Slashdot Mirror
FreeBSDCon '99 Speaker Schedule Announced
Bill Swingle writes "The final speaker schedule for the upcoming FreeBSDCon has been announced. Highlights include, Kirk McKusick's BSD Internals tutorial, and keynotes from both Brian Behlendorf of the Apache Project and Jeremey Allison from the Samba Project. There are all kinds of fun events planned for the conference, including a free (for attendees) beer bash. This should be one killer conference! "
Read on for more. CT : This is the first article in our new BSD Section maintained by Nik. Enjoy.
There are also speakers from Apple, talking about FreeBSD's contribution to Darwin, Jonathan Bresler talking about his experiences with spam fighting as the FreeBSD Postmaster, and Jun-ichiro itojun Hagino of the KAME group, talking about IPv6 and IPSec, to name just a few more (modesty forbids me mentioning my own presentation at the conference, obviously).
I agree, but for an opposite reason. This seems more like an attempt to shove the BSD articles to a separate, little-read page (except by those very interested in BSD). While this wouldn't bother me, Linux articles are on the main page. If both Linux and BSD articles were put in separate sections, that'd be fine, but putting all Linux articles on the main page, and only a small percentage of the BSD articles, seems biased. This isn't, after all, a Linux news site (or isn't supposed to be anyway, according to the FAQ).
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
With all the fuss at the recent Linux* conferences, it's good to see FreeBSD pulling into its own.
I've mentioned this before, but I've become a definite admirer of the various BSD's. The fact that many of the critical network analysis tools I use on a regular basis(and continually have to add to my fresh Linux boxen) are packaged into the installer of FreeBSD.
I'm very interested in stopping by the BSD convention for a day or two, to learn more about who's doing what and so on. Can one attend the exhibits for free, like most(read: almost all) computer conventions? I understand the need for the organizers to make their money back, and respect it, but I would like to make a showing(which would already cost me time off work) to see what the exhibitors have to offer, but don't want to make the drive up there only to be turned away.
So what's the scoop?
Yours Truly,
Dan Kaminsky
DoxPara Research
http://www.doxpara.com
"CT: This is the first article in our new BSD Section maintained by Nik. Enjoy."
What's this mean?
----------------
"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds." - Albert Einstein
Co-founder and designer at Music Nearby: http://musicnearby.com
Pretender wrote:
I suspect that the Linux/BSD ratio here is more related to the popularity of the OS than any inherent bias on Slashdot's part, but I'm still happy to see this happen. Congratulations to - Nik, is it? - and looking forward to seeing your articles.
That's pretty much it. In response to someone else's "What does this mean?" comment -- /. gets a fair number of BSD submissions, but (just like the large number of Linux submissions) most of them weren't deemed 'newsworthy' enough to justify the front page.
Now there's a new BSD section (looks like the boxes on the left hand side haven't been updated yet, but they will be) in which more of the BSD specific material can be posted, in exactly the same way that the "Your Rights Online" section works.
I'm expecting not to have to write too many articles myself -- the number of submissions of BSD articles to /. should feed this section quite nicely. And to forestall comments from NetBSD or OpenBSD folk (and, indeed, Apple folk or BSDi folk) this section is emphatically not FreeBSD only -- I'd love to see submissions that relate to all things BSD.
I'll tell you the worst thing about this though -- like most other /. readers I used to check /. every day to see what new stories had been posted overnight. Now that I can see the incoming submission queue I can see them before they hit the main page any time I want, which takes a lot of the fun out of it :-(
If anyone's going to be around the Bay Area next week (whether or not you're going to the conference or not) drop me a line -- it'd be great to get together for a few beers and puts names to faces (I'm a Brit, and have been told that some of the beer at the conference will have been warmed especially).
N
nik@slashdot.org / nik@FreeBSD.org
phypor wrote:
Nikc, could you please explain the rationalization in having a completely seperate section for BSD related articles?
Sure. Rob or Robin can probably give you more of the inside scoop than I can though -- the first I knew about this was roughly a month ago, when they contacted me and asked if I wanted to 'edit' the section.
Basically, /. gets lots of submissions a day. The current queue of submissions to evaluate is 300 or so, and there are stories queued up for posting to keep /. going for the next couple of days to boot.
If we posted 3 BSD stories, 3 Redhat stories, 3 news stories, 3 YRO stories, 3 Debian stories, 3 "misc" stories, . . . the front page would rapidly get overwhelmed, and stories would cycle off the front page too quickly. 15 stories on the front page is a reasonable number.
Also, you get stories about things which aren't really 'news' in the sense of things breaking now. For example, I expect to be posting reminders when things like DaemonNews are out. But they will be kept to the BSD section (which you will be able to click to from the front page) rather than being on the front page itself.
By the same token, you wouldn't expect /. to post each week when a new issue of LWN is out.
How does having a BSD Section have an advantage over simply having more posted articles?
Stories stay on the front page longer, and it allows more BSD-geek-only stories to be posted to /.
How do you resolve the apparent inequality that results in a BSD section as compared with other Open Source Operating Systems (ie Linux, eCos)?
There's nothing that says that these won't get their own sections as well. For example, if there's been sufficient BeOS interest I'd be surprised if someone who's made themselves prominent in the BeOS community wasn't contacted to help out with this.
