http://www.osnews.com/story/10889/Is_Linux_For_Losers_ Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2013, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Sat, 25 May 2013 01:31:36 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif http://www.osnews.com http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Maybe I missed it, should there be a link to a longer article? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? A few of the authors comments that indicate he's both biased and what I would say is an idiot.

"the gist being that BSD guys are a lot like Linux guys, except they have kissed girls."

What a lame ass comment.

"Linux gets support from big hardware makers like Hewlett-Packard (nasdaq: HPQ - news - people ) and IBM (nyse: IBM - news - people ), which he says have turned Linux hackers into an unpaid workforce."

Sorry but that's excluded developers such as Novell and Red Hat who do pay programmers for their work. As per the GNU/GPL they shouldn't have to pay for open source code but they are required to give back to the Linux community any additional improvements they make to an open source project, which they do.

"Unlike Linux, which is a clone of Unix"

What? First of all "Linux" is not a clone of Unix. SCO has been unsuccessful in court at proving Linux has any Unix code. Linux may be Unix like but that doesn't mean it's a clone (copy) of Unix. Also this comment basically generalizes all Linux OS are the same which they are not. While RPM based distributions use the same Linux commands there are distributions that differ with the tools/software offered.

"I think our code quality is higher, just because that's really a big focus for us,"

Umm...right. That's why fortune 500 companies choose either Windows or a Linux distribution to use in their workplace. Besides web design companies and a few advertising companies I haven't seen a lot of OSX being used in the workplace. Where as with most typical companies Windows is the major player on the desktop (Linux typically on the server end). Windows influence is decreasing with the advances Linux has made globally and is now appearing more attractive as an alternative when compared to Windows or OSX. With post-production (visual effects, etc) studios Linux is the major player (desktop and server). Examples of films made with the help of Linux are Lord Of The Rings, Spiderman, Hulk, Star Wars, T3, etc.

"De Raadt says his crack 60-person team of programmers, working in a tightly focused fashion and starting with a core of tried-and-true Unix, puts out better code than the slapdash Linux movement."

60 people..wow that's seems like a lot to a reader who is unfamiliar with software developement. Let's compare that to the several thousand developers around the world contributing to open source software developement or major companies such as Novell and Red Hat who contribute their resources as well. The author also failed to mention LSB certification which promotes standards or mention that developers such as Novell, Red Hat and Mandriva (formally Mandrakesoft) are certified members. [url]http://www.linuxbase.org/[/url]

"There's also a difference in motivation. "Linux people do what they do because they hate Microsoft. We do what we do because we love Unix,"

Linux users who are former Windows users didn't necessarily switch because they "hate" Microsoft. They switched for several reasons (ie: vendor lock-in, spyware, viruses, late fixes, etc). The reason why Sun or Apple are typically not attractive are vendor lock-in or less support for software. For example Apple recently announced their plans to run OSX on Intel processors but to restrict OSX to hardware they sell. Also studios cannot run some software such as XSI from Softimage on OSX. There's other reasons but I'm sure you all get my point.

For help on understanding Linux alternatives for software see here [url]http://www.linuxforum.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=53452[/url]

For those who believe "one click install" or having a user friendly Control Center is not available on Linux distributions try LiveDVD (demo runs off the DVD drive) for SuSE Linux Professional 9.3 ( [url]http://www.novell.com/products/linuxprofessional/index.html?sourcei...] ), Mandriva Linux ( [url]http://www.mandriva.com/[/url] ), Linspire (Debian based [url]http://linspire.com/[/url] ).

As for TCO, etc concerns over issues such as Microsoft's FUD campaign please feel free to read [url]http://www.novell.com/linux/truth/[/url] Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hopefully one day we'll all be using OpenBSD. But now take your pills and go back to bed, ok? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Copied and pasted from Slashdot. You should read the article before you copy and paste it. There is no mention anywhere of linux being for losers. Nice editing. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I'm interested to see what he has to say....(Most likely beneficial for linux?) But where to find it? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? as a person who uses both Windows and Linux, as well as FreeBSD, I can honestly say that Linux is no worse than Windows, it just sucks in a different way Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? how he can form such an exact openion without ever running linux in his life? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.forbes.com/technology/2005/06/16/linux-bsd-unix-cz_dl_06... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I don't have enough knowledge of the either source code for the kernel, but I do know that for the desktop user, linux is by far the best FOSS solution. I would be amazed if any BSD would recognize all the hardware automatically on my laptop like linux has. In this respect, BSD has a lot of work to do. However, PCBSD is an interesting project. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Is This Article For Generating Flame Wars? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? All I have to say is Theo is an ass. He's a terrific coder but to bash something because it has a different design principle than your stuff is stupid. Theo's main grip is linux isn't as clean and secure as OpenBSD. I hate to tell you Theo, the better, faster, more prevelent operating system is always going to have some quirks, their called engineering compromises. You want more features now, there''s going to be some hacks it's inevitable software isn't perfect. You want perfect security well you get to hang behind the curve feature wise and even speed wise. OpenBSD has piss poor I/O performance, terrible SMP scalability, and just moved to GCC 3 when linux distros are moving to 4. Software is about compromise and Theo is an ass. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Seems to like to complain and say provocative things to imply he is the best. He is not the first, and won't be the last. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "the gist being that BSD guys are a lot like Linux guys, except they have kissed girls."

Now what else did the interviewer say to piss him off? Had he just asked "what do you say to linux users who say bsd suX0rz?" previously? Or had he asked "What makes IBM use linux, is it because it is better?"?

Honestly, can you imagine how much this guy gets harrassed with questions about linux? "Why would I use OpenBSD over linux? " It's hard to answer that with diplomacy and even if you pull it off someone will still complain. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I'm not an OpenBSD user either but this guy is right: Linux is for losers. Linux is just some kind of fat geeks conspiracy. There's nothing really impressive in Linux: the gnu tools aren't linux specific and aren't that great anyway, the linux kernel isn't the best out there, the hardware support still sucks, the windowing sytem sucks as well, almost all the window managers sucks too, ect.

the fat nerds behind linux are so fanactic because they think they are the best hackers out there, well that's not true: they suck really.

i think corporations like microsoft and apple can deliver much better products. at least they have a few bucks to spend on the best developers around the world.

again, fat zealots can't live with it: they have to hate corporate stuff. too bad... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Real men use BSD"
Come on we all know real men only use Hurd for their toaster. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Theo is obviously trolling, since he doesn't explain his 'view' at all. Explain to me why Linux is bad, and I will have an objective but critical look at his points.

In fact, I have already looked at the pros and cons and I have come to the conclusion that (GNU/)Linux suits my needs better, because *BSD doesn't support dri and ipod for my laptop. I know this has nothing to do with superiority or inferiority of either OS, which is what Theo is probably referring to, but to me these are huge disadvantages (hygiene factors, actually).

So his statement has already been falsified (which is really easy without any elaboration from his side). So shut up or explain your statement, Theo.

Btw, I know *BSD is superior in some area's, but so is Linux. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? That man sounds a little childish... my OpenBSD is better but nobody uses it, booh...

I doubt that's going to help OpenBSD community to have such lame comments. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I promise to submit a technical article this summer. But PLEASE stop posting articles that turn OSNews into a degenerate hellhole :-) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? .....the better, faster, more prevelent operating system is always going to have some quirks, their called engineering compromises. You want more features now, there''s going to be some hacks it's inevitable software isn't perfect. You want perfect security well you get to hang behind the curve feature wise and even speed wise....

just me, but this can be used as an excuse for windows too :-) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The idea that a focused and relatively small group of coders can offer a higher quality product makes sense to me and i think that same concept will help haiku. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I would be amazed if any BSD would recognize all the hardware automatically on my laptop like linux has.

Funny. Even years old OpenBSD versions detect/autoconfigure the hardware on the dozens of various configurations I use far better than any GNU/Linux distribution ever has.

OpenBSD has piss poor I/O performance,

I'd hesitate to call it "piss poor". It's proved to deliver more throughput on my (admittedly elderly) servers than any other OS. True, some benchmarks show that it lags overall, however.

terrible SMP scalability

Not a priority.

and just moved to GCC 3 when linux distros are moving to 4.

OpenBSD supports a variety of platforms, many of which the buggy GCC 3 didn't (and doesn't) work on. GNU/Linux really only supports x86/x86-64 and PPC.

Software is about compromise and Theo is an ass.

Software is about delivering the best product possible and Theo is one of the few willing to stand firm instead of caving in to cheap hacks, proprietary code, and NDAs. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? WTF? Did I miss the link to the article? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The answer:

Yes. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > Is This Article For Generating Flame Wars?

Yes, for generating hits for news sites. ;-) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Your justifications seems more to yourself than to anyone else. It looks like you are trying to convince yourself. Once again i would say, Linux has become the wh*re which everyone is trying to p*mp.

