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They won't do that. Why? Because they know that if they did, the same day, a fork would rise, based on their source code and released open-source.

Actually no. The fork could be of the last version of the code which was made available, but every modification thereafter could be closed off. There are quite a few examples of this.

Exactly, but the fork can follow its own way, benefiting from the source code before it gets closed.

Actually PC-BSD has so many GPL components that it can't go closed source. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Edited 2006-10-26 17:25

I wouldn't hazard to state definitely, but even if there were GPL components, the source to those can be made available but with the rest of the system being closed.

If memory serves, even when a BSD is done by a company which initially intends to keep it open, historically they do eventually close it off, making it entirely proprietary. I think that is the case, but don't rely on my faulty memory for this to be completely accurate.

If memory serves, even when a BSD is done by a company which initially intends to keep it open, historically they do eventually close it off, making it entirely proprietary. I think that is the case, but don't rely on my faulty memory for this to be completely accurate.

The opposite is true too. Think about it: How many companies ended up opening their source code and releasing their product open-source?

let's try not to make this to yet another bsd vs. gpl flamewar

another? nah. its one long ongoing one...

its like a bonfire and fuel. just toss some more on it and watch it come back to life...

I hope they don't play the BSD card and close things up (they could at least partially).

I hope the GNU sycophants don't pull the FUD card and start talking out their asses about what might, maybe, possibly happen.

Oh, wait.

...but without all the zealotry that surrounds Linux.

Dream on. What you call zealotry is just passion for a product we like. What technical, complex product (as opposed to products like salt and sugar which are very popular with zero passion) has ever become popular without a passionate appeal?

PC-BSD will become popular if and only if it has a good number of passionate advocates.

One man's passion is another man's zealotry!

Personally I hope that the better operating systems rise to the top based on technical merit and their respective price to performance ratios. Let's leave passion where it belongs, i.e. the bedroom :-)

Let's leave passion where it belongs, i.e. the bedroom :-)

No, please, no computers in my bedroom.

Oh, wait

It's a thin line between passion and fanaticism.

>PC-BSD will become popular if and only if it has a good number of passionate advocates.

It will be popular if it stays "true". Any kind of hype would be the death of this flavour in the long run and a great damage to FreeBSD too.
BSD is BSD! It's no Linux.

What you call passion for a product I call obsessive. I believe in free choice and all that, its when the really hard core advocates come out for linux that really turns me off on it. We know linux is out there and what our choices are. Its good at some tasks but sucks at others. But having a linux advocate scream "use linux!" to solve all the world's computing problems is just ridiculous. This is the road I'd rather not see any of the BSD's take.

What you call passion for a product I call obsessive. I believe in free choice and all that, its when the really hard core advocates come out for linux that really turns me off on it. We know linux is out there and what our choices are. Its good at some tasks but sucks at others. But having a linux advocate scream "use linux!" to solve all the world's computing problems is just ridiculous. This is the road I'd rather not see any of the BSD's take.

If the BSD's want to become more popular then they need to get better hardware support. Seriously. They also need to convince people that the capacity for forking is not as extreme as it may seem, OR not as much of a problem as it seems, OR both.

They also need to promote themselves more - but if you think that BSD users don't go around saying "Linux (or Insert Your Favourite OS Here) is crap, people should use BSD", you're dead wrong. There's also plenty "the GPL is thievery" crap.

As for linux users "screaming 'use linux' to solve all the world's computing problems'; dream on. Linux is an operating system, and therefore it can be adapted to any application anyone chooses to put on it. It's also a much more credible choice than others for a variety of purposes.

"If the BSD's want to become more popular then they need to get better hardware support."

I just love these standard, inaccurate cookiecutter arguments. You need to get a clue. Seriously.

"They also need to convince people that the capacity for forking is not as extreme as it may seem, OR not as much of a problem as it seems, OR both."

There are less than 10 BSD's. How many Linux distros are there?

