Date: Fri, 12 Jun 1998 14:28:30 -0700 (PDT) From: Donald Burr <dburr@POBoxes.com> To: Tim Parkinson <tim.parkinson@ccr.ntu.ac.uk> Cc: freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: RE: What do people on the list use FreeBSD for? Message-ID: <XFMail.980612142830.dburr@POBoxes.com> In-Reply-To: <000b01bd95ea$68bf5f20$92194798@stimpy>
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My secret spy satellite informs me that on 12-Jun-98, Tim Parkinson wrote: > I'm curious as to what people are using their FreeBSD machines for. I > know > some people who are complete UN*X nutcases, yet when asked, why they use > it > they can't answer. > I was just thinking about specific applications that people had. I first started out using FreeBSD a few years ago (around late '95 if I recall correctly), in the 2.0.5-RELEASE days. My first use was as a desktop machine. I was getting sick of Windows crashes (at that time, I had a VERY unstable Windows 3.11 setup, and wanted to replace it with something that actually works. Plus, I was taking some computer classes (One of them was a UNIX class), and wanted an environment at home so that I could do classwork. I figured a UNIX environment would be ideal for this. Unfortunately, I didn't really use it as a desktiop machine. The programs just weren't there -- my main needs being an office suite-type package (and no, I was NOT going to learn *TEX, thank you very much!). So I found myself often booting into Windows. So, once my computer classes were over, I went back to all-Windows. The reasons being (1) the software needs (I had Microsoft Office, after all), (2) lack of hard drive space, and (3) I had, by that time, upgraded to Win95, which (believe it or not) actually ran better than Win 3.11 for me. So, I sort of dropped out of the FreeBSD world for awhile. I never got 2.1-RELEASE, or any of its successors. During that time, I did do a bit of playing around with Linux -- but this was just for playing around. (I never did any serious work under Linux, except a bit of C programming.) My main OS was still Windows 95. Then, last year (June-ish or so), while digging around through a bunch of old computer junk that I was going to donate to the local Salvation Army or something, I found my old 2.0.5 CD. I thought "gee, maybe the world of FreeBSD has changed." So I went over to Walnut Creek and ordered me a CD-ROM set. And so I received 2.2.2, but never installed it, because 2.2.5 came about a week later. By this time, Windows 95 had started its "crash and burn" cycle, so I was getting pretty fed up, and once again, was looking for a serious replacement as a desktop OS. So, I installed 2.2.5. And boy was I impressed! The system ran faster, everything worked better, etc. But the greatest thing was, that now ports/editors/staroffice existed. "Is this true?" I remember thinking to myself, "is there really an office suite-type package that will work under FreeBSD?" I installed it, and sure enough, it lived up to its expectations. That, combined with FreeBSD's great support for PPP, and the fact that the BSDi binary of Netscape Navigator ran, got me hooked. I now had all I needed to convert over to FreeBSD-only as my desktop OS. And so that's what I did. (I also got a newer system, and bigger HD's in the process. :) ) And to this date, I have not looked back. So now I was using FreeBSD as my main desktop machine -- writing letters, doing homework, finances, browisng the Web, e-mail, etc. Since I had more hard drive space than my roommate, and we had only one printer between us (that has since changed), I decided to set up a network. I setup a Samba server so that she could use some of my hard drive space to keep programs and documents. That has worked out very well -- Samba is one of those "gotta have it" programs for me. We also use FreeBSD for web development. I installed an Apache web server, so that I could easily make modifications to my Web page and test them, right on my own computer. But the greatest thing was being able to use FrontPage. My roommate belongs to a club, who wanted their own Web site. Being a nonprofit, they were able to get a local ISP to donate space for a Web site. Unfortunately, they don't know HTML, so for a while, I was editing the web page for them. This didn't work out very well, though, because, due to my other commitments, sometimes I wasn't able to get to it for days, even weeks, and they had a lot of time-sensitive material that had to be put up **NOW** (like legislative action alerts, etc.) So they bought my roommate a copy of FrontPage, because that way she could edit it herself, graphically. Unfortunately, none of us knew that FrontPage needed special extensions on the web server. And also, unfortunately, our service provider was unwilling to put them on their web server. So I figured out a rather nice workaround, thanks to Scot Hetzel's Apache-with-FrontPage port, which obviously came in very handy. I setup my webserver as a FrontPage server -- my roommate would edit the pages on it. I set up a periodic cron job that would upload the complete set of web pages to the ISP, using ftp. This works out extremely well. Throughout it all, I have been extremely amazed, and completely satisfied, with FreeBSD's ease of installation (of both the operating system, and of third-party software [e.g. ports and packages]), its ease of use, ease of configurability and customizability, and its extreme stability. I can't recall my system ever crashing ONCE for anything other than hardware failures or acts of God (i.e. power brownout, etc.) So, in summary, my uses for FreeBSD are: * Desktop operating system * Standard productivity applications * Software development * Server for small in-home PC network * Web development and serving --- Donald Burr <dburr@POBoxes.com> - Ask me for my PGP key | PGP: Your WWW HomePage: http://DonaldBurr.base.org/ ICQ #1347455 | right to Address: P.O. Box 91212, Santa Barbara, CA 93190-1212 | 'Net privacy. Phone: (805) 957-9666 FAX: (800) 492-5954 | USE IT. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- FreeBSD - Turning PCs into Workstations - http://www.freebsd.org/ (NOTE: POBoxes.com appears to be working again -- fire away!) To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message
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