Linux is a good kernel but the whole distribution mess, big companies trying to cater their interest is making it look bad. I wish Linux guys focussed more passionately about the programming and technical stuff rather than GPL politics and i am sure there would have been a value added Linux distro from some "for profit" company and that distribution would have been popular. Today its a big f***in mess of 1000 distros and confusion.

One day gentoo rocks, another day ubuntu, yet another day kubuntu..and then slackware, debian, suse, novell, yellowdog, reddog, redhat, blackhat, suckat...chinadog, frenchcat and what not

Another mistake Linux did was to try and make it one solution fits all kind of kernel. This is the same approach Microsoft took and it bit them back in the ass. I am sure its going to boomrang in the same way on Linux. With they tried to design a cool geeky/stable/useful for programmers OS and not focussed so much on its commercialization. A programmer should love programming and leave all the publicity and politics crap out. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? goto this site and look at the bill gates picture:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/longhorn/default.mspx

i can read on his face: i pwn you all, losers.

MICROSOFT > * Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I've been attracted to trying BSD for awhile, but this complete jerk Theo De Raadt drives me away.

Linux is a proven OS, in everyting from cell phones to large servers to desktops.

And to stereotype Linux users like he did, as stereotyping any group, was completely ridiculous.

Based on this guys attitude, I seriously doubt he's ever kissed a girl. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 15:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? But this is exaktly like at least a good deal of linux hackers, or at least zealots on this page, want it. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Looks like Theo put his foot in his mouth.

If Linux is so bad why is it so stable on my cheap PCs? Why does it support all my hardware? Why do I have a full music studio out of free software that emerged within the last 2 years, after I stopped using Windows? Why can I do all my DVD/CD ripping in simple comprehensive interfaces using the latest codecs? I've got several excellent filesystems to choose from, each with their advantages and disadvantages over the others, but all better than what I see elsewhere, except, maybe, for JFS. I've got video drivers, hardware 3D accelleration, audio drivers, midi over USB drivers, drivers for my camera, USB serial, memory cards, etc. Hardware support is excellent. Security isn't a problem, maybe not as secure as OpenBSD, but I still don't believe all the vulnerabilities have been worked out of openssh, which is my main point of concern about security and that falls in OpenBSD's domain.

I could go on and on about how much I love this OS. But what I love most about it is you don't have to be a CS student at a university to use it. You can be a luser like me, working professionally in the real world, smokin bowls and hacking as I feel like it. Its stress relieving, relaxing, casual, compassionate, and anti-status quo.. which is why I like it so much.

So use what you like, but attacking my beloved Linux will only make you look like an ass. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I mostly use Linux, followed by Windows, followed by FreeBSD.

I commend OpenBSD on its security efforts and code auditing. Everyone should learn from that.

On the other hand, isn't the "proof in the pudding"? Linux servers are reliable and secure---especially with security features such as SELinux and Execshield that Fedora Core comes with by default.

On the other hand again, to Theo's credit, few Linux distributions take advantage of the already available security features: Execshield, grsecurity, SELinux, IBM stack smashing protection, etc. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? amusing and still so true Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I've been attracted to trying BSD for awhile, but this complete jerk Theo De Raadt drives me away.

Linux is a proven OS, in everyting from cell phones to large servers to desktops.

And to stereotype Linux users like he did, as stereotyping any group, was completely ridiculous.

Why blame BSD for Theo? Theo has nothing to do with FreeBSD, DragonflyBSD, and hasn't had anything to do with NetBSD for years. Don't let one man keep you from trying out BSD. BSD is bigger than Theo... Just like Linux. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Here read how he got KICKED off the NetBSD project for being an ass more than a decade ago. Thats when he decided to take all his toys home with him and create OpenBSD.

"On December 20 [1994], Theo de Raadt was asked to resign from the NetBSD Project by the remaining members of 'core'. This was a very difficult decision to make, and resulted from Theo's long history of rudeness towards and abuse of users and developers of NetBSD. We believe that there is no place for that type of behaviour from representatives of the NetBSD Project, and that, overall, it has been damaging to the project.

This decision was difficult to make because Theo has a long history of positive contributions to the project. He was the principal caretaker of NetBSD's SPARC support, and has written too much code to mention.

We are certainly willing to accept (and would very much like to see) future contributions from Theo, but we believe that it is inappropriate for him to be an "official" representative of the project any longer."


He was an ass back then and has not changed much. He is very much the arrogant-brilliant-programmer-a$$hole personality stereotype. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? That's almost two in a row. I'm really starting to agree with others that this flamebait is only posted to generate hits on the site.

Frankly, all of these so-called articles only go to prove that the agressive trolling these days is performed not by Linux advocates, but by anti-Linux ones. When was the last time and equivalent anti-MS article was posted here?

Some balance would be appreciated. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Torvalds, via e-mail, says De Raadt is 'difficult' and declined to comment further."

Its good to see Linus did not drop down to Theo's level. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Between this and the JBoss article, I have to assume that Forbes is on an all out attack on OSS.

Have the aristocrats decided that the little people are getting a little to "uppity" with their fancy "OSS community" and such? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Isn't this the same man that just said he has never used linux before? How would he know anything about it?

From Newsforge

Theo de Raadt: I don't know. I have never run Linux.

http://os.newsforge.com/os/05/06/09/2132233.shtml?tid=152&tid=8... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? rofl

" "You know what I found? Right in the kernel, in the heart of the operating system, I found a developer's comment that said, 'Does this belong here?' "Lok says. "What kind of confidence does that inspire? Right then I knew it was time to switch." " Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? From the Newsforge article http://os.newsforge.com/os/05/06/09/2132233.shtml?tid=8&tid=2

NF: The BSDs are still considered by some to be more technically correct than the Linux kernel. Linus Torvalds has said in the past that it's not all about technology. Do you think the BSD project you work on is better technically for some or all uses than GNU/Linux (in general)?

Theo de Raadt: I don't know. I have never run Linux.

So now he's an expert on Linux? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hello,

I've been using GNU/Linux at home and freebsd on servers for several years. Now I also use FreeBSD on my main computer as a desktop system.

GNU/Linux looks like a systems made up of many patches. Some distros package everything without checking if it all works (like SuSE). Many years ago, I wasn't able to recompile the kernel source of a free version of redhat. I found a stupid syntax error in their source code. Other distros on the other hand, try to make sure that the whole system is very stable, easy to update ... (like Debian, Slack). But in both cases, the systems aren't that coherent, the documentation has to be gathered from many sources, sometimes the even the man page don't look the same, the configuration utilities aren't really synchronized with the rest of the system, the different modules seem to ignore each other ...

FreeBSD is supervised by a team that tries to make the most coherent system, that published a book that is as up to date as possbile, and even that most of the 12500 applications which are ported to FreeBSD can work on the same system with as little conflicts are possible.

So even if GNU/Linux may have more advanced drivers, even be faster and not more crash prone than FreeBSD, easier to install; in the long run, it is more difficult to maintain a production machine, a server or a desktop machine with GNU/Linux than with FreeBSD.

This being said, I think it's sad to start insulting each other. De Raad may do a fantastic job, but that shouldn't be a reason to ridicule people who prefere to used to more advanced system that has more recent drivers, a system they feel more confortable with; even if it's not as well written as OpenBSD Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Wherein Linus was asked how he felt about Linux's competition. I remember he was vague and general because the interviewer asked him vague and general questions, but he wasn't mean.

To paraphrase, he said that Linux is meant to be good for most cases and usage patterns most of the time. He wants it to be the best choice for 80%-90% of all users. Not "good enough" but actually GOOD as in useful, reliable, high performance, and worth the time and effort to switch to. His criticism of the BSD families was that they were too focused on "perfection". He later described how perfection was the enemy of good because it leads to ignorance of what people actually need and when they need it.

So, he admitted that there are warts in Linux for a reason, and that they are sometimes unavoidable. Mind you, it was in a roundabout way, but he did imply it strongly. Allowing non-critical warts lets them improve the kernel faster. Thus, Linux moves faster and keeps up better with emerging technologies (being a corporate darling also helps -- first OS to boot successfully in 64 bit mode on x86-64). Critical flaws tend to get fixed rather quickly. Now, this sounds like the Microsoft Way except the Linux team has a better definition of good, I think.

Theo de Raadt is a jerk. A brilliant jerk, but a jerk. I like OpenBSD and it serves its stated purposes quite well (though it's no OpenVMS ;-). I also think that Net and Free are also nifty for their own reasons. They are all good Unix-ish OS'es. Theo does not need to bash other projects to improve his own, because OpenBSD can stand on its own merits. Linux, for all its merits and flaws, is popular and useful for many things here and now. It is the opensource world's poster child, and making arguments for what SHOULD have or COULD have happened is pointless.

Finally, most BSD users I know are not as immature as portrayed in that article. I hope it is not meant to be representative of the community.

