From owner-freebsd-newbies Fri Jun 26 15:10:45 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id PAA15743 for freebsd-newbies-outgoing; Fri, 26 Jun 1998 15:10:45 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from mail1.auracom.net (root@mail1.auracom.net [165.154.140.21]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id PAA15683 for ; Fri, 26 Jun 1998 15:10:14 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from arthur@col.auracom.com) Received: from outpost.col.auracom.com (ts1-27.tru.auracom.com [165.154.114.59]) by mail1.auracom.net (8.8.8/8.8.5) with SMTP id SAA21099; Fri, 26 Jun 1998 18:12:38 -0400 (EDT) Date: Fri, 26 Jun 1998 19:14:58 -0300 (ADT) From: arthur To: Tim Gerchmez cc: freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: How important is "the OS?" In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org On Fri, 26 Jun 1998, Tim Gerchmez wrote: > > On 26-Jun-98 arthur wrote: > > > Unfortuneatly, to a wide majority, the home computer is nothing more > > than an appliance, or form of entertainment, and that makes the above > > statement very true, and very depressing. Although the up side to that > > is that hardware prices have become ridiculously low compared to years > > gone past, and that makes me sooooo happy. > > Ditto, especially with RAM and hard drive prices. Remember when a 4 meg stick > of RAM cost $120 or so? What you probably don't remember was that was in 1995, > just 3 years ago!! I remember starting a thread in a Usenet newsgroup titled > "RAM prices outrageous!" - ironically, about 3 days after posting that message, > RAM prices began their precipitous fall. > yeah I remember when a 30 pin 1mb cost close to $100, now I use the same simm as a keychain. > > but that's just the > > way I see things, and since this is a list of new-to-FreeBSD/unix type > > users I'd appreciate hearing everyone's reason for looking into this > > type of operating system. > > My personal reason? I was getting bored with Win95 and NT and looking for > something new to play with. You'll get a different answer from everyone. > Hopefully, the more answers the better, some might help others see what can be done with an o/s like this one. > > If anyone didn't catch my impression above, I feel that the popularity > > and growth of unix varients is on a major upswing. > > Do you have any data to support that conclusion? I'm not disagreeing, just > wondering if there's some hard data to support the conclusion. > Not really, just what I've seen and heard since I've been lurking around these lists. But when I was new to FreeBSD -newbies wasn't around, thanx Sue, and I feel that's a little of an indication for FreeBSD. As for other unix varients I can't really say, but I do hear of others that are getting into Linux and such. Unfortunately I think it's safe to say that what ever the growth of unix varients is, it doesn't compare to the amount of Win95 boxes that have been setup during that same time, but it's a start and that is a good thing, at least it proves that there are still people out there that are serious about getting into computers. > > And not to sound like > > a history buff, but without the earlier beginnings of unix, there would be > > no internet today. (my opinion of course) > > Once again, a possibility, but no supporting data. > Well if memory serves me correctly, TCP/IP was developed in a unix environmet, large scale data comunication was also a unix development, and without those two early beginnings the "Internet" wouldn't be what it is today. But I feel it's important to state that some of my opinions of how things are, are based on what I've seen, heard or read, and that in no way are these opinions concrete evidence of how things have come along over the years. Although I do hope my opinions are taken with a grain of salt and used as something to get good conversations going in which I can learn more. I don't mind being a little off, since being corrected is a good way of learning more. And for God's sake I hope people don't think I'm trying to be overly serious, I just enjoy learning more about the computer environment I've decided to use. In fact my first installation of FreeBSD was with a good friend of mine and a flat of beer, we had gotten the FreeBSD box up, running and connected to the net within an hour, not bad for the first time out I feel ;) since then I haven't looked back, FreeBSD is all I use for my personal systems. It's nice to have an operationg system that fills my needs and desires. The hour time limit was just for getting the o/s running, hardware times may vary with different brands or amounts of beer consumed. ltr - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - arthur@col.auracom.com In a world without fences, is there a need for gates --end-- To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message