[Tfug] BSD flavors

[Neil Short]

--- Jude Nelson <judecn at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 3/6/07, christopher floess <skeptikos at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > I think another thing that bsd advocates see as an
> advantage, is that
> > freebsd is a centrally developed os while linux is
> just
> > the kernel with an environment built around it, if
> someone can
> > elaborate on this better, please do
> > so, but I think I read somewhere that that
> translates into a more
> > dependable environment, though some times it also
> means freebsd is slower
> > to
> > add support for new stuff. That's my two cents,
> hopefully I'm not way off
> > :)
> 
> 
> Here's how I understand it:
> 
> The BSD community makes use of highly centralized
> development practices.
> BSD OS's are like small Linux distributions:  only a
> handful of people
> maintain everything.

... With the following exception; many people still
contribute to the OS. The changes are comitted to the
OS after they have been tested and approved; so
contributions are not emplemented so wild-wild-west
style (as often seen in the Linux kernel). So, yes,
there is only a small group of maintainers (comitters)
but the development community is just as vast as is
seen in other free OSen.

> ...  Also, each has its own
> Benevolent Dictator For Life (
> a.k.a. the founder), who usually leads the kernel
> development team for that
> BSD.

That's actually no different that Linux - who has a
single dictator-for-life that has final say on what's
in and what's not. Any old joe can branch off his own
kernel; but any old joe can also branch off his own
BSD.

> ...  The BSDs are basically open source OS's with a
> management model
> similar to proprietary OS's.

Not even close. A commercial Linux distribution is far
closer in management style than a BSD to that of
proprietary OSen. BSD is closer in style to Debian.

> ...  Their development
> cycles are slower, but their
> releases have a slightly higher chance of not having
> bugs.  I don't see this
> as an advantage; large distributions like Debian,
> OpenSUSE, Fedora, Red Hat,
> and Ubuntu, for example, while they may on extremely
> rare occasion have a
> broken package (i.e. Ubuntu had that X server crash
> bug a while back), the
> development community is HUMONGOUS and quick to
> react.  Things may break
> more easily in the Linux development community, but
> things also get fixed
> way quicker than in the BSD community.

It depends on the thing that is broken. It also
depends on whether it is a package or part of the OS
that is broken. If there is any security hole
discovered in a BSD, it will be fixed within a few
hours.

Example: bind, which is part of the core OS:
http://security.freebsd.org/advisories/FreeBSD-SA-07:02.bind.asc

If, on the other hand, some application X package
won't compile, that may never be fixed since the
packages are often maintained purely by volunteers.

I'll give you a little example. I like to compose
music. I'm not very good; but I like it anyway.

So, the best music notation program out there is
Lilypond; but it is a pain in the wazoo to use. The
next is Rosegarden 2.1.2; but its music notation
abilities are somewhat limitted.

The features in the newer version of Rosegarden are
appealing; but that application is not available on
FreeBSD. I actually installed a Linux (Gentoo) in
order to use the newer version of Rosegarden. That
application was so unstable it crashed every time I
was about to accomplish something useful.

While I was at it I tried an application called
Brahms. It also turned out to be too unstable to be
useful.

Well, neither Brahms nor a recent Rosegarden is
available on BSD; but maybe that's for the good since
neither app runs for beans even on Linux.

 

======
Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven, for all his works are truth, and his ways are justice; and he is able to bring low those who walk in pride.
Daniel 4:37


 
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