--JM Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? if he claims everywhere that he NEVER used, touched, smelled linux.

I can say if a movie sucks by the trailler, but i'm mature enough to acknowledge that i was wrong with some of them, so i try to at least watch most of them.

not that i'm defending linux, i rather beos or even windows as a desktop and about some years ago i switched back to BSD on my servers. I'm just calling theo a egocentric witch hunter that think he knows all the trhuth. at least READ some fucking code, there may be nice ideas there, despite the code being shitty. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://linux.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=153049&cid=12842053

:) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? So fat kids who have never been kissed, idiots, loosers are the stereotype linux users? Lets not forget about those blacks and mexicans too.... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Which is better? I think this question needs an addition: "Better for what?" FreeBSD performs better for some tasks, while Linux is the right choice for others and OpenBSD is known for its security concerns... FreeBSD or Linux? Both are good choices, although I still prefer FreeBSD... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Here's the "proof in the pudding" you spoke about:

http://lwn.net/Articles/118251/

To quote Brad Spengler, author of grsecurity:

"Using 'advanced static analysis': "cd drivers; grep copy_from_user -r ./* |
grep -v sizeof", I discovered 4 exploitable vulnerabilities in a matter
of 15 minutes. More vulnerabilities were found in 2.6 than in 2.4. It's a pretty sad state of affairs for Linux security when someone can find 4 exploitable vulnerabilities in a matter of minutes"

"I'd really like to know what's being done about this pitiful trend of
Linux security, where it's 10x as easy to find a vulnerability in the
kernel than it is in any app on the system, where isec releases at
least one critical vulnerability for each kernel version."

ROFL

Until the Linux community and the kernel developers get serious about real security, Linux is going to go the way of Windows. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This is embarrasing, every OS has it's advantages and disadvantages. Theo stooping down to that level does not suit him, I prefer FreeBSD over Linux but have to admit Linux is great talk about usability, applications stability Linux is no less than FreeBSD or OpenBSD. I am sure that Theo has not used Linux, like Linus probably would not have used FreeBSD or OpenBSD but if Theo has not used Linux how can he comment on it. Linux kernel has improved a great deal wiht time and would conitnue to do so. These comments by Theo are so lame, I never expected a programing guru would seak like that, what do I know. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Well, I'm really skinny, use linux and my wife kisses me all the time! I must be an outsider... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Just a quick comment about a reply posted above:

All I have to say is Theo is an ass. He's a terrific coder but to bash something because it has a different design principle than your stuff is stupid.

I agree he's a bit of an ass, but isn't the bashing that linux supporters do against windows exactly because it has 'a different design principle'? Sorry, but your comment is not justified at all! Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Theo de Raadt did not say Linux is for losers.

Theo's legitimate concerns are not with the specifics of Linux, as he has not examined or used Linux itself. His legitimate concerns are with some of the design aspects of Linux that differ from how he and other OpenBSD members have implemented OpenBSD.

Take the whole article with a grain of salt, and don't get too stressed out about it.

Linux is a unix, just like the BSDs. Both Linux and the BSDs undergo substantial structural changes in major components just about every year, thus the valid complaints for one year are non-issues in the next...as long as you agree on the changes. Theo often does not agree with changes in Linux...but has only limited knowledge of Linux so his comments are not from a deep understanding of the specific details. Does this make them invalid? Not necessarily...just suspect. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Ok, it's kinda fair that Theo trounces on Linux for poor security but is it really fair for him to do the same for Windows. For all we know, Windows might be a lot more secure than Linux and I don't see how he would know any better considering it is close source. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Breaking News: Eugenia Loli-Queru posts sensationalist headline on OSnews, trolls everywhere take the bait.

This site is getting ridiculous Eugenia, this site has been spiraling downwards in quality for a while now.. you should go work for Fox News, i think your talents would serve you well there. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Theo de Raadt is a jerk. A brilliant jerk, but a jerk."

Yep. As such, people should take what he says in that context.

I have friends who are jerks. I adjust to meet them at that level and do not expect them to break down and be gushing with sensitivity. If they say something nice, it's almost always said along with something nasty.

(Good comments btw...just replying to this one part for the benifit of others who may not know of Theo's rep.) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Why should someone listen to a guy, requesting you to calculate partition sizes manualy with a calulatur during installation of his operating system? Damnit: Every computer is a very capable and expensive calculator. It was created exactly for the purpose to save you from such dull task like calculating parition boundaries. The operating system I am talking about was OpenBSD 3.5. After that experience I just can not take Theo serious anymore.

Btw: Really do not know, why Theo the Rat tries to split the community permanently.
Btw2: Everyone who has looked into the source code of OpenSSH once, just can laugh about any "Code Quality" statement made by Theo. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Lets see my SuSE distro is easy to use for a ex-windows user, well I still game on windows show me a user freindly BSD & I will look at it. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? He needs to realize it all comes down to just one thing: the license. I don't care how much better he thinks BSD is, the license is the reason Linux has more support. Complain all you want about the "viral" nature of the GPL, but it is the reason Linux has the support that BSD doesn't have.

If you are a developer, do you want your hard *free* work to then be used by another company in a proprietary, closed-source product? Of course not. As just one example, the BSD folks worked hard to build a TCP/Ip stack which Microsoft then took and integrated to fill an important gap in their product.

Similarly, companies aren't thrilled abou the GPL either, but at least it puts them all on level ground. The BSD license means that some will give while others just take. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 16:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I know a number of programmers like that.

In fact, I used to have a boss like that and I am sooo glad I don't work with him anymore.

If I were to try a BSD, I'd try NetBSD.

I like Fedora Core 3 and will be installing FC4 this weekend. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Theo never said Linux is for losers. And he's right about the code quality anyway. A lot of the code in Linux simply blows. That's the price you pay for using the bazaar model. FWIW, Linux has become way too mainstream to be attractive to hardcore geeks. Any random bozo can pop a SuSe DVD into his computer and start using Linux. The rest of us are running less known operating systems and keep our geeky status. Kissing girls? Who cares about that. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? OpenBSD is not even on the same level as GNU/Linux. GNU/Linux is an enterprise operating system, with enterprise features. OpenBSD still has trouble running on SMP, and can't run on PPC64 or Itanium architectures.

In reality there is no comparision between *BSD and GNU/Linux, except on low-end servers or the desktop, and GNU/Linux still is better. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I hear alot of people claim that Microsoft uses the BSD TCP/IP stack; however, has this ever been substantiated by Microsoft?

Perhaps if anyone knows drobbins, he can provide some input? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Fuck, emerge alife .... X.org sucks along with all its windowmanagers!!! ... CLI rulez though .... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This site is getting ridiculous Eugenia, this site has been spiraling downwards in quality for a while now.. you should go work for Fox News, i think your talents would serve you well there.


I'd rather have this community on OSNEWs than any "mutual admiration society" who hang out on LinuxToday or SlashDot. Infact LinuxToday and SlashDot are more like Fox News because you're never allowed to voice any criticism to Linux. You get shouted down by all the sheeple.


Eugenia, don't change a thing!. Keep posting articles that show what a house of cards the linux community and business is built on. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "You get shouted down by all the sheeple."

And how is that different from getting shouted down here by Mac fanatics, Windows fanatics, BeOS fanatics, etc?? Welcome to the internet. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:23:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Is Windows for losers?" but we already know the answer to that... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Here we go with the flame bait...

"These companies used to have to pay to develop Unix. They had in-house engineers who wrote new features when customers wanted them. Now they just allow the user community to do their own little hacks and features, trying to get to the same functionality level, and they're just putting pennies into it," De Raadt says.

I agree with this statement... Unfortunatelly, 1000's of developers working on linux, as someone pointed out on a previous post, does not translate to a useable and/or secure product. Many have been the examples of missed opportunities because of Linux Community's inability or just plain refusal to listen to the user community (non-programmers) on requested features. Then we bitch and moan about companies like RH, Novell and IBM having so much control of the direction of Linux software.

FOSS as a distributed development model seems to work but as a business, that's where it fails to meet expectations and will eventually catch up with it's products when their software fails to be considered for mission critical functions because of it's inability to cope with enduser demands. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? just plain refusal to listen to the user community (non-programmers) on requested features.


What features are you talking about, anything specific? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? it works for me, i do not care about marketing trends or desktop fashion, i just want something to work without scams, viruses & worms, and draconian EULAs that include long strings of numbers & letters for product keys and product registration crapola... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I'm tired of the need to answer to flame baits with arguments. There is nowhere to go from this kind of discussion, just like putting any other OS against Windows. Everyone by now should've got to the point of understanding the drawbacks of each OS they experienced, this kind of talk which Theo also did is the kind of stuff that mature IT professionals shouldn't get into. It looks like kids in school comparing each other's father, saying which is stronger, or has a better car... Is there a need for him to do this? He's so good dodging questions sometimes, why doesn't he do it everytime? Every OS is a work in progress, there are problems in all, and the community gathered around each one is working to solve them to make it better. Why is there a need for making something look better by bashing something else?

