FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#1

Post by bado » Thu, Apr 17, 2014, 6:41 PM UTC

FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014
freebsd.org

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#2

Post by 0161 » Thu, Apr 17, 2014, 7:18 PM UTC

This report has only made me want to try FreeBSD even more at some point.

Some highlights for me were:

- FreeBSD on Chromebook - Chromium port - Improved Wine port

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#3

Post by wcfields » Thu, Apr 17, 2014, 7:49 PM UTC

0161 wrote: post #2

This report has only made me want to try FreeBSD even more at some point. Some highlights for me were: - FreeBSD on Chromebook - Chromium port - Improved Wine port

Ha, you beat me to it! https://wiki.freebsd.org/FreeBSD/arm/Chromebook

I bought a refurb Acer C720 4gb and have found it perfect for everyday tasks / general use with Ubuntu installed.

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#4

Post by Touche » Thu, Apr 17, 2014, 8:30 PM UTC

FreeBSD is a fantastic operating system and this report highlights why. Documentation is something the team takes very seriously; as important as the code itself, so if you're impressed by this high-quality report you'll be even more impressed by how easy it is to find your way around FreeBSD because of the documentation.

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#5

Post by hf » Thu, Apr 17, 2014, 8:33 PM UTC

Enticing; depth and vision. Coherence is always tricky, but, to my mind, they pull it off.

To be quite honest: Debian/kFreeBSD is still my version of FreeBSD, but that's just laziness.

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#6

Post by btgeekboy » Thu, Apr 17, 2014, 8:59 PM UTC

0161 wrote: post #2

This report has only made me want to try FreeBSD even more at some point. Some highlights for me were: - FreeBSD on Chromebook - Chromium port - Improved Wine port

I've similar feelings about ZFSGuru. Never heard of it before; might download it and give it a whirl.

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#7

Post by 0161 » Thu, Apr 17, 2014, 9:32 PM UTC

Touche wrote: post #4

FreeBSD is a fantastic operating system and this report highlights why. Documentation is something the team takes very seriously; as important as the code itself, so if you're impressed by this high-quality report you'll be even more impressed by how easy it is to find your way around FreeBSD because of the documentation.

I too noticed the quality of the report. I know what it is and what it is for as soon as I start reading. Well laid out, succinct, contact details and further links for each item.

It's all very encouraging.

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#8

Post by danford » Thu, Apr 17, 2014, 11:22 PM UTC

0161 wrote: post #2

This report has only made me want to try FreeBSD even more at some point. Some highlights for me were: - FreeBSD on Chromebook - Chromium port - Improved Wine port

I love FreeBSD and was planning on switching some servers from Linux but found that it consumed about 25% more power than my Linux boxes (even after extensive power management tweaks) and in the end didn't have much advantage.

It's not hard to install freeBSD in a VM, set up ssh, run it headless, and ssh in. I suggest you give it a go. It's a great learning experience.

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#9

Post by networked » Fri, Apr 18, 2014, 12:47 AM UTC

danford wrote: post #8

0161 wrote: post #2

This report has only made me want to try FreeBSD even more at some point. Some highlights for me were: - FreeBSD on Chromebook - Chromium port - Improved Wine port

I love FreeBSD and was planning on switching some servers from Linux but found that it consumed about 25% more power than my Linux boxes (even after extensive power management tweaks) and in the end didn't have much advantage. It's not hard to install freeBSD in a VM, set up ssh, run it headless, and ssh in. I suggest you give it a go. It's a great learning experience.

>I love FreeBSD and was planning on switching some servers from Linux but found that it consumed about 25% more power than my Linux boxes

Wow, I wouldn't have thought there would be such a dramatic difference in power consumption on anything but portable hardware. Did you try to measure the CPU and I/O usage on your servers and compare them between Linux and FreeBSD? I wonder if FreeBSD's greater power draw was due to its ACPI implementation or if the average system load was also higher (ZFS?).

Re: FreeBSD Quarterly Status Report, January-March 2014

#10

Post by danford » Fri, Apr 18, 2014, 12:59 AM UTC

networked wrote: post #9

danford wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love FreeBSD and was planning on switching some servers from Linux but found that it consumed about 25% more power than my Linux boxes (even after extensive power management tweaks) and in the end didn't have much advantage. It's not hard to install freeBSD in a VM, set up ssh, run it headless, and ssh in. I suggest you give it a go. It's a great learning experience.

>I love FreeBSD and was planning on switching some servers from Linux but found that it consumed about 25% more power than my Linux boxes Wow, I wouldn't have thought there would be such a dramatic difference in power consumption on anything but portable hardware. Did you try to measure the CPU and I/O usage on your servers and compare them between Linux and FreeBSD? I wonder if FreeBSD's greater power draw was due t…

I wasn't using zfs at the time and I didn't do much comparison with CPU and IO, I used a wattage meter. I followed the FreeBSD guide (http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/ac...) and tried just about everything. My Linux box was running at about 9watts (idle) and freeBSD started out at around 18, but I got it down to about 12watts after making a lot of optimizations.

I think most of the difference is because FreeBSD is using older more stable software, and the Ubuntu server was running some of the latest software.