From owner-freebsd-advocacy Wed Nov 25 19:29:34 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id TAA18960 for freebsd-advocacy-outgoing; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 19:29:34 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from corinne.cpio.org ([207.88.211.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id TAA18945 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 19:29:25 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from jkatz@corinne.cpio.org) Received: (qmail 5886 invoked by uid 1000); 26 Nov 1998 03:38:53 -0000 Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 19:38:53 -0800 (PST) From: "J. Joseph Max Katz" X-Sender: jkatz@corinne To: netbsd-advocacy@NetBSD.ORG, FreeBSD advocacy list , advocacy@openbsd.org cc: jkatz@cpio.net Subject: Re: Merging Net/Free/Open-BSD together against Linux In-Reply-To: <19981126123721.N67961@freebie.lemis.com> Message-ID: X-Silly-Sender: Mr. Potatoe Head Organization: CPIO Networks MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Great, now I'm adding my $.01. In the past this has been considered flame bait, but I've now seen that all three communities won't slam each other at the first opportunity. Way to go, guys (and gals!) As a sometimes-user of the various distributions at various points in time, each OS has its own niche and its own benefits. Each OS productively borrows from one another-- NetBSD applies some of the OpenBSD security patches, OpenBSD takes the ASM IP Checksumming from FreeBSD, FreeBSD is now multi-platform. One day OpenBSD (or NetBSD) will integrate the FreeBSD ARM port, OpenBSD will add more utilities to its basic distribution (based on adding lynx and Apache you can tell it is heading that way.) Sooner or later the BSDs will have more in common than they do different. Any secton in the following starting out with "IMHO" is not flame bait, but my opinion. Send me PRIVATE mails blasting me on those if you don't like what I say. I'm speaking for MYSELF, not for any project. I see exactly four BIG problems with any merging-- 1: The technical aspect-- (off the top of my head) o messaging all device drivers to one format for this new "mega" 'vmunux' This will be the greatest strength gained-- a great collective pool which will ensure BSD for generations :) . IMHO-- we need to make as many of these drivers as machine independant as possible. Even if the gscbus is only found on PA-RISC machines, we should be able to compile it onto an i386 kernel if we really, really want to. o making sure all syscalls/libaries are backwards compatible with the current setups on all systems. ("foo" on FreeBSD/i386 should run the same on this new kernel as it used to.) o distribution layout. We all nitpick. OpenBSD follows the decree in the BSD Net/2 README to the letter. FreeBSD, if I remember from experience correctly, is slightly different. I can't speak for NetBSD. . IMHO-- I prefer the Net/2 decree out of anything else I've seen. If folks have something better, please step forward o IMHO re-entrent kernel. It's debateable, but if we're going to merge the codebase we should do this. This will make SMP work correctly on all architectures. We could also make SMP work across the board, and make it as MI as possible. 2: The licensing aspect-- o (Let me annotate this by saying that I'm not an expert on what each project is doing or not doing) I think FreeBSD and OpenBSD have pretty similar licensing schemes as of late (BSD +notification of other code.) I know NetBSD has some funky licensing in the compiler tool chain of its alpha port, and also (I think) in some of the machine dependant code. We'd need some folks to clear this up. 3: Packaging/installation-- o IMHO We need a solid packaging system. Someone on misc@openbsd.org touted we should move to RPM. RPM is REDHAT Package Manager. We need our own. I propose ".bsz" -- gziped, tarred + header with info on arhitecture + version + dependencies. Ever install a SparcLinux RPM onto a i386 RedHat system? :) o IMHO Release distributions. Base + extended utils + programming tools + X + kernel source + full source. Easy to use install manager. I heard FreeBSD is paying someone to write a really, really, really good installer. How easily can this be ported to other architectures. On OpenBSD these days there is a SINGLE floppy-ramdisk install on most architectures. Even if the box doesn't support floppy, as long as it can boot from the drive it loads the ramdisk and you can do the install. o Release schedules o At the last FreeBSD user group meeting was at, jkh admitted to being behind its deadlines. (This was almost a year ago.) o OpenBSD (like clockwork, ready or not) makes a release every six months and only has one version level (2.x, 2.y, etc.) o NetBSD I haven't researched yet. I do know it is different from both of the above. o IMHO we need to forge ahead and commit to release dates and release regardless. We can have major and minor releases-- we make a snapshot release every 6 months, but if we have good stuff going we make a big release (like FreeBSD's 3.0.) 4: Code review-- o ego 'r us. o Each group has its own "core" group with its own level of "trust". o There are no real "documented" rules on how to get CVS commit access with any group other than the unwritten "you code good and often, you in." o We're dealing with groups that have splintered because they couldn't agree on this stuff (among quite a few other things.) o Security. As a security guy and OpenBSD guy as of late we need to constantly audit code-- no new code can be thrown in the tree if it hasn't been looked at. I think Net/Free feel the same way, but I don't know their internal auditing process. o IMHO I'm not a code review guy-- I don't know WHAT we should do with this. If this ever happens, it will be a huge undertaking. If all the "ringleaders" of the *BSD projects lost their egos, joined in a big circle and hugged and said "let's merge" there is no way in hell they'd have the man/womanpower to pull it off and continue the current development. We'd need a leader to lead the leaders if you get my drift. It won't be easy. Jonathan Katz -- jkatz@cpio.net. -- CEO CPIO Networks -- http://www.cpio.net ---- http://www.openbsd.org -- "You know, Picabo Street is now a doctor. They named the Intensive Care Unit after her. It's now the 'Picabo ICU'" To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message