BSD users kiss girls? But it looks like they need to say it... why?

:-) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Too numerous to list... But recall the whole debate with the GNOME Desktop guys and their reluctance to include any feature that was not proposed and implemented by its own programmer.

Another example is the kernel debates everytime a major release comes out as to what features make it and which don't. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "sour grape" is very an appropriate word to describe these cooments. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I got nothing against *BSD, i just want to say this article is crap and that guy is an ass. Linus did the right thing by saying he is "difficult" and refusing any more comments.

Also the article says Linux is a unix clone. I am not sure what they mean by clone, but as we all know, the linux kernel was originally written independantly and completely separatly from unix.

And just for the fun of it, as if unix didnt have any "interesting" comments in source code:

ttp://cloanto.com/logoff/

I guess Dennis Ritchie must be a complete incompetent idiot who doesnt know how to program... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Unfortunatelly, 1000's of developers working on linux, as someone pointed out on a previous post, does not translate to a useable and/or secure product

Feel free to explain why you think according to your knowledge the developers of "the Linux" community hasn't taken security initiatives,without quoting others.I would like to see your very technical view on the matter,for instance why Linux is so insecure.Thought so,you can't.

Many have been the examples of missed opportunities because of Linux Community's inability or just plain refusal to listen to the user community (non-programmers) on requested features.

Well i appears to be likely that most *BSD users who troll here haven't used Linux at all or seek comfort at *BSD for their inabillity to succeed with Linux.

I can hardly believe that Mr de Raadt has really said what appears to be said in this article.If you believe 50% of what the media says you believe still to much.Other than that believing is good for religeous people with all respect but i think in facts in. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? And how is that different from getting shouted down here by Mac fanatics, Windows fanatics, BeOS fanatics, etc??


Just by the fact that we have Mac, Windows and BeOS guys hanging out here. You never find these guys on Slashdot or LinuxToday. LinuxToday never even posts your comments if they flame Linux.


I have no problems with Windows/Mac/BSD/BeOS/Solaris fanatics - it's healthy to listen to their side of the computing world.


Linux is becoming so much like the republican party - they don't want you to hear how bad Linux has gotten. and they don't want you to hear how poor developers and engineers are getting because of open source. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? ...about the comment in the kernel code cracks me up. I put wiseacre comments in my code all of the time, intermingled with long comments about the process or function the code is about to perform along with brief descriptions of the reasons for doing what I am doing. My coworkers like to review my code because it is both amusing to read my comments, but at the same time my code acts as its own documentation.

So what if a coder put "does this belong here?" in the code!! We all encounter those kind of doubts even after lengthy design sessions and modeling... In some cases it will be obvious, in others there will ALWAYS be some doubt because the change might be good if the future moves in one direction, or problematic if it moves in another.

Sorry for the rant. That one just irritated me. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:51:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Linux is becoming so much like the republican party - they don't want you to hear how bad Linux has gotten. and they don't want you to hear how poor developers and engineers are getting because of open source.

We're all ears. Go ahead. [puts elbows on table and chin on fists...waiting]

It's easy to call someone closed minded. I doubt that you can get beyond the name calling and produce some substance. Keep in mind that it should have some substance that is beyond what other operating systems suffer from...or your point will be seen as simple hand waving. Expect tit for tat. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I think that it depends on what you're after. sure linux is pretty lame when compared to windows and apple software, but remember: it is a hobby OS, not a serious OS. and certainly, the technology underneath it is kind of hokey, I think. I mean if you want to do real stuff, with a real computer then you should use windows or OSX, because you can buy them in stores. nobody really does anything serious with Linux - there aren't any businesses that use it to make money, and people generally aren't enthusiastic about it. technical advantages matter too - look at how windows is technically better than OSX, and has taken the market over. in terms of BSD, yes it is better than Linux technically, so it will therefore take over linux probably. a free OS is also the same as an OS you can buy in a store, except that it's not as good - otherwise it's the same. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 17:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The world is full of blowhards who mistake their opinions for the laws of nature. They may be brilliant, accomplished people, but no less blowhards for it. It may make them worse, if anything, since, being right in some things, they will think themselves right in all things. Furthermore, being right, they don't have to be fair... or kind. No weak-minded sentiments for them!

I don't care how smart and accomplished he is. Nor do I care what forums he manages to get into, Mr. De Raadt is in full blowhard mode here. There's nothing to discuss since he's 'right', so I say "thank you for sharing." Now let's move on to the next topic. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I agree.

I think that it depends on what you're after. sure Windows and OSX aree pretty lame when compared to Linux or BSD software, but remember: it is an end user OS, not an industrial strenth OS and can't even run on mainframes. and certainly, the technology underneath it is kind of hokey, I think. I mean if you want to do real stuff, with a real computer then you should use Linux or one of the BSDs, because you can modify the source. nobody really does anything serious with Linux - there aren't any businesses that use it to make money, and people generally aren't enthusiastic about it. technical advantages matter too - look at how OSX is technically better than Windows, and has been sold to an elite group. in terms of Linux, yes it is better than BSD technically, so it will therefore take over BSD probably. an end user OS is also the same as an OS you can put on servers, except that it's not as good - otherwise it's the same.

Perspective is important! Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You guys take this stuff way too seriously for your own good. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:06:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I have no problems with Windows/Mac/BSD/BeOS/Solaris fanatics - it's healthy to listen to their side of the computing world.

In other words, you're biased. Well, at least you don't try to hide it!

BTW, there are plenty of anti-Linux comments in Slashdot threads. But since they are usually trolls or flamebait they get modded down. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? i can feel the jealousy radiating from him....
that is ALL i get from what he is saying, he should just break down into a screaming fit tantrum about how his OS is better and he should have all those devleopers back.... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:10:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? While I agree with what Theo said ("It's terrible", "Everyone is using it, and they don't realize how bad it is.", "This is garbage and we should fix it."), The BSDs are no better. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:10:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I have no problems with Windows/Mac/BSD/BeOS/Solaris fanatics - it's healthy to listen to their side of the computing world.

In other words, you're biased. Well, at least you don't try to hide it!

BTW, there are plenty of anti-Linux comments in Slashdot threads. But since they are usually trolls or flamebait they get modded down. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Mods, can you delete please? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? i am going back to windows or at least hop over to apple while they are still ppc Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:16:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? nobody really does anything serious with Linux - there aren't any businesses that use it to make money, and people generally aren't enthusiastic about it.

This is completely false and you know it. Counter-example abounds: just take Google - they're making a lot of money with Linux, and you can't say that they're not doing something "serious" with it.

technical advantages matter too - look at how windows is technically better than OSX, and has taken the market over.

This has nothing to do with technical superiority. In fact, most people will agree that OSX is superior to Windows - most people except die-hard MS fanboys and astroturfers, that is. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? does Theo have room to talk?

i tried OpenBSD at v 3.3 (and other versions). it was OK, but the default desktop was terrible looking. terrible fonts. and several packages and ports were broken. i hear some of this was fixed in 3.4.

for what it's worth, i have run into very few broken linux packages (from various distros). Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Help me feel in the blanks , please :

Theo : Single ( or Gay ? ) , Radical , live in an apartment with is two cats ?

South African who emigrated to CANADA.

Beer drinker.

As a mountain bike ...

Only as 1 project attached to his creation :

http://www.openbsd.org/

Wikipedia :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theo_de_Raadt

Personnal website :

http://zeus.theos.com/deraadt/

Work as a consultant

Net worth ???

------

Linus Benedict Torvalds

Beer drinker.

Creator and God of the Linux Kernel.

Co Creator of the GNU/Linux OS ( is kernel is what drive GNU/Linux ).

More then 500 company Created GNU/Linux company with the help of is Kernel and GNU OS.

Married ( wife Tove (six-time Finnish national Karate champion) )

Father of : three daughters Patricia Miranda (born December 5, 1996), Daniela Yolanda (born April 16, 1998) and Celeste Amanda (born November 20, 2000).

Worked for Transmetta and now work for Open Source Development Labs.

As cars ...

Awarded the takeda award in 2001 for Social/Economic Well-Being with Richard Stallman and Ken Sakamura

As a house.

Is probably a Millionaire ( Is often offered share in GNU/Linux company who make it to market as a gesture of good will )

Is own work is the base for more then 500 company working directly on GNU/Linux distributions :

http://distrowatch.com/

--------

can someone remind me what define a looser ? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > Based on this guys attitude, I seriously doubt he's ever kissed a girl.

Doesn't Theo kiss guys? I vaguely recall someone telling me that he likes males.

