Date: Sat, 23 Jan 1999 03:11:10 +0100 (CET) From: Konrad Heuer <kheuer@gwdu60.gwdg.de> To: freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: FreeBSD - A User's Point of View Message-ID: <Pine.BSF.3.96.990123030913.20784A-100000@gwdu60.gwdg.de>
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Is it really true? Has time passed so quickly? My history with FreeBSD started some years ago with 2.0-RELEASE. Ok, I had read about FreeBSD 1.x some month before that time but I didn't try until someone lent me a second hard disk drive for some weeks shortly after 2.0 was released. On the first disk there was Slackware Linux at that time, and I didn't want to remove it for FreeBSD. Some weeks later, I removed it for FreeBSD. Although the big crisis of the FreeBSD project caused by the legal problems with NET/2 were overcome with 2.0 I still remember some rumors in the freebsd newsgroup. FreeBSD would soon be dead someone told and Linux would be the future. It didn't come so. Many people have done a lot for FreeBSD in the recent years, especially the core team and the developers. Thank you very much! But as we all know, concerning publicity FreeBSD is still too much behind Linux. Germany's computer magazine iX - formerly the `multiuser/multitasking magazine', now the `magazine for information technology', may be because it now also deals with NT (my guess :-) ) - has articles about `Linux and Multimedia', `Linux Compute-Cluster' and so on. I know, there's *one* problem we must solve by ourselves: writing articles! But the other problem is how to convince people to do something with FreeBSD and not with Linux. I don't know anything that can be done with FreeBSD but that can't in principle be done with Linux. I know there are things that can better be done by FreeBSD but outstanding people often only know Linux. In the moment, I work on a FreeBSD-driven printer server for someone. One of his first questions was: "Please, can't you do that with Linux?" I was in good position and answered: "I'll only do with FreeBSD!" Other people I know are still worried about the future of FreeBSD. They say: "Wouldn't it be safer to do that with Linux?" I'm very optimistic about FreeBSD. I also know people who made unsatisfying experiences with Linux and know wish to have started with FreeBSD instead. I don't want to be misunderstood. I see it would be dangerous to attack Linux in the public. Today, there's already too much commericial interest in Linux. RedHat has done a lot for Linux, but, to tell the truth, I'm happy there's no equivalent in the world of FreeBSD. It may also be better for FreeBSD not to gain the attention by Microsoft Linux gains. To come to an end and to come to the point, we nevertheless need to have some answers concerning the questions outstanding people have about FreeBSD and Linux (see before). I try, and I'd be happy about any idea or statement I hear or read about. My current arguments (of different quality) for FreeBSD are: 1. FreeBSD has an excellent pedigree. 2. For someome who has experiences with SunOS, Ultrix etc. FreeBSD is more familiar. 3. Linux is a kernel plus distributor's work, FreeBSD is a complete operating system. 4. Linux NFS performance is bad. 5. Linux process scheduling algorithm is worse than that of FreeBSD if system load is high. 6. As far as I've observed, the virtual memory system of FreeBSD behaves better. 7. The Linux kernel has internal limits (e.g. max number of open files) which may cause troubles on bigger systems. Regards // // Konrad Heuer ____ ___ _______ // Gesellschaft für wissenschaftliche / __/______ ___ / _ )/ __/ _ \ // Datenverarbeitung mbH GÖttingen / _// __/ -_) -_) _ |\ \/ // / // Am Faßberg, D-37077 GÖttingen /_/ /_/ \__/\__/____/___/____/ // Deutschland (Germany) ----- The Power to Serve ----- // http://www.freebsd.org // kheuer@gwdu60.gwdg.de // To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message
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