Date: Tue, 28 Feb 95 15:27:43 MST From: terry@cs.weber.edu (Terry Lambert) To: phk@ref.tfs.com (Poul-Henning Kamp) Cc: nate@trout.sri.MT.net, davidg@Root.COM, freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: Binary compatibility with NetBSDk Message-ID: <9502282227.AA09199@cs.weber.edu> In-Reply-To: <199502282137.NAA00953@ref.tfs.com> from "Poul-Henning Kamp" at Feb 28, 95 01:37:03 pm
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> > Should I keep going? The reason FreeBSD and NetBSD both exist is > > because neither groups agrees wholly with the goals and directions of > > the other groups. This means that there will be two differing versions, > > whether you like it or not. Minimizing that is a worthy goal, but if it > > means hobbling one group then it's not worth it. I beg to differ. The reason the both exist is because the NetBSD people got fed up waiting for the promised 386BSD 0.2 release before the Bill Jolitz pulled his sanction from the unannounced 0.1.5 interim release being put together by the patchkit people. The NetBSD release occurred because the Interim release was not an announced project. I have email from various NetBSD principles that collaborate this. They were simply tired of waiting for Bill and didn't see an alternative. The reason the FreeBSD project exists is because it was 90% done when NetBSD was released and 95% when Lynne fired off her famous "2/3's of the patchkit is crap" posting and Bill pulled out from his interim release agreement. And since I (shortsightedly) convinced Bill to trademark "386BSD", it couldn't be called "386BSD 0.1.5" without Bill's permission. Anything that tries to justify NetBSD vs. FreeBSD on the grounds of initially considered philosphical positions is so much bogus BS and post-facto rationalization. They both exist because they started nearly simultaneously and weren't aware of each other until a significant amount of effort had been put forth by both nascent groups, not because they started with intentionally different goals. It took the first "merge war" to even define that there were any differences at all, and even those are so thin that it would take a microtome to seperate them -- the only reason they were arrived at is that the real issue, editorial control, had to remain unvoiced so the damn thing dragged on long enough for a subtle difference (one that could be voiced) to be found. This is also why both sides are so predictably touchy when any type of cross developement is suggested, or when anyone asks "what are the differences between...", etc. > Can we bury this axe now ? Nobody seems to both want this enough and > have sufficient time to do it, so it's dead, D.E.A.D ! Apparently we *can't* bury the axe. Fine, if that's what you all want. You can't say I didn't try, or that I didn't volunteer for the work despite my existing very heavy time commitments. Shame, too, since 64bit clean libraries would have been more benficial that whatever illusory "brand distinction" is gained by not sharing supposedly freely usable source. Terry Lambert terry@cs.weber.edu --- "Those who do not remember history are doomed to repeat it" --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers.
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