Theo isn't an idiot; he's socially retarded. I doubt very much if he cares if you want to try OpenBSD. If you select your technical solutions based primarily on the personality of the lead developer then you're likely not going to use it on anything noteworthy. From his perspective, you not using OpenBSD probably equates to one less whiny guy asking how to run Doom through the linux syscall layer, or how to setup networking. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Just by the fact that we have Mac, Windows and BeOS guys hanging out here. You never find these guys on Slashdot or LinuxToday."

What? You can't be serious. Slashdot has hordes of Mac fanatics and quite Windows ones as well. Go into a Mac thread over there, criticize Apple and watch what happens to you. And despite what OSnews readers think, there are an awful lot of Windows users at Slashdot who will also engage in flame wars.


"I have no problems with Windows/Mac/BSD/BeOS/Solaris fanatics - it's healthy to listen to their side of the computing world."

Actually the point was that fanatics of any type are not really a good thing, but that they exist for all operating systems.


"Linux is becoming so much like the republican party - they don't want you to hear how bad Linux has gotten. and they don't want you to hear how poor developers and engineers are getting because of open source."

Dude, this could apply to any open source project if one is not happy with the direction it's moving in or thinking its missing a particular feature, but at least in open source there's discussion about the various projects in open forum. With closed source, you don't even get to expres an opinion to them. They do what they're going to do and really don't care if you like it or not. Somebody else will buy it even if you won't. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Is there really any point at all to internet forums if not for the flame wars and the trolls? How much sensible discussion goes on anyway? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? There this should make every happy Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:41:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Don't discredit everything this guy says. I think BSD is actually better-designed than Linux from an OS theory point of view.

Here are some concrete reasons why:

(1) Linux's loadable kernel module feature is great, but it is also the least stable part of the whole OS. Modules which don't clean up after themselves before being unloaded can leave the OS in a strange "defunct" state, causing all sorts of erratic behavior. For example, a kernel module can crash, but the OS can still remain online. This often leads module writers to "not mind a crash here or there." In most OSes, any sort of crash in kernel space means the system goes down, so any bugs leading to them are showstoppers and must be ironed out.

(2) Unloading kernel modules is very buggy. Admittedly, in 2.6 kernel developers recognized this and turned off module unloading by default, but this is sometimes unavoidable. For example, because most modules don't pick up suspend/resume calls from laptops, the only way to do a proper suspend/resume cycle is to unload modules of the related devices, and reload them on resume. Also very bad. (Admittedly, I don't know how suspend/resume works on BSDs, if at all... but Apple got it to work somehow with Darwin, I know that much).

(3) Better theories are employed, rather than the "most popular" stuff or "whatever gets written by volunteers". So, for example, FreeBSD scales up a lot better, especially under heavy network load. Disk I/O performance is better. And more than anything else, though Linux may be stable, BSD is definitely yet more stable.

(4) Fragmentation of distros and package management. I like choice, but the hard truth is we have our own kind of dependency hell in the Linux world. It's not good enough to say "My package installs on Linux." You have to say "Redhat Linux" or "Slackware Linux" or "Debian Linux" or "Linspire" or whatever. The BSD ports system is more predictable.

(5) Better security audits (especially OpenBSD).

As for a little personal story, I've been running Linux on an Averatec 3250. I am sure most of this hardware wouldn't even work on BSD, but guess what: I ain't stable. Here are predictable ways I can crash my OS:

(1) If I restart my XServer and then try to run a DRI application (like glxgears) I hardlock. This is a bug somewhere between the DRI.sf.net and unichrome.sf.net projects.

(2) If I suspend my machine with a Netgear WG511 (prism54) card still inserted, my machine won't resume when I come back.

(3) If I eject my Netgear WG511 without downing the interface (ifconfig eth1 down), I hard lock. Sometimes, I can't down the interface because it reports that the interface is "busy".

(4) My RAlink rt2500 can't be suspended without being downed, or the kernel will infinitely tell me that "wlan0 is in use (usage_count=1)"

(5) If I use an external 20GB hard drive via a PCMCIA IDE adapter, I must use the ide_cs module. This module works most of the time, but sometimes after long periods of write activity to the drive, it will "lose interrupt", my kernel will take over my CPU (100% utilization in kernel mode), and my only option will be to unload the ide_cs module (can't umount the drive or anything). When I try to unload it, it says it's "busy" so I do a forced removal. This stops the kernel mode 100% usage, but makes it so it is impossible for me to continue using the drive without a full reboot.

So, though the hardware may be "supported," it definitely is not always stable. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? He's a longtime Microsoft schill and FUDster; and I'll bet he's printing Theo's comments way out of context. OpenBSD & Linux certainly have different design philosophies, but I can't imagine the likes of Theo or Linus (or even Bill Gates!) publicly calling a rival operating system "Garbage".

Anyways they may look simular, but it's a comparison between apples & avacado's. I'd call OpenBSD -the one- for security concious server farmers, but "Hardcore geeks only" need apply (in fact I'd have difficulty thinking of OpenBSD & Linux as "rival" operating systems. FreeBSD & Linux maybe...) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Let de Raadt look at himselfs first.
The world isnt run on secure software, nobody wants it, we want tools and if possible more stable than windows. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I don't get it. Why do people always feel the need to start arguing about stupid stuff. I use Windows for games, linux as a desktop and openbsd as a router. Some software is just better at there own little things. All this areguing about "Real men use BSD" is just dumb ok. Software is Software, a tool to be used for whatever is best. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? thanks alot ;-) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "the gist being that BSD guys are a lot like Linux guys, except they have kissed girls."

Kissing your mother doesn't count... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? ...thats why i enjoy hitting on linux once in a while. im so sick of seeing those jerks talking shit about microsoft everyday on slashdot/osnews.

its funny to see how they react when someone else attack linux. linux is far from being the best os anyway. still, i have a debian box because im not closed mind but honestly, this is the worst os i use :] i use linux when i feel like getting raped by micheal Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? *BSD is still better because it has the 'S' in it Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Software is Software, a tool to be used for whatever is best.

Are you implying Linux isn't the best for eveything??? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? (4) Fragmentation of distros and package management. I like choice, but the hard truth is we have our own kind of dependency hell in the Linux world. It's not good enough to say "My package installs on Linux." You have to say "Redhat Linux" or "Slackware Linux" or "Debian Linux" or "Linspire" or whatever.

At least you don't generalize in this part of your response.

The BSD ports system is more predictable.

Which of the BSD's you have in mind?What is a bit annoying is when one distro fucks up suddenly it's *Linux* this *Linux* that.

Don't discredit everything this guy says. I think BSD is actually better-designed than Linux from an OS theory point of view.

What facts does he have to bring forward i ask you.He doesn't scientifically *prove* neither do you.At least you try to sum some advantages and less heresay.I might as well say don't generalize Linux.Or do you think hardened-gentoo,Adamantix (Trusted-Debian),Open Wall Linux to name a few aren't distros with security in mind just as OpenBSD appears to be?

Better theories are employed, rather than the "most popular" stuff or "whatever gets written by volunteers"

All who contribute code to the varies *BSD projects are full-time employed by the project,and not volunteers?

(1) If I restart my XServer and then try to run a DRI application (like glxgears) I hardlock. This is a bug somewhere between the DRI.sf.net and unichrome.sf.net projects.

Somewhere?Where? How would you know?Let me guess,heresay. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Discussion of issues with Linux (esp. modules) and mixed results. BSD not working at all on some hardware also mentioned.

"So, though the hardware may be "supported," it definitely is not always stable."

Thnanks for the detailed and thoughtful post. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? As for a little personal story, I've been running Linux on an Averatec 3250. I am sure most of this hardware wouldn't even work on BSD, but guess what: I ain't stable. Here are predictable ways I can crash my OS:

As a coincidence, I also run Linux (Kubuntu) on an Averatec 3250HX (very nice little machine, btw) – if you don't mind, I'd be interested in hearing more about your experiences. Note, however, that I haven't encountered quite the same bugs as you, so it may be a question of which distro/kernel you use.

(1) If I restart my XServer and then try to run a DRI application (like glxgears) I hardlock. This is a bug somewhere between the DRI.sf.net and unichrome.sf.net projects.

I don't have this problem here. I use xorg, so this might be the issue – unless there are some specific steps to follow reproduce the bug...can you give me a step-by-step example?
My problem with the display so far is that I can only use 1024x768, and not any smaller resolutions (or higher ones, but that's because 1024x768 is the maximum...)

(2) If I suspend my machine with a Netgear WG511 (prism54) card still inserted, my machine won't resume when I come back.

I've heard about this problem, however since I only use the built-in wireless adapter I haven't experienced it. Is there a reason why you use a separate WiFi card instead of the built-in adapter? (Performance?) I'm wonder if this isn't a hotplug issue...

(3) If I eject my Netgear WG511 without downing the interface (ifconfig eth1 down), I hard lock. Sometimes, I can't down the interface because it reports that the interface is "busy".

