From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Sat Jul 22 12:36:12 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 804F716A4DF for ; Sat, 22 Jul 2006 12:36:12 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from mail@ozzmosis.com) Received: from smtp.syd.people.net.au (smtp.syd.people.net.au [218.214.225.98]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with SMTP id C1D7743D45 for ; Sat, 22 Jul 2006 12:36:11 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from mail@ozzmosis.com) Received: (qmail 6814 invoked from network); 22 Jul 2006 12:36:27 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO blizzard.dnsalias.org) (218.214.144.129) by smtp.syd.people.net.au with SMTP; 22 Jul 2006 12:36:27 -0000 Received: by blizzard.dnsalias.org (Postfix, from userid 1001) id A0F3BDE; Sat, 22 Jul 2006 22:36:07 +1000 (EST) Date: Sat, 22 Jul 2006 22:36:07 +1000 From: andrew clarke To: sammy sumer Message-ID: <20060722123607.GA15150@ozzmosis.com> References: <8f0d62060607220403j599c1131xfcfb38e6b18c7c6c@mail.gmail.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <8f0d62060607220403j599c1131xfcfb38e6b18c7c6c@mail.gmail.com> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.12-2006-07-14 Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: What FreeBSD users really want X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sat, 22 Jul 2006 12:36:12 -0000 On Sat, Jul 22, 2006 at 09:03:47PM +1000, sammy sumer wrote: > 1. Reinvent the installer and interface. > > Fundamental thing like system installer is still phenomenally arcane. There > is no excuse for FreeBSD developers not to upgrade the system installer and A lot of people consider FreeBSD as primarily an OS for use as a mail/file/web server, so a graphical installer is not necessary. The text mode installer is looking a bit dated and could be made to look more "polished", but I don't think this is a big deal. > why not using disk imaging technology like Norton ghost or Acronis > TrueImageinstead of the traditional installation. Why? Installing FreeBSD from CD only takes about 15 minutes on a modern machine. Faster if you do a minimal install. A disk image wouldn't allow people to exlude parts of FreeBSD they don't want to install, eg. X Windows. ISO disk images of the entire OS ans selected binary packages are available for burning to CD though. > 2. Integrate a PHP shell into the core of the system. > > PHP is by far the most popular computing language in the world. Why not > have a shell called PHP shell. So lots of web developers out there can > easily create shell scripts in PHP syntax to automate and run programs on > FreeBSD. I already use Python for this, but I wouldn't want Python to be in the base system as it would make it more difficult to upgrade to a newer version of Python. If you've used Python for a while you'd probably notice how much more suitable it is for what you describe, compared to PHP. I recommend you check it out. Regards Andrew Melbourne, Australia