"There's also plenty "the GPL is thievery" crap."
Just like there's a lot of "BSD is dead" and "BSD licensed code can be closed" crap going around.

Edited 2006-10-27 02:49

Original statement: "If the BSD's want to become more popular then they need to get better hardware support."

A reply: "I just love these standard, inaccurate cookiecutter arguments. You need to get a clue. Seriously."

I worked with FreeBSD trying to get it to install on a computer that is known to work great with Linux and does. When I tried FreeBSD, the install, while easy, was the only good part of my experience.

FreeBSD is not as smooth as Linux on hardware. It lacks drivers and critical commercial support that Linux gets on an everyday basis. So this observation is correct and is even admitted to by FreeBSD developers.

"FreeBSD is not as smooth as Linux on hardware."

That's a pretty widereaching conclusion to come to from trying to get it installed on one computer. I could say the same about Linux using my own experience (Ubuntu did not support my ralink wifi, openbsd did). Also, FreeBSD != BSD.

Edited 2006-10-27 03:37

But that's my point.

Any computer upon which Linux runs nicely and FreeBSD has problems is one more strike against the system.

Regardless of the reason for the difficulty, when Linux installs and works out of the box (several distros mind you) and FreeBSD chokes and is a pain to get working--if working at all, it is one more testimonial to the fact that FreeBSD has a way to go to reach parity with Linux in terms of ease of installation.

I tried it on every system I could get my hands on. One major version even tanked before loading the install program (NetBSD 3.0). So don't give me the cookie-cutter argument, because it won't wash.

I am passionate about kosher salt.

when one works around a machine buildt on pure logic (no matter how illogical it can appear to behave some times, it still is logical. its just that the observer do not have the full data set.) the part of the brain that deals with emotions gets little stimuli.

i theorize that zealotry is either a way to exercise, or a over-reaction based on lack of practice.

still, given that different people is zealots about different subjects (sports anyone?), the theory is at best incomplete.

if it isnt religion, politics or sports, what else do one have that one can be passionate about?

if it isnt religion, politics or sports, what else do one have that one can be passionate about?

... how about being passionate about your life?
it's there all the time anyway, 24/365, so why spend this time mostly in a lukewarm way?

but then again, those topics are whats most often used to define what kind of life one lives.

ie, you vote for a specific party or person based on your life (or what you want/hope your life to be). same with sports and religion.

life alone becomes very darwinian...

I don't know how you expect BSD to get more recognition without the "zealotry". Perhaps it is its lack of "zealotry" that keeps BSD forever in the back seat.

Diego, I doubt these guys want to be the next Linux. If they wanted, they would have used a Linux kernel. They based their OS on FreeBSD because of FreeBSD's maturity, strengh and robustness.

> So BSD won't be the "next Linux". If BSD gets more
> used, it'll continue to be gnome, kde, X.org, apache,
> gcc, mysql. I don't think it matters at all wheter the
> kernel is Linux or BSD or Solaris, or even Haiku. It'll
> continue being FOSS with just another name.

Correction: It'll continue being FOSS *UNIX* with just another name (and kernel). Many FOSS OSes aren't UNIX-centered and don't use gnome, kde, X.org, apache, gcc, and mysql.

Well if you want to get technical, BSD is not a Unix either, but a Unix-like system. The Open Group has the trademark and get to determine what is and is not officially a Unix. None of the BSDs are, according to them.

Why is DragonFlyBSD better than FreeBSD? Backing your statement would help us understand.

"Why is DragonFlyBSD better than FreeBSD? Backing your statement would help us understand."

He does not need to do so. He said so, so it must be true. No need to back it up with any facts of any sorts.

"Is going to be" rather sums up the merits of the statement. Lots of things are going to be, or would have been only if...

I'll continue using a "real" FreeBSD which I can configure by myself.

