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FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

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Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#51

Post by inopinatus »

cowtools wrote: post #12
dark-star wrote: post #7

Man, FreeBSD really needs some driver love... * No Suspend/Resume? Linux has solved this for years, I have not come across a laptop in the last 10 years that had trouble with s2r or s2d (but I guess that there might be a few that don't fully support it, I mainly tested Dell laptops) * WiFi driver and Ethernet over USB-C both highly unstable? That's an Intel chipset, those are usually the more stable ones (at least on…

if FreeBSD had a copyleft license, maybe companies would have a reason to publish their drivers, or you could port drivers from Linux.

If FreeBSD was encumbered with copyleft then half the contributors would leave, and the sectors in which it is widely used would seek an alternative.

Pretty sure any “port” of Linux drivers would be in effect a substantial rewrite, for the dissimilar kernel structures and coding standards.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#52

Post by IgorPartola »

MontyCarloHall wrote: post #48

Serious question: what is so compelling about the FreeBSD desktop experience compared to Linux that makes it worth jumping through all these hoops?

For me personally it would be the ability to run jails and ZFS on a desktop. That would in turn enable me to run the same in production because local/dev/prod parity would be a good thing.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#53

Post by cesarb »

sdfjkl wrote: post #2

> wifibox essentially spins up an Alpine Linux VM using FreeBSD's bhyve virtualization technology, and allows you to passthrough your machine's wireless card Jesus christ.

Not that different from a Linux user using NDISwrapper to run a Windows wireless driver on Linux.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#54

Post by MontyCarloHall »

IgorPartola wrote: post #52
MontyCarloHall wrote: post #48

Serious question: what is so compelling about the FreeBSD desktop experience compared to Linux that makes it worth jumping through all these hoops?

For me personally it would be the ability to run jails and ZFS on a desktop. That would in turn enable me to run the same in production because local/dev/prod parity would be a good thing.

Don’t Linux and FreeBSD both use OpenZFS these days?

Jails are a fair point, but if they’re essential to your production environment, why not just run your FreeBSD dev environment in a VM on your Linux laptop, or SSH into a dedicated FreeBSD dev box?

After all, OP is already running Linux in a VM in order to run working WiFi drivers.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#55

Post by 0x457 »

dark-star wrote: post #7

Man, FreeBSD really needs some driver love... * No Suspend/Resume? Linux has solved this for years, I have not come across a laptop in the last 10 years that had trouble with s2r or s2d (but I guess that there might be a few that don't fully support it, I mainly tested Dell laptops) * WiFi driver and Ethernet over USB-C both highly unstable? That's an Intel chipset, those are usually the more stable ones (at least on…

> * No Suspend/Resume? Linux has solved this for years, I have not come across a laptop in the last 10 years that had trouble with s2r or s2d (but I guess that there might be a few that don't fully support it, I mainly tested Dell laptops)

I wouldn't be so sure. My Dell XPS 13 and ThinkPad X1 Carbon both had issues with suspend/resume. Close the lid @ get surprised with a completely dead battery.

Ironically, when I used FreeBSD on X1 - S3 state worked perfectly fine. The issue in post is how bhyve handles wake up from S3 state, with devices being pass-through to the VM.

Not once had a laptop that isn't a MacBook with macOS with properly working hibernation.

> * Bluetooth not supported???

Yeah, BT stack is completely broken for years. No one has desire to fix it.

> Ethernet over USB-C both highly unstable?

- I had no issues with my no-name dongle.

> I wonder if there is any laptop from the last 5 years where FreeBSD fully works.

Define fully works? Graphics - you're limited to Nvidia and whatever Linux 5.4 supported. Wi-Fi - 802.11g is as fast as you can go without wifibox.

> but these days I kinda expect most things to just work out of the box ...

Even on Linux, you either have to deal with hardware that been out for some time or know how to install the latest kernel and maybe apply some patches. When I got my XPS, it was the first one with Intel Xe - had to use "unstable" kernel in NixOS with every other distro not having graphics output.

This is still an issue in 2022: https://01.org/blogs/qwang59/2018/how-achieve-s0ix-states-li...

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#56

Post by ladyanita22 »

IgorPartola wrote: post #52
MontyCarloHall wrote: post #48

Serious question: what is so compelling about the FreeBSD desktop experience compared to Linux that makes it worth jumping through all these hoops?

