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DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

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Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#151

Post by caf »

woodman wrote: post #138
caf wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The /proc/sys/ and sysctl(2) methods are really just down to which syscall is used to talk to the kernel - either way it's just reading or writing a kernel-side data structure, there's no fundamental difference there. The /proc/sys/ pseudo-filesystem interface has the advantage that it's discoverable. The sysctl(2) interface requires userspace to have knowledge of a swag of hardcoded ID numbers identifying each node…

I haven't poked through the code, but the linux man page isn't encouraging: "use the /proc/sys interface instead" [0] Compare that to the freebsd man page [1] [0] http://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man2/sysctl.2.html#NOTES [1] https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=sysctl&sektion=3&m...

I think perhaps we might be talking at cross-purposes here.

My point is that when you call write(2) under Linux on a file descriptor derived from opening a /proc/sys pseudo-file you are talking directly to the kernel code responsible for updating the sysctl variables in the same way as you are when you call sysctl(2) under FreeBSD.

The /proc/sys files aren't real files - they're just a way of representing the sysctl variables in the existing file namespace.

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#152

Post by skrebbel »

TheDong wrote: post #139

The fact that DO had to make this announcement at all is a sign that things have gotten worse for VPSs. Before, when a company provided Xen or Kvm, you generally would get to have low-level access such as the ability to virtually connect to a serial port or vnc session of your box as it booted. You also, typically, could provide your own ISO images. Even if you couldn't provide your own iso, being able to interact wi…

I assume you also complain about the availability of microwave meals? That'll only become a problem when you can't buy raw fruits and vegetables anymore, but I didn't see that happen. Likewise, you mention more customizable VPS options in your post.

There's a market for everything. You don't understand my use case. My use case is "I want to click a button and then I want to be able to `apt-get install what-i-want` and then it should work. I don't even care whether it's Debian or Ubuntu, as long as it has apt-get because that's all I understand.

Granted, maybe I shouldn't be running VPSes at all but hey, it works, and I bet DO has many customers like me.

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#153

Post by woodman »

caf wrote: post #151
woodman wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't poked through the code, but the linux man page isn't encouraging: "use the /proc/sys interface instead" [0] Compare that to the freebsd man page [1] [0] http://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man2/sysctl.2.html#NOTES [1] https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=sysctl&sektion=3&m...

I think perhaps we might be talking at cross-purposes here. My point is that when you call write(2) under Linux on a file descriptor derived from opening a /proc/sys pseudo-file you are talking directly to the kernel code responsible for updating the sysctl variables in the same way as you are when you call sysctl(2) under FreeBSD. The /proc/sys files aren't real files - they're just a way of representing the sysctl…

Ah, when you said sysctl(2) I thought you were talking about the linux call - which is basically dead code. Yeah I don't really have a beef with the whole "everything is a file" design, I actually quite like it, but I really like how well freebsd has done sysctl - both the subroutine (3) and the command (8).

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#154

Post by TylerE »

atmosx wrote: post #112
xhrpost wrote: post #28

As a web developer who knows enough Linux to do minimum dev-ops, could anyone recommend some things worth playing around with in FreeBSD? Like "do this and see how easy it is vs Ubuntu!". Or are the gains more long term like better stability?

Yes. From my experience: * PF (default on OpenBSD, a fork exists on FreeBSD) configuration is way more human-readable than iptables. Makes a lot easier to create custom complex rulesets. * Documentation is much cleaner on FreeBSD (or OpenBSD) compared to GNU/Linux. Again helps you deploy complex solutions easily. * The upgrade process (using ports or pkg) is well documented, easy to execute[1]. * ZFS makes FreeBSD a…

The best thing about FBSD is that it mostly works the same way it did a decade ago. It's a lean, mature, core that isn't subject to flavor-of-the-month changes to core systems.

