Date: 11 Feb 1998 14:05:02 -0600 From: stephen farrell <stephen@farrell.org> To: Uncle Flatline <flatline@gri.gallaudet.edu> Cc: Vincent Defert <vdefert@trace.fr>, freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: FreeBSD vs Linux Message-ID: <87pvktaowh.fsf@phaedrus.uchicago.edu> In-Reply-To: Uncle Flatline's message of "Wed, 11 Feb 1998 11:45:04 -0500 (EST)" References: <Pine.LNX.3.96.980211111632.13097A-100000@gri.gallaudet.edu>
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Uncle Flatline <flatline@gri.gallaudet.edu> writes: > - Properly connect to a DECserver multiplexor. > - Boot Windows 95 from my second hard disk. (This appears to vary. Others > do not have this problem, but others don't seem to have my setup.) > - Proper full VT-terminal emulation outside of X-Windows, while still > maintaining the ability to use the syscons graphics. > - Connect to a Linux server. Not sure about the 4th, but as a general rule I agree that linux/windows integration is quite a bit better. I credit this, really, to the fact that most freebsd folks are die-hard unix fans and don't even have win95/nt, and so they don't bother with things like vfat support. (just a personal theory) So if these are your needs, then by all means linux is a better option. > I've fought with these problems for over a week now, and maybe if I fought > for a month I'd solve them. But I didn't have to fight to get them working > right away with Linux. I did get responses like "Maybe in Windows 98... ummm > NT 5.0, err... I mean, FreeBSD 3.0," "Change your hardware," and "We don't > consider that worth doing at this time," which are some of Micro$oft's > favorite lines. > > In my day-to-day usage, I couldn't find anything that FreeBSD did, that Linux > could not. (And I saw several people on this mailing list asking about Linux > emulation. There appeared to be a lot of interest in programs that only run > under Linux. On the Linux lists, I don't see nearly as many requests for > FreeBSD emulation or programs that only run under FreeBSD.) linux has a few more innovations, and if you list the features it'll definitely come out ahead. But you don't see me running linux. Bottom line is that freebsd is trouble-free for me. I love that. I can tell you *loads* of stories of problems I've had with linux w/slackware, redhat, and debian. But I'll just tell one b/c it was the last straw and why I run fbsd: Someone wrote a nifty scheduler patch for linux that was based on the QNX scheduler. Groovy, I thought, so I snarfed it, recompiled my kernel, saved my old kernel(*), ran lilo, and rebooted. So the (*) means that I didn't really save my old kernel. Debian puts the kernel images in /kernel/vmlinux-<version> (or whatever). Then, IIRC, there is a link in / to the current kernel image. I accidentally renamed the *last* kernel I made w/o the version number, so when I made this new one I thought that the one with the current version number was the old-old one, and blew it away. I also blew away the one without a version number. My fault--yes, I suppose. But w/freebsd I've got kernel.GENERIC in /, as well as my last kernel (kernel.old) and my most recent kernel. If my new kernel doesn't boot, then I can just type at the boot prompt to boot kernel.old. If some reason that doesn't work, there's always kernel.GENERIC. I never have to think twice before building a new kernel since I know that I'll have *no trouble* going back to the old one. Right, so, it wouldn't boot. Aha--you say, but what about that handy dandy debian boot disk recovery thing? Well, I had one, but it was pretty old and wouldn't let me choose which disk to set as my root (just a bug; it happens). I didn't keep a newer one b/c we have half a dozen unix boxes here and I can always go to debian.org and snarf the current boot floppy. So I snarfed a new one and GUESS WHAT? It had a newer kernel and didn't recognize my ethernet card. It also didn't recognize the 4 ethernet cards I ripped out of some of our other computers in frustration. Here's the crime: the *NEW* bootdisks for the "stable" release of debian had (1) no new version numbers (2) they did not retain the old ones on the ftp site. I was hosed--there was nothing I could do to preserve linux on my box short of buying a new ethernet card or ordering the CDROM and building an older kernel or something. So 30 minutes later I had fbsd installed and haven't regretted it for one second (about 9 months now; though I'd run freebsd for about 6 months before). FBSD people call it "PLA" --principle of least astonishment. I think they're on the right track. ymmv. -- Steve Farrell To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe questions" in the body of the message
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