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OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

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Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does OpenBSD have an alternative to wpa_supplicant? I've been using wpa_supplicant under the hood for ages, but only recently learned anything about it... and it's actually very good, except that it's CLI interface is so low-level and difficult to use.

Its standard ifconfig handles all the equivalent functionality.

This isn't quite accurate, you need wpa_supplicant for 802.1X authentication aka "WPA Enterprise" (typically only really seen in schools or very corporate environments).

But on OpenBSD thats the only thing it handles, its not an otherwise generic WiFi manager like on linux.

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#72
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Projects without a code of conduct are either immature or led by reactionaries, and in either case have a much higher risk of toxicity. If you want to get something done in a communitarian fashion, implementing, clearly stating, and enforcing rules of conduct is an absolute must.

I suppose you're right. Before the CoC craze, the open source community just wasn't able to crank out anything of technical value. But since then, things have really taken off, and there's no doubt we can attribute it to the CoC and also the non-technical community members who, more often than not, demanded we carry it.

Not sure if you're missing an /s or not.

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#73
post #28

So, you are giving up what seems like your 2 most important apps (Evernote and VMs) just so you can run X operating system on a laptop? Excuse me, but this just doesn't make any sense. Applications are the reason we use computers, not OSs, and to have to make such sacrifices is IMHO just silly. The whole OS holy-war thing seems so played out to me...its 2019 just use whatever works..no one care really. Add to that th…

I understand what you're saying but I fear you may be misunderstanding my intentions and opinions. I feel you may be injecting your own issues with things into my blog post. Please allow me explain.

The importance of having a secure and correct OS is most important to me (I feel OpenBSD is most appropriate and interesting here). I feel the value of OpenBSD outweighs the lose of two applications. I'm not part of an OS war, I frankly don't care what anyone uses. I just posted about about my experience on my blog (blogging is a new/rare thing for me and I am proud of the post, it took hours to do) and frankly didn't expect the post to HN to do anything (I posted on a whim, a coworker next to me loves the site) :)

I intended to migrate off of Evernote at some point, it is a tough band-aid to pull off after getting used to it for 10 years. Not having native VirtualBox on the machine is definitely a dislike, but isn't the end of the world. I only need it for labs. NetBSD can apparently run in vmm, too, just have to pass a boot option for the serial console (but I haven't tried it).

For Evernote, I had to ask myself what I'm actually using Evernote for. I'm solely using it for having minimally rich text and website scrapes stored in notebooks, and all notes being searchable. And I want it available wherever I am. I don't use OSR, non-text notes, pro features, related notes, etc. So, I question why I'm still paying for it, entrusting a vendor with all my data, and dealing with non-standard clients outside of windows/mac. Doing something just because I've always done is a terrible pattern. Time to re-evaluate and fix. That's what I did, and now I have an extremely portable and flexible solution that doesn't cost me anything but time, which I'm OK with.

I make a living with Linux for high traffic web applications, I use NetBSD and Linux for my personal servers, and OpenBSD for my workstation. I enjoy operating systems and I'm comfortable in all of them. Each one has their own character, their own quirks and pros and cons. One size fits all, for me, is a fool's game. No matter what you choose, there's some price to be paid for what you get.

And to be crystal clear: I'm not trying to change hearts and minds, or influence others, or be part of some cool kids club. Ultimately, I'm selfish with my hobbies, which this is, and so I do what solely is interesting to me. If I was able to help others, that's great and I'm happy for that, but I have no expectations.

Thank you. I hope we can be on the same page now, and I hope I was not too verbose. Be well.

An update to the article too about VMs: Note that for VMs I'm now using Oracle (non-distro provided) Virtualbox with their VRDP active, which is RDP for the VM instance and not the VM OS itself, so can RDP to the VMs on the network much better than libvirt. So, it is good enough. VirtualBox is mainly for intensive labs or monkeying with NetBSD kernel development, which 99% of the time I'd do at home.

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#74

This article is what is wrong with bsd/linux. You have to write an article about all the things you did to get your desktop to just work like any normal desktop works out of the box. In a normal world, the article should read "I installed bsd, and just used my computer to do something useful."

Well idunno. I don't concern myself with "trends" and such on GNU/Linux, and things generally get better for me year over year. I have used Linux as my main desktop operating system, to do productive work, for years. I pay a bit of attention to the hardware I'm installing it on (which a lot of people I guess don't feel they should need to, but what do they say about macOS?), but other than that it's basically been the same for me for years. I get better peripherals, components, and assembled computers, and the experience gets better in the ways you would expect for that upgrade.

