Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2005 12:18:47 -0600 From: Vulpes Velox <v.velox@vvelox.net> To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Cc: atkielski.anthony@wanadoo.fr Subject: Re: Freebsd vs. linux Message-ID: <20050213121847.0ac4fa12@vixen42.local.lan> In-Reply-To: <823196404.20050212105644@wanadoo.fr> References: <200502112313.28082.hindrich@worldchat.com> <823196404.20050212105644@wanadoo.fr>
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On Sat, 12 Feb 2005 10:56:44 +0100 Anthony Atkielski <atkielski.anthony@wanadoo.fr> wrote: > > Could you please either explain, why Freebsd is superior to Linux, > > (I am asking this as I would like to understand, in more depth, > > why it is better) or direct me to a source that might give me > > some further reading on the subject. > > The main reason why I consider Linux inferior to FreeBSD is that > Linux is only a kernel, whereas FreeBSD is a complete OS. > > Linus Torvalds originally wrote only the kernel portion of an > operating system. He wrote it from scratch and patterned it after > the behavior of the well-established UNIX operating system. This > kernel became Linux. > > Unfortunately, a kernel alone doesn't make an operating system. So > people began adding programs to the kernel in order to provide > something complete enough to actually run as an OS. Different > organizations added a different mix of programs, and each mix today > is called a "distribution." No two distributions are alike. The > set of programs you get in your Linux OS from Red Hat isn't the same > as the set of programs you get in your OS from Debian, and so on. > > The Linux situation is pretty unusual. Most operating systems, > including FreeBSD, are supplied as complete operating systems from > the start, including not only a kernel but also a comprehensive, > coherent, and consistent set of system programs to run under that > kernel. You don't need a "distribution"; the OS already contains > everything you need to run the system. In my view, this greatly > improves reliability, stability, and coherent of the OS, as there is > only one version of the OS for each release, and it is complete in > itself. > > Another reason why I prefer FreeBSD is that the BSD UNIX systems > have a much longer history that is much more closely linked to UNIX > as a concept than does Linux. New code is usually buggy code, and > so I prefer an OS that has time-proven code, or at least is > patterned after time-proven OS concepts. I find it very hard to > believe that a university student is going to write a kernel that is > superior to kernels that have been established and tweaked little by > little by many programmers over a period of decades. > > For example, I learned only yesterday that Linux does asynchronous > disk I/O by default. That means that disk I/O is buffered within > the kernel, such that data written to disk doesn't immediately get > actually recorded on disk--instead, the OS actually writes to disk > when it deems it best from a performance standpoint. While this > improves performance enormously, it does so at a very high potential > cost: because if the system crashes before the disk is written, the > entire file system may be destroyed (key blocks on disk within the > file system may not be updated correctly, causing corruption so > serious that the file system must be recreated and restored > completely from backup). > > FreeBSD, on the other hand, uses a type of buffered I/O that > guarantees that the file system structure on disk is always > coherent. Disk writes are buffered, but they are written out to > disk in such a way that, at any given instant, the file structure is > clean and coherent. If a power failure occurs, you may lose the > last few seconds of data you wrote to a file, but the structure of > your system and directories will not be corrupted. > > Still another reason why I prefer FreeBSD is that it places far less > emphasis on the desktop. Linux has been moving more and more > towards a desktop because that's where the hype and money is > perceived to be. It's a losing proposition because Windows and the > Mac are so dramatically superior to Linux that it will probably > never catch up. But all the emphasis on pretty graphics and > Windows-like desktop behavior are made at the expense of server > performance. You can't have an OS that is both a good server AND a > good desktop. Linux is wasting time aiming at the desktop, while > most other versions of UNIX (including FreeBSD) are aiming at > servers. I run a server, so I use FreeBSD. I think the problem there is ppl make largely pointless differences between the two... the only difference between a server and desktop, is a desktop needs support sound cards and a the kernel level stuff for GL. > (Ironically, Mac OS X uses elements of BSD as its foundation and is > a UNIX system underneath the hood. But Apple has hugely modified > the upper layers of the OS and has done so in a coherent, controlled > way, producing a desktop that is dramatically superior to anything > Linux will ever produce.) > > Finally, I know from some years of experience with FreeBSD that it > is a rock stable operating system that makes very efficient use of > whatever hardware you give it and never crashes. I have thus come > to trust it for my production server, which must run 24 hours per > day (350,000 unique visitors per month on my Web site, or about 12 > million hits, plus all of my DNS resolution, e-mail services, time > synchronization, etc.). > > I hope this helps. > > -- > Anthony > > > _______________________________________________ > freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list > http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions > To unsubscribe, send any mail to > "freebsd-questions-unsubscribe@freebsd.org"
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