?)
-RAID: good (I love vinum)
-TCP/IP: good
I know, I know - some of my opinions are probably ill formed, please correct me where I may be wrong.
\forall code \in C, \frac{\Delta readability(code)}{\Delta t} < 0
cjs
The world's most portable OS: http://www.netbsd.org.
You should learn a little more about the history of Unix before you start talking about how old BSD is. Peter Salus has a good book on it.
cjs
The world's most portable OS: http://www.netbsd.org.
My main problem with *BSD personally is that you still have to install most of the GNU tools by hand due to *BSD licensing/NIH/minimalism issues. I prefer to have a reasonably featureful command set out of the box.
This hits on something that the article, and most bsd'ers, fail to mention. I hear a lot of people citing the stability and security of *BSD compared to linux, but it's not an even comparison. If you compare kernel-to-kernel, they're probably about equal. Most linuces ship with a far greater spread of applications than the *BSDs, and are therefore mathematically more likely to contain a set of exploitable code.
So, until someone comes up and says, "codewise, thise, this, and this methodology are employed in SomeBSD and are proven more stable/secure/sexy," I don't buy it. the BSD's I've played with are, at heart, just like linux, without the toys. I like toys.
And, of course, as soon as you prove a linuxism wrong, someone will fix it. IF BSD really _was_ better, someone would have adopted the code long ago.
Long rant short, it's all the same crap. Shut up and code.
i browse at -1 because they're funnier than you are.
If you want to find linux users, go to a LUG, join development mailing lists of linux projects, join linux mailing lists. Of all the methods to form opinions on "Linux users", reading slashdot and coming up with your conclusions from there has got to be a genuinely stupid method. Why on earth would you pick the one place where people don't need so much as a valid email address to post, so the anonymity level is through the roof?
:-)
Look, I'm on a number of mailing lists and projects (generally in the periphery (sp?) for most), and the people there are virtually all intelligent, level headed people. You tend to find more people who believe in the GPL than you will in other places, but by and large you find competent people getting work done.
Go to LUGs, you'll find linux users from every walk of life. Some smart, some not so smart, some brilliant, some questionably mentally incompetent. A wide variety of people like and use Linux, and forming your opinion of them in a place nearly guaranteed to be unrepresentative is a little strange.
Oh, Linux is a better client side OS than NT as long as you have a sysadmin for it, if for no other reason than it's not the path to hellish vendor lock-in. I've seen a place which runs just about every incarnation of windows under the sun (including different service pack levels of both NT 3.51 and NT 4.0) because some particular proprietary software package will only work on that particular version, heaven knows why. And let's see you remote display on a Mac's interface. Of course, you can probably come close to duplicating a Mac's wm/interface nowadays with gnome/E, so it's not even much of a point.
Note, the interface issue is a really dumb one to bring up. I'm a power user, so I can't stand the mac interface. Some people love it. Interfaces are extremely subjective things.
Anyhow, my experience with *BSD people, aside from slashdot, has them generally being pretty decent people, and I've whitnessed great levels of cooperation for portability whenever needed. These holy wars generally only exist in isolated places. The majority of people live with each other, just like the rest of life.
I'm not surprised at the insecure people who find meaning in their lives through enemies bashing everything but their one true foo. That's always happened and always will. i'm a bit surprised at level-headed sounding people thinking that those people are at all representative.
Oh, and microsoft is a real enemy. Just like carthage to the romans, microsoft must be destroyed for the good of the computing community in general, be it mac, sun, *bsd, linux, os2, etc. Everyone else can work with each other relatively well, M$ is the only one who's trying to kill off the rest. Personally, as a linux user, I hope that both linux and the BSDs flourish. As a man who has to live in the world, I hope that microsoft dies. There are real enemies and there are fake enemies. The BSDs and Linux are anything but enemies. Microsoft and everyone else are nothing but enemies. Please keep the two straight.
