Date: Thu, 27 Apr 2000 14:02:43 +0930 From: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com> To: Peter Seebach <seebs@plethora.net> Cc: FreeBSD advocacy list <FreeBSD-advocacy@freebsd.org>, netbsd-advocacy@netbsd.org, advocacy@openbsd.org Subject: Re: Document: What's the difference between Linux and BSD? Message-ID: <20000427140242.M55780@freebie.lemis.com> In-Reply-To: <200004270407.XAA18098@guild.plethora.net> References: <20000427131738.G55780@freebie.lemis.com> <200004270407.XAA18098@guild.plethora.net>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Wednesday, 26 April 2000 at 23:07:35 -0500, Peter Seebach wrote: > In message <20000427131738.G55780@freebie.lemis.com>, Greg Lehey writes: >> 1. Have I forgotten something? > > BSD/OS. I know we're "distant cousins" or whatever, but we're definitely > a live branch of BSD Unix, with active development, market niches, etcetera. > There are a bunch of things listing the three open-source systems, but > not listing BSD/OS; this may confuse people when they see just-occasional > references to the 4th member of the family. Even if we're widely thought to > be the black sheep. ;-) Hmm. I didn't forget BSD/OS, but this was supposed to be a comparison of open source operating systems. I see I somehow managed to drop the mention of the name, though. I've fixed it now with a better description of where it fits in. Let me know if that's enough. > Somewhat related: A reason to use BSD would be that you want to > develop a product based on a system, and may not want to use a > completely open source model. Good one. I've added that as well, as well as a brief discussion of the main difference. > At some point, you may want to point to "bsd.com", which will eventually be > something of a BSD, Inc., page for BSD info. Tell me when. Currently it just redirects to http://www.bsdi.com/. > I believe there's a company doing commercial support for OpenBSD, as > opposed to mere consulting, and Walnut Creek has an existing support > deal for FreeBSD, although this is, as I understand it, folding into > BSDI's old support group. It was also my understanding that the WC group wasn't exactly overloaded. > (And no, for the curious, no one is losing jobs as a result of the > merger; the big outcome has been a hiring spree.) Yes, I've noticed :-) >> 2. Is it accurate? > > Mostly - but, for instance, note that BSD/OS is not "open source", even though > it's clearly a BSD kernel. > > I would not call the BSD systems "derivatives of AT&T's UNIX". In fact, > the entire point of the Lite stuff is that there is *no* derivation, in a > legal/copyright sense, which is why BSD is allowed to exist. I wasn't talking in a legal or copyright sense. A lot of the code in BSD is also in System V, and Research UNIX editions 8 to 10 were derived from 4.1cBSD. I think we can let this one stand. > If you compare AT&T UNIX(tm) to BSD, in practice, the systems diverged from > about V7 - BSD is more like V7 than it is like System III or V. That's why :-) >> I'm trying as much as possible to show the BSD camps as a united >> front. I'm also not trying to knock Linux: any reasons to move to BSD >> must be well-founded, and quite honestly I haven't found too many. >> But I hope that, when I'm finished, I'll have a document which will be >> useful to the BSD community as a whole. > > I think the key to understanding the BSD "family" is that we're essentially > siblings. Siblings don't necessarily get along, but they have a lot in > common, and may band together abruptly if they see outsiders "attacking" > members of the family. > > You might want to compare all four of the BSD's, when talking about the > differences; BSD/OS is something of a cross in goals between NetBSD and > FreeBSD; the product has a lot of the "it's right or we aren't shipping" > attitude of NetBSD, and yet, it isn't going for nearly as many platforms > as NetBSD. A BSDi higher-up might give a better explanation of our official > goals. I don't want to differentiate too much. There's a perception in the Linux world that the BSD projects are fragmented and belligerent, and I don't want to help that perception at all. Just enough to explain why there are so many. Greg -- Finger grog@lemis.com for PGP public key See complete headers for address and phone numbers To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20000427140242.M55780>