See above (hotplug issue, perhaps).

(4) My RAlink rt2500 can't be suspended without being downed, or the kernel will infinitely tell me that "wlan0 is in use (usage_count=1)"

I thought the suspend scripts deactivated network interfaces by default? I know on mine this isn't an issue. Actually, the bug I encountered is a bit different. If my network card is up when I suspend, it will not come back when I resume. I added a "Reset Wireless Network" button on my panel (a very simple script that simply does a "sudo ifdown ra0 && sudo ifup ra0" then plays a sound) so it's not a big deal. This is when using the rt2500 module – with ndiswrapper the network comes back on by itself (but then I can't use the nifty raconfig utility!).

(5) If I use an external 20GB hard drive via a PCMCIA IDE adapter, I must use the ide_cs module. This module works most of the time, but sometimes after long periods of write activity to the drive, it will "lose interrupt", my kernel will take over my CPU (100% utilization in kernel mode), and my only option will be to unload the ide_cs module (can't umount the drive or anything). When I try to unload it, it says it's "busy" so I do a forced removal. This stops the kernel mode 100% usage, but makes it so it is impossible for me to continue using the drive without a full reboot.

Okay, this one is pretty bad. I'm happy you told me, because I was planning on getting an external drive. This has motivated me to get a USB drive instead of a PCMCIA-based one (in any case, that will make it easier to share among my various computers). Have you tried with a newer kernel?
I'm curious, did you ever get Sleep (Suspend-to-Ram) working? Hibernate (Suspend-to-Disk) works great, but I wouldn't mind using Sleep sometimes. Actually, Sleep works, it's just that I haven't found a way to resume from it without rebooting!

Other than that, I'm quite happy with my purchase – wireless mobile computing is very cool, and so is DVD-writing! Yay! Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? If you can find a way to play battlefield 2 on linux and use the hardware to its fullest without emulation, let me know. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:13:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Wine/WineX/Cedega is not an emulator. Just thought you should know. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Yes, they are emulators, unless you want to get all geeky and technical about it. It's the same thing to the end user. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "the gist being that BSD guys are a lot like Linux guys, except they have kissed girls."

Well BSD'ers can kiss my a... [Eh? What? Oh, sorry].

The moderators inform me that the remark I was about to make is unacceptable because it is not sufficiently crude and boorish for this thread, which started low and is sinking fast. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > I'd rather have this community on OSNEWs than any "mutual
> admiration society" who hang out on LinuxToday or SlashDot.
> Infact LinuxToday and SlashDot are more like Fox News
> because you're never allowed to voice any criticism to
> Linux. You get shouted down by all the sheeple.

Slashdot is populated mostly by Windows users. Yes, if you say something that offends the sensibilities of one of the parties, just like here, you'll find a pointless flamewar between factions of typically-ignorant cheerleaders. If there's any difference between OSNews and Slashdot it's that Slash's interface is slightly less obnoxious, and Slashdot is run by enough people that they duplicate-post their flamebait articles. There are probably more knowledgeable people posting on Slashdot than OSNews, but since there are also more idiots it's only slightly more useful to read the comments of the typical Slashdot article.

What you can do here, since there's no real moderation system here, is say a lot of stupid, simply incorrect things and have anyone bothering to read the comments maybe read them. Slashdot's moderation system is mostly useless at promoting quality to the top, but it does succeed in pushing some of the crap to -1.

> Just by the fact that we have Mac, Windows and BeOS guys
> hanging out here. You never find these guys on Slashdot or
> LinuxToday. LinuxToday never even posts your comments if
> they flame Linux.

It's rare for a computer-related discussion at Slashdot to not include a flamewar or six between operating system zealots. I have no idea about LinuxToday, and I don't intend to educate myself about their policies.

> Just by the fact that we have Mac, Windows and BeOS guys
> hanging out here. You never find these guys on Slashdot or
> LinuxToday. LinuxToday never even posts your comments if
> they flame Linux.

No, it's usually pretty stupid and pointless. That I've bothered to read the fruitless ramblings of morons on Internet forums for so many years tells me that I should probably travel more.

> Eugenia, don't change a thing!. Keep posting articles that
> show what a house of cards the linux community and
> business is built on.

I'm sure that she'll keep posting obvious flamebait. Flamebait attracts more comments. More comments attract more readers. More readers = more page hits = larger ego boost. Just like Slashdot, only the page hits are a good source of revenue for OSDN in that case. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:28:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? ...rather it's for zealots!

Some id10t in a previous post compared OSS to the republican party! What a moron! How in the hell do you make that comparison?

Linux and OSS is just a refuge for MS-haters.

Get a life! Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? OSNEWS the Boulevard press of Operating Systems. Honestly i don't know why they even bothered to put it up here ... reimnds me of THE Sun (English trash newspaper) or Bild (german eqivalent) - badly researched sensationalist headlines and articles just to attract readers. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I don't know why there's 108 comments about this; you people have way too much time. This is just plain sour grapes, and if he's talking about operating systems, then OpenBSD must suck badly as well because it uses a lot of the same software you find in any Linux distribution or Unix.

As for code quality, when OpenBSD can handle multi-processors as well as Linux can then he can give us all a call. When has there ever not been a comment in a piece of code with the words "Should this be here?". It's called thinking, using your brain and writing things down for other programmers to follow. Theo didn't make that comment on the quality of Linux code, but it's just silly nonetheless.

Yes, I know Theo has probably been taken out of context but he often brings it upon himself with some silly inflammatory comments. Linus Torvalds called it right when he labelled him difficult. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? It's called spending your free time saying inflammatory things on forums in order to feel intellectually superior to the people that respond. Yes, it's a fairly strange world that trolls live in. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hehehehe... I think he's correct. Windows is similar in that it's users also behave this way. But don't worry, OS X is coming. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:41:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You know we BSDers need a guy like that. We need marketing. I think what he said is good. It will get people curious about BSD in general and OpenBSD specificly. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Yes, they are emulators,

No they are not, they're API layer translators. It's important to make the distinction because the performance hit is much, much less than with emulation. With some games (especially OpenGL ones) the performance is almost on par as when running native (WarCraft III was a good example).

unless you want to get all geeky and technical about it. It's the same thing to the end user.

It's not about getting geeky or technical, it's about being accurate and truthful. And it's definitely NOT the same thing to the end user, as performance under emulation sucks. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Theo de Raadt: I know Linux.
Linus : Show me.

lol Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/sys/arch/mac68k/mac68k/ma...

that poor old crazy a$$ guy that switched from linux should look at this. search for does this belong. i wonder what he will switch to next after he sees that comment in openbsd. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 20:10:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Obviously, he's kidding. We know he isn't stupid :-) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 20:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? If De Raadt truly believe in core groups making systems he's no open source proponent; he's a Brooksian developer who believes code should be shared.
Open Source generally implies a large (large being a value which is hard to find and track) number of developers who aren't working together so much. Usually there's a core group that weeds the good from the bad and the large group makes submissions.

BSD tends to have some great stuff, but it also tends to be farther behind the times than Linux.

Now, is De Raadt talking about Linux or is he talking about "Linux?"

Anyway, it's a bad article. Kinda annoys me if De Raadt is really this cynical; but I'm hoping he was misquoted/misrepresented/minus-contexed... Fri, 17 Jun 2005 20:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "There's also a difference in motivation. "Linux people do what they do because they hate Microsoft. We do what we do because we love Unix,"
That's a flat out lie. Most of those people aren't developing. Very few people do creative work out of hatred; and that sort of creative work seems to never get finished (hate passes).
You do creative work for things that last: Love, a paycheck, your pride, etc.

I'm sorry he lovex Unix and not all good software, too bad for those other good ideas .

See, we can all make stupid implications based off a fact or two to discredit the other side! Fri, 17 Jun 2005 20:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This over-critical schizmatic (great word) attitude is one of the things that's always scared me off BSD's (although FBSD doesn't get into it so much; but people tell me it's the "linux" of the bsd world). I don't want to be a part of an elitist community of assholes (it's the right word for the attitude).

If every OSS programmer was this unable to get along with others we'd all form into core groups of 60 people working hard on reimplementing the same stuff over and over and over. And in the end, the best thing we'd produce would be a secure shell system.

There's something to be said for some social skills, we can't do everything by ourselves. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Am I going crazy, or did Mr. Theo de Raadt just throw a temper tantrum? Needs a time-out? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I don't have enough knowledge of the either source code for the kernel, but I do know that for the desktop user, linux is by far the best FOSS solution. I would be amazed if any BSD would recognize all the hardware automatically on my laptop like linux has. In this respect, BSD has a lot of work to do. However, PCBSD is an interesting project.

