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Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

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Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#351
post #338
post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>IBM i, Unisys ClearPath and OS/2200 Once again, have you seen anyone technical wilfully choosing any of those for web stuff over the past two decades?

Wilfully or not, they offer such capabilities in 2022, and there are people paying for their use, probably many more people than some obscure UNIX clones that still exist out there. And again, this whole thread started with what is possible outside Linux, and apparently I touched a nerve with you, apparently related to your FreeBSD role, let it go. FreeBSD, IBM i, Unisys ClearPath and OS/2200, or flavour of the month…

The thread started with what's possible outside Linux, but I don't think that to majority of people that means systems that exist purely for backwards compatibility. And I'm pretty sure that's the main - or perhaps the only major - reason anybody is still paying for "i" and OS/2200.

And no, neither FreeBSD nor MacOS are "miles behind Linux"; in fact all the same pieces of ecosystem are available in all of them.

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why? it's a valid decision to make. Linux is turbulent and uncoordinated. FreeBSD is the opposite of that.

Because it's not worth the hours when it inevitably breaks, which corpo server setups always do. At least in my view, that is. If it's running GNU/Linux or, God forbid, Windows, honestly as the head of a larger company I can just make a guy or another company fix it asap, whereas with BSD you'll be reliant on a handful of people at the very most, and no one is going to help you. They'll help you to help yourself, but…

FreeBSD is not some esoteric thing. it's actually a UNIX whereas Linux is not.

for someone with only Linux experience, FreeBSD is a nearly trivial set of skills to pick up.

you're smacking on FreeBSD and I dont think you know it as well as you could when making these arguments.

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#353
post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm willing to bet that most people running Arch or Gentoo are still using quite a bit of 'Debian resources'/assets. More like the reverse, the Arch Wiki is the best so everyone uses it. Although for some topics it makes sense to take a look at Debian or Gentoo wikis, too. Not sure what other kind of 'Debian resources'/assets you had in mind.

Whilst I don't at all doubt your testimonies, I am still sitting here wondering what programs everyone here is using, if not programs usually tailored for Debian. I feel like I've seen more software that runs natively on Debian (Ubuntu, really) and made specifically for dpkg. But I suppose a lot of applications also come with "snap" these days, but I avoid "software stores" like the plague. I personally have had very…

You do know about package managers and software packages, right? Debian has its own packagers, and so does Arch, there's nothing in common between Debian and Arch packaging (except for certain elements of the philosophy, etc).

What do you mean by "programs usually tailored for Debian", in general Linux programs for sure won't be tailored for Debian, except for Debian-internal developer tools perhaps.

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#354
post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet… “On FreeBSD you'll notice right away that you're dealing with a "complete operating system", a system that has been put together very well.” It’s a complete operating system. /s This is why FreeBSD loses in my view. The arrogance of claiming to be a complete system when basic stuff like wifi doesn’t work.

The arrogance of claiming that "wifi doesn't work", implying for everyone, when it's really just _your_ hardware that it doesn't work on. For me, FreeBSD wifi works straight of the box on the laptop I have.

No, it "works" in that it's 2.4ghz. That is not what most people would expect from speed at this point.

It will "work" correctly when it supports general consumer expectations e.g 5ghz networks, which has been a common complaint about FreeBSD for years now.

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#355

I have to plugin Void Linux, a nice little distro that tries to mimick some of BSD philosophy (I believe w.r.t. simplicity and security). It's working very well here (it's somewhat analogous to Arch, meant for advanced users -- that said, following the docs it shouldn't be too difficult to get going). https://voidlinux.org/

Chimera Linux is a more recent interesting attempt at this. I believe it involves some former Void people.

https://chimera-linux.org

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#356
post #27

For people (semi-rightfully) complaining about the feasibility of FreeBSD as a desktop OS (or a workstation purposed OS), the fact that it isn't easy to install through the graphical interface is both a blessing in disguise and a legitimate point for slow install + config times. To that end I say to the less keyboard/terminal focused (which should be a paradox when it comes to developers but whatever) : try some of t…

> ravynOS

This is a cool project but it's in no way usable right now.

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I'm pretty sure all his problems are due to Nvidia. Try Intel or AMD; they are a lot more stable in my experience.

Don't Nvidia make open-source Linux drivers now? I honestly have not had graphical driver issues since... Well since a good while before SteamOS and such. I don't doubt you guys at all, but I only have "older" laptops that might have GPU issues in terms of overall Linux compatibility.

> Don't Nvidia make open-source Linux drivers now?

Yes, but only since very recently — AFAIK, most distros are not using the open-source drivers yet, as they don’t yet have feature parity with the proprietary ones.

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Me too, at FreeBSD 6. ZFS was also pretty new and unstable in those days. I upgraded and could no longer read my pools. But I came back to it in the last few years and it's matured a lot.

ZFS wasn’t just new when FreeBSD 6 was released, ZFS wasn’t even released itself. :P FreeBSD 7 was the first release to support ZFS and even in that it was marked as experimental support. So if you were using ZFS before FreeBSD 8, and especially somehow on 6 and below, then you’re very much using ZFS at your own risk and can’t really complain if things go sideways.

[deleted]

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#359
post #274
post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IDE was one of many hardware issues that just took too long to be solved. For a long time, BSDs didn't seriously try to support consumer-grade hardware - be it because of lack of manpower, conservative attitudes, or "commercial" choices. OpenBSD still doesn't support Bluetooth... On the other side, the Linux community fought hard to get everything to work, creating positive loops: the more hardware it supported, the…

>OpenBSD still doesn't support Bluetooth OpenBSD supported Bluetooth but they threw out the whole stack because of security concerns. I think it's the right decision for OpenBSD.

Exactly, "commercial" choice. Any OS that wants to support consumer-grade hardware, in 2022, must provide Bluetooth; OpenBSD just doesn't care enough about the consumer market to do that.

Re: Technical reasons to choose FreeBSD over GNU/Linux (2020)

#360
post #359
post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>OpenBSD still doesn't support Bluetooth OpenBSD supported Bluetooth but they threw out the whole stack because of security concerns. I think it's the right decision for OpenBSD.

Exactly, "commercial" choice. Any OS that wants to support consumer-grade hardware, in 2022, must provide Bluetooth; OpenBSD just doesn't care enough about the consumer market to do that.

True they don't care about you, it's like you don't count...who could imagine that!!!

Quel sacrilege!!

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