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NetBSD 9.0

netbsd.org

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Re: NetBSD 9.0

#31

Post by detaro »

golergka wrote: post #30
rvp-x wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want a simpler system that is easy to understand, NetBSD is a pretty good choice. The source is almost entirely in a single repository for you to read, and you need a single command to build a boot-able release (you can even build it on other OSes and architectures). It's a level of familiarity with the inner workings of a system that is hard to express. It has pretty decent support for ARM boards so that's th…

> not-too-recent x86 hardware I don't know much about system development, but aren't most x86 platforms extremely backwards compatible? Would an OS that is not adopted to the latest CPU not load at all, or just wouldn't use that CPU to the fullest potential?

CPU isn't the problem. Peripherals (GPU, network/WLAN cards, storage controllers, ...) are.

Re: NetBSD 9.0

#32

Post by bch »

labawi wrote: post #27
bch wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d say BSD (esp Net and Open, as mentioned above), just don’t run as many processes, by design. BSDs are *nix, like Linux, but with their own traditions. If you, familiar with Linux, sat down at a NetBSD box, you’d be able to easily get around like a little girl[0]. You wouldn’t find systemd, though, you’d see a “wheel” group, your login shell might not be bash. The BSDs just decorate their houses differently than L…

I'd say it depends on the Linux distribution. Things like Ubuntu would be much like mentioned [1], packing just about everything¹, while on something like openwrt you would probably recognize or easily find out the function of all userspace processes - I counted 13 on my router. It doesn't help that linux (kernel and userspaces) tends to resemble chaotic patchwork more¹ than a reasonably designed system. ¹ exaggerati…

Of course you are correct; “Linux” is a big landscape, and descriptions of instances run the gamut (eg: OpenWRT vs Ubuntu). When I was writing above I had (eg) Red Hat or Ubuntu in mind.

Re: NetBSD 9.0

#33

Post by wtallis »

> Reworked SATA subsystem, now supporting multiple commands in transit (NCQ),

Well, that's more than a decade overdue. It looks like they added a NVMe driver in 8.0 that's not shockingly primitive, so I wonder why SATA was lagging so far behind.

Re: NetBSD 9.0

#34

Post by ianai »

fishtacos wrote: post #19
geff82 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NetBSD is a great system for learning Unix. It lets you deep dive into certain topics because you have to. I learned to use Unix with NetBSD in the 2000. Only problem: find hardware for it. If you do not have a Raspberry Pi, your PC should not be brand new ideally (3-4 years is a good starting point).

VMs don't work as well?

This release lists lots of increased hardware support including vms.

Re: NetBSD 9.0

#35

Post by harryruhr »

There was an Article "Are the BSDs dying" (https://www.csoonline.com/article/3250653/is-the-bsd-os-dyin...) where it us said, that NetBSD has the lowest code quality of all BSD variants. It also finishes last when it comes to security updates.

To this day NetBSD doesn't deliver binary security updates in a timely manner. Not in the base system and not for packages. Even OpenBSD manages to do this nowadays. If there is even a patch at all, it is delivered in source form only. Users are supposed to build the binaries for themselves. That's anachronistic in the year 2020.

Building from source consumes not only time but also energy. When everyone talks about saving energy and reducing carbon footprint, source based systems where every user is supposed to build binaries from sources are a not only a waste of time but are also contributing to the climate crisis.

Re: NetBSD 9.0

#36

Post by [deleted] »

harryruhr wrote: post #35

There was an Article "Are the BSDs dying" ( https://www.csoonline.com/article/3250653/is-the-bsd-os-dyin... ) where it us said, that NetBSD has the lowest code quality of all BSD variants. It also finishes last when it comes to security updates. To this day NetBSD doesn't deliver binary security updates in a timely manner. Not in the base system and not for packages. Even OpenBSD manages to do this nowadays. If there…

[deleted]

Re: NetBSD 9.0

#38

Post by ddevault »

cnst wrote: post #29
ddevault wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please help! The image is almost complete: https://git.sr.ht/~sircmpwn/builds.sr.ht/tree/master/images/... But I need a NetBSD expert to come in and put on the finishing touch: making the filesystem resize to fill the available space on the qcow2. Without this, the image cannot build a new version of itself which isn't smaller than the host image, leading to image shrinkage over time and eventual breakitude.

It should be doable with the following rc.d configuration: resize_disklabel=YES resize_root=YES The second script is available by default, but the first one is somehow hidden from general availability: * http://bxr.su/n/distrib/utils/embedded/files/resize_disklabe... * http://bxr.su/n/etc/rc.d/resize_root You can fetch it raw, it seems to work great: cd /etc/rc.d/ ftp http://bxr.su/raw/NetBSD/distrib/utils/embedded/f…

Aye, but that doesn't seem to work. Check out the genimg script - it's already trying to set up resize_root. I've also tried resize_disklabel without success. What this needs isn't another well-meaning HN comment trying to debug by proxy - I need someone who knows how NetBSD works to get their hands dirty and get it done.

Re: NetBSD 9.0

#39

Post by theonemind »

harryruhr wrote: post #35

There was an Article "Are the BSDs dying" ( https://www.csoonline.com/article/3250653/is-the-bsd-os-dyin... ) where it us said, that NetBSD has the lowest code quality of all BSD variants. It also finishes last when it comes to security updates. To this day NetBSD doesn't deliver binary security updates in a timely manner. Not in the base system and not for packages. Even OpenBSD manages to do this nowadays. If there…

Contributing to the climate crisis seems like a stretch. Bitcoin obviously uses a lot of power and contributes to the climate crisis. Building OSes from source is just a hobby for most people, and probably doesn't register as a particularly environmentally intensive one compared to even reading paperback books.

Re: NetBSD 9.0

#40

Post by rvp-x »

harryruhr wrote: post #35

There was an Article "Are the BSDs dying" ( https://www.csoonline.com/article/3250653/is-the-bsd-os-dyin... ) where it us said, that NetBSD has the lowest code quality of all BSD variants. It also finishes last when it comes to security updates. To this day NetBSD doesn't deliver binary security updates in a timely manner. Not in the base system and not for packages. Even OpenBSD manages to do this nowadays. If there…

NetBSD publishes updated builds of src daily, you can just update to them. No idea about the frequency of package rebuilds but they definitely happen.
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