It's not about the damned desktop experience. It's about the quality of the kernel. Gnome/KDE can be made to just as good on any OS. On Linux supporting all the USB and Blue-Tooth coffe-makers is of great importance. On BSD/Solaris/etc. , it's more important to have a high-performance TCP/IP stack and integrated and very fast firewall/routing/shaping. This is where Linux really lags. Not to mention the complete lack of stability that linux-2.6 has. It shouldn't be called a stable branch. The Windows 2003 kernel has proven to be much more stable and reliable. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? It was fanning the flames of a barely existant OS war.

I use OS X, Free BSD, and Linux. They have different strengths. I sometimes use Windows. Again, different strengths.

As an end user, I trust FBSD the most of the 3 Unices. If I need OpenBSD, I'll use it. It's even more trustworthy. They all have two things I like: mature code, and generally less code.

Other OSs have their charms. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I'm a long-time Linux user from the early Red Hats and Caldera to Gentoo to just today installing Fedora 4 and I think that his comments regarding code quality are dead on. Like the article says in the bottom, I have also seen kernel code that says things like "does this belong here" or application code that says things like "fix me" or "finish me".

Theo may be more than a bit jealous that Linux has taken off where BSD hasn't so much but I don't think his comments should be disregarded because of it. Anyone who actually takes a look at some of the code almost immediately knows that, many times, code quality in Linux is not what it could be. There is often a push to get the latest and greatest software in Linux but, as a Linux user, I've seen more than my share of code that looks like it's been hacked together quickly. While it is hard to take from Theo,

Linux developers would do well to take heed of some of his comments. Recently I heard that Microsoft has been hiring hackers
http://slashdot.org/index.pl?issue=20050616
in order to show them the insecurities in their code in order to make their OS safer in the future. If/when that ever takes place, hackers are going to look for the next easiest target and Linux could find itself to be next unless some much better QA is put into place. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Some id10t in a previous post compared OSS to the republican party! What a moron! How in the hell do you make that comparison?


Here's the simple theorem:

Statement:
Microsoft said GPL/Linux/OSS is communism and you Linux guys blasted back and said that Microsoft is full of sh*t and that GPL/Linux is actually all about capitalism.

Therefore:
1) Republicans == Captitalism == Linux/GPL


Q.E.D.


Hahaa --- I actually feel sorry for you OSS/Linux zealots because you can't seem to win either way - if you say "we're all about capitalism" - you get branded republicans and conservatives. You say "we're all about sharing" and you get branded communists/socialists Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Like the article says in the bottom, I have also seen kernel code that says things like "does this belong here" or application code that says things like "fix me" or "finish me".

You do realize that such comments also appear in the BSD kernels, as others have already pointed out, right?

Similar funny and/or seemingly unprofessional comments are also to be found in the Windows source code:

http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/2/15/71552/7795

It seems to me that your comment was another attempt at FUD. For instance, why did you feel the need to specify that you were a long-time user? Was it to give yourself more credibility? The problem is that, since anyone can claim anything on the Internet, such self-awarded credentials are meaningless. The strength of one's argument is what counts.

Sure, Linux devs should always strive to make a better kernel, but such flamebait as what Theo wrote doesn't help in any way. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:41:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? and I'll say it again. Theo the RAT is an a**hole.
Plain and simple.
Have a nice day. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Hahaa --- I actually feel sorry for you OSS/Linux zealots because you can't seem to win either way - if you say "we're all about capitalism" - you get branded republicans and conservatives. You say "we're all about sharing" and you get branded communists/socialists

Actually, there's an easy way out of this. Linux is in fact "libertarian". Since you can either be a Libertarian Leftist (aka anarcho-syndicalists, like Noam Chomsky, for instance) or a Libertarian Rightist (aka anarcho-capitalists, like, er...I think Eric Raymond is one), then both labels can apply, depending on your political views.

Reducing everything to the left/right paradigm is misleading. I urge everyone to check out the Political Compass site for more on this matter:

http://www.politicalcompass.org/ Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Theo ...... waaaah.
-nX Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:10:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "You know what I found? Right in the kernel, in the heart of the operating system, I found a developer's comment that said, 'Does this belong here?' "Lok says. "What kind of confidence does that inspire? Right then I knew it was time to switch."

Sun developers put the word "Shit" in the Solaris source code. Guess Lok should switch any Solaris servers they have running. Jesus christ, what kind of piss poor management team would switch their entire product line to a new OS because of a comment in the source code.

And what exactly, may I ask, was the point of this article? Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:28:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Theo said in a different interview that he has never used Linux..Theo is much of a "f*** you" kinda guy, and he's very stubborn and stuckup.

P.S. He's ugly, too. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I run FreeBSD on al my desktops, including my old Toshiba laptop. It runs very fast and very stable :-) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? In Fact the Linux-Kernel is a shame, but hey! The whole GNU-System runs great! Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "If De Raadt truly believe in core groups making systems he's no open source proponent; he's a Brooksian developer who believes code should be shared.
Open Source generally implies a large (large being a value which is hard to find and track) number of developers who aren't working together so much. Usually there's a core group that weeds the good from the bad and the large group makes submissions"

This is so wrong in so many ways. The GPL might imply something of that nature but Open Source implies nothing of that nature. The only thing Open Source implies is that the source is readable and available to everyone. But of course, a GPL zealot would not know that GPL does not equal to open source. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? He may be rigth that OpenBSD is better, but the article contains very little to support that statement, other than mine is bigger than yours kind of statments.

Even if OpenBSD really was better, one would have to ask for what. If the applications I need isnt ported or the drivers for my hardware isn't available it doesn't matter if its better. It is of no use to me.

Articles like this one belongs at ./ There they can at least be moderated as troll. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? FreeBSD is supervised by a team that tries to make the most coherent system, that published a book that is as up to date as possbile, and even that most of the 12500 applications which are ported to FreeBSD can work on the same system with as little conflicts are possible.

[Updating the portsdb in /usr/ports ... - 13101 port entries found .........1000.........2000.........3000.........4000.........5000..... ....6000.........7000.........8000.........9000.........10000......... 11000.........12000.........13000. ..... done] Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I havn't read all the comments, so someone might have already said this, but the guy must not have read the cathedral and the bazzar. He just doesnt know what he is talking about. Even MS is tring to mimick the way linux is developed. It just plain works well. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 22:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Lets see my SuSE distro is easy to use for a ex-windows user, well I still game on windows show me a user freindly BSD & I will look at it.

My FreeBSD desktop as well. No graphical install doesn't mean it isn't userfriendly.. Fri, 17 Jun 2005 23:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I can hardly believe that Mr de Raadt has really said what appears to be said in this article.If you believe 50% of what the media says you believe still to much.Other than that believing is good for religeous people with all respect but i think in facts in.

Try to discuss something with him by email and find out.. ;-) Fri, 17 Jun 2005 23:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? And behind Linux there is Bill Gates, for whoever still hasn't understood this yet...
Linux is Gates' trojan horse to demolish the competition and so far it succeeded since it smashed IBM like never before as well as many other Companies/Corporations that were tricked into thinking that Linux was the best way to raise profits without investing as much as they did in the past in Unix programming/mantainance and such... and IBM was among those that invented UNIXes in practice, with AIX being among the best .. and still it got tricked due to its poor management full of retarded guys that can't see Gates' tricks and tactics... so Bill Gates managed to sink IBM for the 3rd time, the issue here is that this time IBM is going to bomb forever, it's just a question of time (and not so much at this point,the Company it's in its worst state thruout its whole history). Fri, 17 Jun 2005 23:40:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Unlike Linux, which is a clone of Unix, OpenBSD is based on an actual Unix variant called Berkeley Software Distribution.

clone
n : a group of genetically identical cells or organisms derived
from a single cell or individual by some kind of asexual
reproduction [syn: clon]
v : make multiple identical copies of; "people can clone a sheep
nowadays"


Source: The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (2003-OCT-10)

clone

1. An exact copy of a product, made legally or
illegally, from documentation or by reverse engineering,
and usually cheaper.

E.g. "PC clone": a PC-BUS/ISA, EISA, VESA, or PCI
compatible x86-based microcomputer (this use is sometimes
misspelled "klone" or "PClone"). These invariably have much more
bang per buck than the IB PCM they resemble.

E.g. "Unix clone": An operating system designed to deliver a
Unix-like environment without Unix licence fees or with
additional "mission-critical" features such as support for
real-time programming.

2. A clonebot.

[Jargon File]

(2000-06-15)
Source: Jargon File (4.3.1, 29 Jun 2001) Sat, 18 Jun 2005 00:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "This is so wrong in so many ways. The GPL might imply something of that nature but Open Source implies nothing of that nature. The only thing Open Source implies is that the source is readable and available to everyone. But of course, a GPL zealot would not know that GPL does not equal to open source."
Read the Cathedral and the Bazaar (usually called the Open Source manifesto) and then get back to me.

Open Source implies a lot more than readable. That's distributed source, viewable source, etc. Openness actually implies inclusion. For example:
"You're wrong, it's always been this way."