As for the users, there's no real generalizing them. I've seen everyone from great programmers to great novices using Linux, just like nearly everything in life. Why overgeneralize? life's to short to be wrong.
They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. -- C. Sagan
Please don't take this as bashing you, but do you realize how sad this sounds? What would you say if I told you that my new car works just fine if I just treat it right. Treating it right consists of:
1. Only making left turns under 9 mph
2. Never going faster than 55 mph
3. Always using extra high super octane fuel
4. Always getting manufacturer supplied hyper-expensive parts
5. Not adding things like GPS units, replacing the air conditiong system, or getting a CD player.
6. Occasionally turning my car off and starting it up again while I'm driving.
Would you say that that's the mark of a good car?
As long as you're willing to redefine normal operating conditions, anything can be stable. That's not the point. Stability isn't about adapting your computing to your computer, it's about adapting your computer to your computing.
Do you really not think that users not being able to install their own software is normal? Hell, UNIX/Linux systems are designed in such a way that users can add their own system libraries without affecting any other user or system stability (minus disk space requirements).
They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. -- C. Sagan
Here Here!
I was hoping to read about the real, nitty gritty differences between the two, like:
"Well, FreeBSD handles network configuration This Way and Linux does it This Way"
I have never used a BSD, or even seen one in action. I have been using Linux for a year now and was really hoping to learn what BSD was all about, specifically what it does better than Linux.
The author seems to have a attitude that Linux will train the newbies who will then "Step Up" to a BSD, but he really gives me no reason to, no hints as to why a BSD would be a step up from Linux.
Anyone want to post what the BSDs do better than Linux and vice-versa?
-geekd
I hesitate to post this because I know the author from his posts on FreeBSD mailing lists but I must question the obvious lack of technical details. I assume I am not alone in wanting to know more about things such as the differences in scheduling algorithms than the differences in userbases. It just seems to be spewing out the things most of us have known all along, gee there is a tendency for people to start with Linux only to move to Free or Open BSD. I would much prefer a discussion on the comparative technical strengths on each system.
Having used FreeBSD and Linux for a number of years now... well, I'll share my own opinion on the xBSD vs. Linux ball of wax.
Linux gets the nod from me for a desktop workstation. It's got the widest support of obscure hardware, multimedia support, graphics support, and so on.
xBSD (FreeBSD in perticular) gets the nod from me for serving. It is infinately more stable and secure then any flavor of Linux I've tried, out of the box, without any tuning. My Linux boxes are just fine for creating content, and mild serving. But, past experience has taught me not to trust them for serving huge mission critical projects.
Don't get me wrong, I like Linux. However, the development structure is just too muddled. There's some excellent code, some good code, and some not so good code. FreeBSD (and call this snobbish if you will, but it works) has a 'tighter fist' as I put it on source, Open but it gets scrutinized more, as such it's stable and secure as a rock. Sure, explots show up (e.g. the 3.2 natd thing) but they are much less common then the Linux expolits which turn up. e.g. Teardrop, and the fistfull of other DoS attacks on Linux. Sure, they are patched within hours of being found, but with xBSD they generally aren't there to begin with.
FreeBSD, from the people who brought you TCP/IP.
Hippies smell.
The problem is that the audience might not be big enough... ie, people who are able to read intelligent comparison without getting angry that it didn't take their side. Let alone people who could actually produce it.
I've been thinking about this. I'm beginning to notice that in many ways, some of Microsoft's products are satisfactory for most of my "everyday" end-user type needs. They're even satisfactory for my net access needs. So, I wonder, why do I have lingering (OK, sometimes consuming) hostility toward them? Largely because of their behavior. I worry that someday they really might win and I'll have no choice. Though Open Source largely seems to have fixed the no choice problem for now.
I think I also hate them because I got my broadest exposure to their products from 1993-1995. I'd always thought DOS was emasculated
UNIX, but when I encountered FoxPro 2.5 for DOS
(and was expected to write a real application
in it; this while Delphi actually existed)and Win 3.1 and its ilk up close, I really hated Microsoft. But Windows 95 and NT really are better (than previous MS products). Although I will never touch FoxPro again, maybe not even for large sums of money.
