From owner-freebsd-questions Wed Sep 5 15:59:51 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from po4.wam.umd.edu (po4.wam.umd.edu [128.8.10.166]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4A41F37B405 for ; Wed, 5 Sep 2001 15:59:48 -0700 (PDT) Received: from rac1.wam.umd.edu (IDENT:root@rac1.wam.umd.edu [128.8.10.141]) by po4.wam.umd.edu (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id SAA00935; Wed, 5 Sep 2001 18:59:35 -0400 (EDT) Received: from rac1.wam.umd.edu (IDENT:sendmail@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by rac1.wam.umd.edu (8.9.3/8.9.3) with SMTP id SAA09057; Wed, 5 Sep 2001 18:59:35 -0400 (EDT) Received: from localhost (culverk@localhost) by rac1.wam.umd.edu (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id SAA09053; Wed, 5 Sep 2001 18:59:35 -0400 (EDT) X-Authentication-Warning: rac1.wam.umd.edu: culverk owned process doing -bs Date: Wed, 5 Sep 2001 18:59:35 -0400 (EDT) From: Kenneth Wayne Culver To: Daniel Blankensteiner Cc: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: FreeBSD vs. OpenBSD In-Reply-To: <20010905065206.6009.qmail@linuxmail.org> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=X-UNKNOWN Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG > To =93FreeBSD=94 >=20 > I have a little problem I hope you will help me with. I have to choose > an operating system for my server and I am torn between OpenBSD and > FreeBSD. I have heared a lot of good things about each, but I have > found that most people use FreeBSD and there is more literature on > FreeBSD. But when I visit your website and OpenBSD=92s the to headlines > concern me: FreeBSD: "Please be aware that the telnet daemon shipping > in FreeBSD prior to July 23, 2001 contains a remotely exploitable > security problem. " OpenBSD: "Four years without a remote hole in the > default install!" I have read about OpenBSD=92s default installation and > found out that it meant no running services, but I couldn=92t find > similar information on you website. So there of my first question is: > Which services are running after a FreeBSD default installation? And > my second: In your honest opinion, which of the two OS=92s are the most > secure? (less buggiest) And finally my last question: Which of the two > OS=92s have the brightest future? You can choose whether any services are running by default when you install FreeBSD; I believe there's an option for "medium" security which just basically runs almost everything, and high security or something of that sort that turns off almost everything. I don't think either operating system is incredibly buggy, I'd say they are probably equal in that respect, and I don't think it's possible to guage which OS has the brightest future objectively; FreeBSD has more users than OpenBSD, and has been growing faster than OpenBSD or NetBSD with respect to the number of users, and is getting a lot of new and cool technologies in it's development branch which to me says it has a "bright future." With respect to security advisories like the one on www.freebsd.org, all I have to say to that is that it was fixed within hours of the announcement, and could be updated very easily. Ken To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message