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#155

Post by icelancer »

icelancer wrote: post #78
samgimbel wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey there, Sam here from the DO Product team. You're right, we dropped the ball on UserVoice. There aren't any excuses to be made. I know it's a lot to ask, but please trust that going forward we will be much more transparent through UserVoice & elsewhere. We'll also be much more intentional in communicating our priorities through that medium, as this seems to be at the root of the concern about missing deadlines. Ag…

Do you have a timetable on when tickets and announcements will be set up? There are outstanding issues with hundreds/thousands of votes with zero updates, and promises made 12 months ago with no progress. I've heard DO reps in the past say they were going to update things but lack of follow-up is always what happened. I think I speak for a lot of DO users who have to rely on AWS/Linode for larger clients that we'd mo…

Unsurprisingly, there's no answer to this ticket. Sigh.

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#156

Post by icelancer »

newaccountfool wrote: post #143
dhaivatpandya wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If DO users don't need the ability to upload their own images, why is this a problem?

Some DO users will want this, others who aren't DO customers will also want this. As a growing company DO want to attract as many new customers as possible. They're still in early stages though, I'm sure this is in the pipeline.

>They're still in early stages though, I'm sure this is in the pipeline.

I would not call Digital Ocean all that early. This has been an issue for years.

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#157

Post by mdnormy »

icelancer wrote: post #78
samgimbel wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey there, Sam here from the DO Product team. You're right, we dropped the ball on UserVoice. There aren't any excuses to be made. I know it's a lot to ask, but please trust that going forward we will be much more transparent through UserVoice & elsewhere. We'll also be much more intentional in communicating our priorities through that medium, as this seems to be at the root of the concern about missing deadlines. Ag…

Do you have a timetable on when tickets and announcements will be set up? There are outstanding issues with hundreds/thousands of votes with zero updates, and promises made 12 months ago with no progress. I've heard DO reps in the past say they were going to update things but lack of follow-up is always what happened. I think I speak for a lot of DO users who have to rely on AWS/Linode for larger clients that we'd mo…

> ..retaining IPs..

I noticed since few month back, if you destroy your droplet and create fresh droplet even after few days, you will get the same IP. Only in same DC though.

Maybe some sort of temporary policy while they're working on proper IP retainer.

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#158

Post by stock_toaster »

vbit wrote: post #129
andrewthetechie wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With FreeBSD, in order to be able to have automatic backups work, we were required to disable journaling on the disk. This will cause the disk speed to be much slower than our Linux distributions. If you wish to have higher disk speeds, but not use backups, we recommend for you to remount your disk with journaling. https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/articles/gjournal-desktop/con...

Why did journaling interfere with automatic backups?

journaling generally interferes with dump(8). It seems odd that they would be using dump to do backups though, since they are virtualizing the OS.

The parent link to gjournal is weird too, since gjournal is not the same as softupdates w/journaling (SU+J). It makes me wonder if they actually disabled softupdates too.

I found a random post[1] about issues (unmapped io?) running i386 freebsd with su+j in virtualbox (apparently a virtualbox bug[2]).

[1]: https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/freebsd-10-i386-data-corr...

[2]: https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2013-Nov...

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#159

Post by _xzu »

newaccountfool wrote: post #143
dhaivatpandya wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If DO users don't need the ability to upload their own images, why is this a problem?

Some DO users will want this, others who aren't DO customers will also want this. As a growing company DO want to attract as many new customers as possible. They're still in early stages though, I'm sure this is in the pipeline.

Why would a growing company want to attract as many new customers as possible? This seems to be a fast lane to default. Growing company wants as many profitable customers which can be served as possible. Or should growing companies try to offer everything for all?

Re: DigitalOcean now supports FreeBSD

#160

Post by vacri »

dhaivatpandya wrote: post #140
TheDong wrote: post #139

The fact that DO had to make this announcement at all is a sign that things have gotten worse for VPSs. Before, when a company provided Xen or Kvm, you generally would get to have low-level access such as the ability to virtually connect to a serial port or vnc session of your box as it booted. You also, typically, could provide your own ISO images. Even if you couldn't provide your own iso, being able to interact wi…

If DO users don't need the ability to upload their own images, why is this a problem?

Read the link. There are over a thousand votes and six pages of comments of people saying "this is a problem for me".
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