Hmmm. I'm just meandering. I guess my main point is that it's snuck up on me that MS's products, by and large, have become tolerable for me. In some cases, even adequate. Anybody else feeling
this?
Tweet, tweet.
Well.. Here's a nice quick MS vs Linux..
;-)
(All points are in no order, just as I thought them up)
Pro's of Linux
1) Affordability. The OS, the apps, free. And more then just free beer, free code too.
2) Portability. Runs across most any platform.. Arm, PPC, x86, Alpha, Sparc, etc.
3) Development. Always growing, updates quickly available. Sure it's not complete and buggy in parts, but it's being fixed! Plus, all devel tools (gcc, etc) are free too (see 1)
4) Community. This means a LOT actually. The community not only comments, critiques, assists and what not, it contributes through coding. This makes support free.
5) Configurability. Linux can be a DNS/SMTP server on a 486 in a closet. It can be a file sharing intranet server. It can be a webserver of large size (/. anyone?). It can also be a workstation, a development box, etc. Also, how can you not like themeable wm's and widget sets?
Linux's Cons
1) Software. Sure, we're working on it. But we aren't there Just Yet(tm). Sure we have apps that wordprocess (Abiword, StarOffice, WP, etc), but nothing quite as nice as Office (Please, I don't like WordPerfect's Motif feel)
2) Development. It's a con too, not everythings finished, and it's not going to change. Well, it is changing, all the time. It's a growing OS, always growing, making holes and filling them.
3) Install. (Way)Less of a point then it used to be, but it's not easy to, say, take your average WinBox and add Linux. You have to deal with partitions, installation, configuration, etc.
Pros for Windows
1) Community. If a lot of people use it, even if that's because it's all that's out there, this will mean people will know it. This makes for a lot of books, software, etc.
2) Software. Just about everything sold on the average computer store shelf is for Windows. This includes one of the Holy Grails, games. Sure, we have Civ:CTP and Q1/2/3 and a few more for Linux. But Windows has the rest. Not to mention the popular Office.
3) Compatibility. While not on as many platforms as Linux, you do get a lot of hardware support within the x86 architecture. Vid cards that don't have Linux support work in Windows, same with some sound cards (A3D anyone?). Sure, this is because noone needs release specs/source, many hardware companies are reluctant to do this.
Cons for Windows
1) Stability. Any OS that can be crashed simply because an app crashes is NOT good. Any OS that can crash for no real reason is NOT good. Need I go on?
2) Proprietary. Where's the source? Why's there a price tag? It's not open. If it breaks, you can't look at the source code to find out what's wrong and fix it.
3) Install. Hey, come on, Windows 95 had you click the mouse button on Next and decide on easily as much crap as my Debian install does. People don't notice this though, as it's always preinstalled.
As for learning curves? I remember when EVERYONE had a CLI. Remember DOS? Joe User could learn DOS. Heck, sit someone clueless down in front of Windows and they won't be totally effecient. I know people who have used computers for a year or two and all they know how to do is turn it on, launch IE/ICQ/Word and shut it down. Linux may take a little more base knowlege to use, but both systems must be learned.
Both systems have to be configured at some point. Plug & Pray still doesn't exist on a level that lets devices work flawlessly on insertion (with maybe the exception of a USB mouse).
Bottom line? I'd rather not say, my bottom line doesn't like Joe User and his I-Just-Want-It-To-Work and I-Can't-Be-Bothered-To-Learn-Anything attidudes. Computers are tools, powerful ones too. People should treat them as if they were as dangerous as a car or a buzzsaw.
In the end though.. I prefer Linux. So please note a slight bias
As some others have said, I also would have liked to see more technical details in the article. Before I read it, I expected at least a somewhat more technical article than it was. After reading it, I thought that there was very little content of interest to myself (and probably a majority of the others who read Slashdot).