I think in both cases, people could stand to pay a little bit of attention to what hardware they're using. A lot of people aren't used to this because their hardware comes with an OS that is ostensibly "certified" for it, in the way that bugs in the integration can sometimes be warranty claims. Those manufacturers pay attention to whether or not drivers are available for Windows to support the hardware they're shipping, but consumers experience it as "it just works".

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#75
post #11

OpenBSD will download your wifi firmware during first boot (post-install) if there is a configured internet connection (i.e. ethernet).

A lot of Linux distros just ship a lot of this firmware, not expecting to be litigated against for it; and it seems to work out.

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#76
post #9

> vmd is cool tech, for sure, but it isn’t that useful to me. It is best if you want to run OpenBSD virtual machines or gimped Linux virtual machines. The use of "gimped" is poor choice of words. It would be better if the author described specifically what fell short for them.

From https://www.openbsd.org/faq/faq16.html

The following features are available:

    serial console access to the virtual machines
    tap(4) interfaces
    per-VM user/group ownership
    privilege separation
    raw, qcow2 and qcow2-derived images
    dumping and restoring of guest system memory
    virtual switch management
    pausing and unpausing VMs 
The following features are not available at this time:

    graphics
    snapshots
    guest SMP support
    hardware passthrough
    live migration across hosts
    live hardware change 
Supported guest operating systems are currently limited to OpenBSD and Linux. As there is no VGA support yet, the guest OS must support serial console.

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#77
post #2

I like openbsd. I like their attitude (even if many don’t) I like what they’ve given to the UNIX-likes, and what they strip away due to complexity (removal of Bluetooth) or lack of decent UX (wpa_supplicant), or just potential issues (removal of Hyperthreading) I know it’s probably controversial to mention it; but I’m also glad they didn’t buy into the code of conduct saga that waved over FreeBSD and eventually Linux…

Openbsd has a code of conduct. It's been there a while. https://www.openbsd.org/mail.html only half joking

> Intelligent people may look at the same set of facts and come to very different conclusions. Repeating the same points that didn't convince someone previously rarely changes their mind, and irritates all the other readers.

This one is crucial. I see so little respect for tolerance around various projects these days.

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#78

surely "my workstation is now openbsd". fwiw, didn't mention anything at all that would make me budge from linux...

That's OK, I was posting about my experience without intentions to change hearts and minds of others.

I'm just a geek playing around, ya know.

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#79
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Projects without a code of conduct are either immature or led by reactionaries, and in either case have a much higher risk of toxicity. If you want to get something done in a communitarian fashion, implementing, clearly stating, and enforcing rules of conduct is an absolute must.

> Projects without a code of conduct are either immature or led by reactionaries. That seems like a pretty "reactionary" take. OpenBSD is a mature project with a relatively snooty/picky but not abusive or cruel community. I've found that not only are the people helpful, if you show that you've made an effort to meet them half way; but working of the software itself shows a degree of empathy which is not common elsewh…

"Reactionary" doesn't mean literally "reacting to a problem", it's a political term that comes from the French revolution, referring to monarchists who became organized and motivated as a reaction against the French revolution.

It's more or less synonymous with "conservative" and "right wing" which have similar origins, although today it has more of a pejorative connotation in English, or sometimes specifically refers to people on the colloquial "far-right" who advocate for ethno-nationalism, authoritarianism, military adventurism, nativism, etc.

Re: OpenBSD Is Now My Workstation

#80
post #60
post #2

I like openbsd. I like their attitude (even if many don’t) I like what they’ve given to the UNIX-likes, and what they strip away due to complexity (removal of Bluetooth) or lack of decent UX (wpa_supplicant), or just potential issues (removal of Hyperthreading) I know it’s probably controversial to mention it; but I’m also glad they didn’t buy into the code of conduct saga that waved over FreeBSD and eventually Linux…

Projects without a code of conduct are either immature or led by reactionaries, and in either case have a much higher risk of toxicity. If you want to get something done in a communitarian fashion, implementing, clearly stating, and enforcing rules of conduct is an absolute must.

Thanks to the CoCs the open source community can finally produce something of value!

Everyone was so busy arguing and being rude that nobody was able to put anything together until now.

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