Remember PIF
http://faqs.pcbsd.org/14_304_en.html

Once upon a time I was a passionate advocate of Windows, or at least the Win32 kernel, and I wasn't alone. But Windows almost falls into the salt and sugar category because you have to have some OS, and there didn't used to be a lot of choice.

Don't worry, I'm not offended. The Linux community is already in a terrific position and getting better all the time. And PC-BSD may also vault ahead to a terrific position as well.

Windows became popular. Where were its passionate advocates?

I believe they live in a place called Redmond.

Or Cloud Cuckoo Land.

Look, MS make good products, OK? Windows is not one of them, and never has been. At 15GB and already critically compromised, the next version isn't going to be, either.

Edited 2006-10-26 21:32

Windows became popular. Where were its passionate advocates?

Sorry, can't resist!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1274983729713522403&q=ballm...


.

LOL that was very good. Here's another one:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1769003739231727974&q=ball...

What a mad guy!

That's an interesting question. I've used FreeBSD and currently use NetBSD on one desktop, but I've never even considered using OpenBSD. I think the reason is that the other BSDs are so secure that OpenBSD just doesn't address a perceived need.

I agree that all of the BSD's are very secure, but most of the security that they have is because of OpenBSD's innovations. Nothing against the others, but why not go right to the source of the all these security technologies and just use OpenBSD?

Dude, OpenBSD's hard disk partitioner is horrendous.

True, it's in no way intuitive, but functional. But if someone were to build a nice LiveCD/Install CD for OBSD that utilized something like gparted, it would make a kickass system

>I agree that all of the BSD's are very secure, but most of the security that they have is because of OpenBSD's innovations. Nothing against the others, but why not go right to the source of the all these security technologies and just use OpenBSD?<

I don't think you really understand the underpinnings of the OpenBSD project. By it's very nature it could not be used in the same manner as freebsd or netbsd. The reason OpenBSD is so secure is because virtually every package that goes into OpenBSD is heavily scrutinized, broken down and put back together (sometimes several times) prior to the package being allowed into ObenBSD proper.

In a fork of OpenBSD you would essentially lose the large majority of that security and stability by installing packages that were not tested, retested and configured by OpenBSD... eg... xorg, kde, gnome, and almost anything that would make for a good desktop distro.

OpenBSD is designed to be a solid stable and socure server os and nothing more. Turning it into a desktop os would simply make it like every other BSD out there.

Edited 2006-10-27 00:13

I understand what you are saying, but its not entirely true. Yes, the OpenBSD team does control what goes into the source tree, and that's why its so stable and secure; however, all of the programs that would make OpenBSD a useful desktop OS are compiled and tested by the OpenBSD team, they're what makes up the OpenBSD Ports Tree. And Xorg is already included with OBSD anyway. I dont think it would be all that bad to take obsd and add a nice WM that has been fully tested by the obsd and distribute it. At least at that point the core OS would be fully tested and known to be secure and stable. If users can find a way to install enough crap on obsd to make it less stable then no OS is safe.

"The reason OpenBSD is so secure is because virtually every package that goes into OpenBSD is heavily scrutinized,"

This is not entirely true. All code that goes into the base system is scrutinized, yes, but this is not true for the packages/ports. There's simply not enough manpower to audit gigantic packages like GNOME, OpenOffice and KDE completely. This means that ports are generally not as well audited as the base system.

"OpenBSD is designed to be a solid stable and socure server os and nothing more."
While OpenBSD is a very solid and secure server OS it's not the primary goal of the project:
http://openbsd.org/goals.html
For example, with PF, OpenOSPFD and OpenBGPD it makes for an awesome router.

"Nothing against the others, but why not go right to the source of the all these security technologies and just use OpenBSD?"

It's not intended to be an everyman's desktop OS and thus it's not suitable. It could be but it would take some serious work. Another factor is that there are far more freebsd users and thus perhaps a bigger interest in putting together a desktop "variant".

Btw, I use OpenBSD on my desktop every day and has done so for more than 6 years.