Note: This is not an invitation for hordes of BeOS supporters (or Amiga supporters, or Debian supporters, or whatever) to deluge Roblimo with applications for the mythical post of section editor. I've only been on board a short time, and don't yet have a firm handle on exactly how many of these kind of submissions /. gets. The BSD (and also the new Apache section) are experiments. Ones that we all hope are successful, of course, but experiments nonetheless.
If demand is the primary motivation for establishing a seperate BSD section, would you initiate a push with CmdrTaco and Hemos about a policy change to enact a more open submissions record, so that the Slashdot community as a whole had access to see the real numbers on types of articles submitted?
That's the first time I've seen that request on /.. As far as I know the numbers aren't secret, but as I say, I haven't been around on the 'team' long enough to know. Doubtless Rob or Robin will let me know in due course. But as I say there are ~ 300 submissions in the queue now -- perhaps 15% of those are duplicates, or have already been posted here. Some of them just aren't 'appropriate' for /., and the rest of them get looked at and scheduled for posting.
Questions that need a longer response are probably best e-mailed to me. If there's a lot of demand I'll either send out a standard reply to everyone who asks, or (if my prose is interesting enough) it'll get posted here.
N
phypor wrote:
Nikc, could you please explain the rationalization in having a completely seperate section for BSD related articles?
Just to be absolutely clear about this. BSD articles will still appear on the front page of /.
This new section is just to allow posting of more stories that, by themselves, wouldn't make it on to the front page, or, if they did, would have occured as quickies.
It's also one of the first to be split off (along with YRO and Apache), this does not mean it will be the last. KDE, Gnome, BeOS, Amiga, even Linux could all end up with their own sections.
Or not.
It's really far too early to tell. The success of the BSD section (and the Apache section, and others) will determine what happens in the future.
OK?
N
From the way many BSD users have been treated by both the slashdot posters (and the FUD you see now is a shadow of what it was before), and the way the maintainers openly neglected them, I'm not surprised many BSD readers don't feel much joy in this. When Nik told FreeBSD advocacy a few weeks ago about /.'s new section, even then there was a tone of 'sorry for all your work on Daemon News, FreeBSD advocacy, etc.. but your dead. We're covering it now.'
/. BSD because for publicity.. we may have to.
Andover, when Nik told advocacy, was the one who requested the BSD section because they saw the market. This was not Rob, etc. Andover sees the market, which means money. While I'm quite happy that Slashdot is claiming to support BSD better, I wouldn't them as my *only* news source, not even my main one on BSD. I don't trust the maintainers (except Nik, of course), I don't think they take responcibility for their actions, etc.
So just understand thi: many BSD users don't see the increased number of articles as a great thing, its nice. The way slashdot has treated them in the past, none are rejoicing. I think many will continue to support Daemon News, some OS Online, and other sites with pride.. and support
"Open Source?" - Press any key to continue
I've posted this before in a previous slashdot article -- but in case anyone missed it. This site has some slides on Barry Caplins FreeBSD@USWest talk at FreeBSDCon.
FreeBSD has been in use in the USWest.net core infrastructure for years. The stability, reliability, performance, and security of the Operating System are major factors for its use. There are additional regulatory requirements that make our ISP environment unique and FreeBSD fits these needs. This presentation will cover the regulatory and technical environment at U S WEST Internet Services. We will discuss how we got to where we are now, where we're going to go tomorrow, and how FreeBSD fits into our big picture.
----------
Nope,
I am afraid that the AC tried to do that, and has failed.
I put OpenBSD on my first machine this past weekend. Now I have Slackware, NetBSD, OpenBSD, NT, Win95, and Win98 boxes all running on my home network (all on single machines- dual/multi boot systems drive me crazy). It all works together quite well. Slackware was good 'practice' for running a BSD system. A lot of the core infrastructure is the same on all the free unices, when you get right down to it. The O'Reilly "Essential System Administration" book and all of the "blue cover" O'Reilly books are valuable with any of the Freenixes.
I'd hate to give any of them up.
My interpretation of the "fracture" of the BSDs is as follows:
NetBSD is the most 'research-oriented' branch, the aim with NetBSD is to port the OS to as many architectures as possible. As such, NetBSD is what new hardware vendors can latch onto to explore their architecture and develop infrastucture. The StrongARM port is an example of that. Now that NetBSD has plowed some ground people are starting to port Linux over to, say, the Chalice CATS motherboard.
OpenBSD is the branch where Security and stabiltiy are the most important priority. These are the folks who set up the whole system to be tight as a drum. It's the only install I have done which forced me to establish a Root password VERY early in the install process. (as an aside- Slackware 3.6 never even reminds you to set up a Root password- a friend of mine browesed the Net with a wide open Slack 3.6 system for weeks before I discovered [by telnetting into her system!] that there was no root password at all on her system. This is 'fixed' on Slack 4.0)
FreeBSD is the branch whose primary aim is robust 'popular' support for lots of hardware on the i386 processors. For some reason a number of people are also porting FreeBSD to Alpha and other architectures (I've never understood why they don't just use NetBSD, but to each his/her own, I guess)
They are all closely related, as they all come from the same origins. And they complement each other, for the most part, IMHO.
Of course, this is ALL my humble opinion, as I don't have direct contact with anybody in the core teams of these fine products. Kudos to them all, of course.