For me personally it would be the ability to run jails and ZFS on a desktop. That would in turn enable me to run the same in production because local/dev/prod parity would be a good thing.

I mean, Ubuntu does support ZFS, and there's LXC...

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#57

Post by bpye »

martin1975 wrote: post #49

Is it possible to port Linux driver code to FreeBSD, given licensing issues and all that? Seems like an 'easy' fix, given that Linux has most of the non-working FreeBSD issues solved..if not all. I'm all for code re-use.

Some Linux code is dual licensed, a lot of the DRM subsystem for example, I’m pretty sure GPU support on the BSDs are based on ports of it.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#58

Post by Melatonic »

0x457 wrote: post #55
dark-star wrote: post #7

Man, FreeBSD really needs some driver love... * No Suspend/Resume? Linux has solved this for years, I have not come across a laptop in the last 10 years that had trouble with s2r or s2d (but I guess that there might be a few that don't fully support it, I mainly tested Dell laptops) * WiFi driver and Ethernet over USB-C both highly unstable? That's an Intel chipset, those are usually the more stable ones (at least on…

> * No Suspend/Resume? Linux has solved this for years, I have not come across a laptop in the last 10 years that had trouble with s2r or s2d (but I guess that there might be a few that don't fully support it, I mainly tested Dell laptops) I wouldn't be so sure. My Dell XPS 13 and ThinkPad X1 Carbon both had issues with suspend/resume. Close the lid @ get surprised with a completely dead battery. Ironically, when I u…

On Windows the first thing I always do is turn off hibernation. It made a bigger difference back in the day since the swap was on a spinning disk but it still has a little performance improvement and nets you a bit more ram. With machines booting up so fast these days I personally avoid anything related to hibernate / sleep.

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#59

Post by 0x457 »

filmgirlcw wrote: post #25
cowtools wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if FreeBSD had a copyleft license, maybe companies would have a reason to publish their drivers, or you could port drivers from Linux.

That’s probably true but it cuts both ways too. I don’t know if the lack of copy left license is the problem as much as the momentum. The various Unix and BSD wars (that were predicated on a much different licensing challenge) and splintering of the communities has meant there was never a big way for developer or even manufacturer interest to really focus. OpenBSD has a very different philosophy related to drivers th…

Well, it's not that simple.

FreeBSD has some contribution from businesses like Netflix and Nginx and those are very welcome, but they have nothing to do with desktop usage. Those have deadlines and budgets, features get implemented and tested. That's why FreeBSD has superb network stack, good NUMA support, files from disk to nic go brrr. That's why the move to OpenZFS was so fast.

Then, they're contributions without company backing it. This is where desktop feature live. That's why FreeBSD's Wi-Fi stack is stuck on 802.11g - no company depends on this. GPU drivers stuck at Linux 5.4 level - no company cares about it[1]. Those get discussed to death - there is no deadline, no money.

Note, that solution to graphics card driver is to use Linux's drivers, so they don't shy about GPL. However, FreeBSD folks LOVE to bikeshed and polish things. This is why PR to port linux 5.11 drm was open when 5.11 was already EoL for an entire year. Instead of "just" porting 5.11, they decided to refactor how things are done. There are like 3 people working on that PR. It still not merged and not even in review yet.

[1]: Bless Nvidia for having FreeBSD driver available. Would be nice to have CUDA too...

Re: FreeBSD on the Framework Laptop

#60

Post by Melatonic »

0x457 wrote: post #55
dark-star wrote: post #7

Man, FreeBSD really needs some driver love... * No Suspend/Resume? Linux has solved this for years, I have not come across a laptop in the last 10 years that had trouble with s2r or s2d (but I guess that there might be a few that don't fully support it, I mainly tested Dell laptops) * WiFi driver and Ethernet over USB-C both highly unstable? That's an Intel chipset, those are usually the more stable ones (at least on…

> * No Suspend/Resume? Linux has solved this for years, I have not come across a laptop in the last 10 years that had trouble with s2r or s2d (but I guess that there might be a few that don't fully support it, I mainly tested Dell laptops) I wouldn't be so sure. My Dell XPS 13 and ThinkPad X1 Carbon both had issues with suspend/resume. Close the lid @ get surprised with a completely dead battery. Ironically, when I u…

Was actually also debating recently between the thinkpad and the dell - ended up based on cost with the XPS 15 - any other general tips or big gotchas running linux on it?
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