I don't know a huge amount about the specific details of FreeBSD, but I have briefly installed and played with it (and will do so again when I free up a machine for it). I would have loved to learn a little more of the specifics, e.g. how the task scheduling and memory management is handled compared to Linux, etc.
I also found the article appeared to be a fair comparison on the surface, but to me the author seemed to be belittling the efforts of Linux developers, which is a real shame.
However, I don't know who the target audience for this article is, but I have a feeling that it's not the technical community, but more people who have a passing interest in Unix in general or more specifically, Linux/BSD.
One thing that was somewhat annoying was the author's example of running FreeBSD on a small system, and then saying that it scaled right up to big systems like Yahoo/Walnut Creek/etc. Although he provided some good examples of large systems which run FreeBSD, it was almost as if 'Linux can handle the in-between tasks'. However, I can't think of an example of a big/famous system running Linux to use as a counter (although I'm fairly sure that some exist).
I have to agree with that. Too often, linux advocates just say "Micro$oft fscking sucks!" It'd be nice to see an intelligent comparison. Pros/cons to each system. Learning curves. Support (public and professional).
Anyone up to it?
"It compiles, SHIP IT!" -Overheard at Microsoft's development lab
I currently run RedHat6 and Win98. I'm in both boats right now.
I try not to trash MS products. Inevitably, it happens, though.
My problem with Microsoft is its lack of stability. Even with a clean install of Windows, computers crash. Run a buggy program on it, it crashes. Restart the entire computer. Also, the fact that the system isn't reliable for long periods of time is an issue for me. Running a small web/ftp server means wanting my PC up for 24/7. Win9x can't do that. NT won't do that. Linux does.
Also, when Microsoft DOES come across a bug in their system, they say "We found this bug. We'll issue a fix for it with the next service pack..." 3 months later. In the Linux community, the story is "I found this bug. Here's what it is. Here's what it does. Here's a fix for it." In that instance, Open Source is a godsend. Bug fixes that are released WHEN the bug is announced? When do you see MS do that?
And my last point (for now) is a bit biased, but not because of a love for Linux:
Windows is too User Stupid. (flaimbait, or what?) It's been made so "user friendly" that a complete moron can sit down, use a few programs, play a few games, and turn the computer off (don't bother shutting down. Thank you for playing). I remember, in the not-so-distant past, when you had to LEARN how to use a computer. WHen you were faced with "C:\>" you needed to know what to do. I also liked having control over my system. Those cryptic dos commands meant being able to control what was happening with the system. With Windows, we're forced to use a GUI that has EVERYTHING predetermined in it. We're told what we can do and when we can do it.
Linux is different. Yes... There's a steep learning curve. Yes... it can be a pain to work with. But it also gives users control over what is happening. It forces a person to learn about a computer. It forces a person to learn how to use the computer. It forces people to read, ask questions, and search for answers. All of this, in my experience, leads people to a wealth of knowledge. How many different books can you have, with different info, for Windows 98? How many can you have for Linux? (I have 1 Win98 book and 5 Linux books).
I'm going to stop rambling.
"It compiles, SHIP IT!" -Overheard at Microsoft's development lab
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Wonko the Sane
What I dislike NetBSD for is the sluggish response time. I've tried the new NetBSD 1.4 with its new UVM system, but response-wise it looks like 1.3.
How to repeat: Start three compiling batches (you may even nice them to 5) and watch the response time (I tried console and ssh) drop off. I've never seen this behaviour on FreeBSD, Linux, and Solaris, systems I work with daily. A login takes several seconds at that time.
Anyone want to give me any hints? The system in question ran on a P200/96MB RAM, self-compiled kernel (tweaked GENERIC + i4b). Otherwise, I used only stock tools.
The system ran FreeBSD 2.2.x, 3.x and several Linux versions already, so I know that better response times are possible on exactly the same hardware.