"Come on man, be more open minded!"

He wasn't saying: "Let me read your mind!" He was saying: "Let me manipulate your mind!"

Get it, got it, good . Sat, 18 Jun 2005 00:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I pretty much said that, but I didn't mention the book. Most people commenting here likely haven't read it. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 00:13:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I think that by suggesting that Theo is "a huge proponent of free software", you may be giving the wrong message, it would appear that he has no interest in free software, as defined by the FSF(http://www.fsf.org/), but rather in plain old open source, sources are available, but there's no reason why a company can't take said sources, make extensive changes to them, produce a commercial product, and give absolutely nothing, other than a tiny copyright notice, back to the community from which the sources came.

This discussion reminds me of Mac users, with no experience of using Windows, arguing with Windows users, with no experience of MacOS, about why their OS is so much better than the other's, granted, in the above situation neither side has the benefit of source code and programming knowledge behind them, but the analogy still stands.

when he stated in a recent newsforge interview( http://os.newsforge.com/os/05/06/09/2132233.shtml?tid=8&tid=2 ) that he has never run linux, it really made me wonder.

We can all argue the toss to "prove" that something is better than the other, without ever actually getting anything productive from the discussion, but it's not something that one expects very much outside of teenhood.

OpenBSD is a minority OS, more so than linux, so he's going in for anything he can do to get a little media attention, sour grapes? yes, most probably. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 00:41:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Eugenia what the fuck was the point of postin this shit? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 01:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Da "Rant" was a loud one. Too much of that thin, Canadian mountain air makes one dopey!!

I don't see how Linux is poor quality, and for those that read the lists, you know there are even cross-collaborations between Linux and BSD's on many projects and even the occasional kernel issue. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 01:26:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? For all the l33t people:
Newbie: Hey yo what is that OS you using.
L33t0: Man, havent you heard of Linux? Screw Windows. I can do whatever I want with Linux.

I just sit their and watch that l33t0 guy pushed with the wave like others. Most people use Linux because they saw it as the only outlet from the Windows world. The way I saw it was all showing off to other people that there is something else free.

Then comes the new Era where Linux became more famous. You see professors uses Linux just because they heard of Linux as a new fantastic OS. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 02:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I personally use FreeBSD all the way along with this Windows PC where I chat and play games.

I found FreeBSD very easy to use. I am happy with What I have, just dont mention the L word to me I had a bad experience there. I would rather use Windows than use LLLLosers lol. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 02:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? First of all this is yet another utterly useless flame war between brothers.

BSDs are nirvana and linux " is garbage and we should fix it"?
Why then BSDs have a tiny fraction of the linux userbase?
Wait a moment, could it be because BSD developers are a bunch of elitists who couldn't care less about usability and ease of use? Could it be because BSDs as desktop operating systems are a nightmare? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 02:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? pulled from openbsd.misc:

From: Theo de Raadt
Subject: Re: Theo gave an interview to Forbes Mag. about Linux
Newsgroups: gmane.os.openbsd.misc
Date: 2005-06-17 16:13:37 GMT (10 hours and 12 minutes ago)

> On Fri, Jun 17, 2005 at 04:48:31PM +0200, J. Lievisse Adriaanse wrote:
> > Theo gave an interview to Forbes Magazine, in which he stated: "It's
> > terrible," De Raadt says. "Everyone is using it, and they don't
> > realize how bad it is. And the Linux people will just stick with it
> > and add to it rather than stepping back and saying, 'This is garbage
> > and we should fix it.'"
>
> Heh. Theo never did pull his punches. I suppose there's now a war going
> on in /. ?

If the Linux people actually cared about Quality, as we do, they would
not have had as many localhost kernel security holes in the last year.

How many is it... 20 so far?


http://article.gmane.org/gmane.os.openbsd.misc/83740

It speaks for itself. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 02:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Ever time I hear these BSDers going off about how stupid Linux is. Give me a break, alot of the stuff in Linux the user never cares about. Furthermore the stuff, kernel level, users do end up depending on, such as dm-mod and netfilter are excellent and far surpass anything OpenBSD has.

OpenBSD makes the mistake of making a pretty good kernel, but lacking to improve rc scripts or the installer. Then they go off complaining about how everybody sucks, dudes look at your installer I could use some work.

Enough of this ridiculousness, get back to code and stop bragging. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 02:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? cos he just spat his old one out ;-)

Theo is a long term asshole, his rantings have long been a shame to the OSS community. He has no tact, doesn't care that he has no tact, and only sees *openbsd*. All else is garbage in his eyes. Would I contemplate using Openbsd? Nope. Not after his repeated ill mannered comments. To compare Theo, McEnroe was a brilliant on a tennis court, but was an asshole. Plain and simple. Theo is the same when it comes to coding within the OSS community. Great coder, but his behaviour leaves a lot to be desired.

Linux isn't perfect, perfect code simply does not exist, and if someone's telling you that it does they are lying. Plain and simple. Linux is a compromise of many different things, done by many different people.

Eugenia, there really is no need for trash like this. Honestly. Of late there has been a spate of anti GPL/anti GNU/anti Linux/pro Solaris/Pro Windows/Pro BSD posts from your site, and personally, I expect a lot better. I rarely see stories bashing Windows, or bashing OS X, BSD or Solaris. You do only seem to publish bashing articles that bash Linux/GPL/GNU/FSF it seems. Why is this so? As a reader I think I have the *right* to ask. It appears that many others do, but they all of course get moderated down. If you cannot simply accept criticism, then you shouldn't be running a site like this, that posts articles/links/stories with a increasing frequency of poor research, trouble making headlines and flame/troll bait.

Whatever troubles Linux might have, it's a usable system, and it is stable. I've been using Libranet GNU/Linux for quite some time now and haven't had much "instability". The odd problem yes, but not instability. I do all my day to day work with it, and it works fine. Other Linux's are similar I might add.

As to BSD, I wonder how far BSDs would have come along if they hadn't copied the code from AT&T/USL? If it had been implemented totally from *scratch*. How good and how developed/advanced would the code be now?

Licenses are a separate issue (ie GPL vs BSD), they both have good and bad points, all valid from whatever point of view of the reader. I have my favourites, others have their favourites, and it's all down to a variety of personal beliefs and/or morals.

If you're going to bash GNU/GPL/FSF/RMS/Linux, then be fair and start publishing bashing articles on other things as well. Use the brush to tar all of the topics ;-)

Dave Sat, 18 Jun 2005 03:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? OpenBSDs can kill anyone they want! OpenBSDs cut off heads ALL the time and don't even think twice about it. These guys are so crazy and awesome that they flip out ALL the time. I heard that there was this OpenBSD who was eating at a diner. And when some dude dropped a spoon the OpenBSD killed the whole town. My friend Mark said that he saw a OpenBSD totally uppercut some kid just because the kid opened a window.



And that's what I call REAL Ultimate Power!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



If you don't believe that OpenBSDs have REAL Ultimate Power you better get a life right now or they will chop your head off!!! It's an easy choice, if you ask me.



OpenBSDs are sooooooooooo sweet that I want to crap my pants. I can't believe it sometimes, but I feel it inside my heart. These guys are totally awesome and that's a fact. OpenBSDs are fast, smooth, cool, strong, powerful, and sweet. I can't wait to start yoga next year. I love OpenBSDs with all of my body (including my pee pee). Sat, 18 Jun 2005 03:06:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? if they cant beat linux using their "get the facts", then they have to use the "other" open source OS to discreding linux. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 03:10:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I personally use FreeBSD all the way along with this Windows PC where I chat and play games.

Nice, you say linux is for losers, but can't do everything that you need to under FreeBSD, you can't even chat with it?!
With the current state of linux desktops you have to be pretty inept if you can't get a system up and running more easily than with FBSD! Games are trickier, but cedega is looking pretty nice these days.

come on man, if you need to resort to windows then your freeBSD setup doesn't exactly win any points against GNU/Linux, maybe you should try Ubuntu if you want something mindbogglingly easy to install that will just work. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 03:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? hehe no I know exactly what I said
I can chat using FreeBSD and it works as simple as pkg_add -r bitchx

Also I have used Redhat 6.2 Suse 6 and Slackware in my LLLL days and they weren't as good as FreeBSD at that time.

I use FreeBSD for development thats one as well as a server.

"
With the current state of linux desktops you have to be pretty inept if you can't get a system up and running more easily than with FBSD! Games are trickier, but cedega is looking pretty nice these days.
"
Nop you are wrong, for desktop and games.
Run FreeBSD installer if you want it as a desktop choose KDE for example
next boot ype startx.
what do you want to install firefox ?
type pkg_add -r firefox
heck you want java ?
cd /usr/ports/java/jdk14 && make

plus I do not need to go and seach for rpms and sources to compile the apps I need
I just browse my fancy little port directory or I use precompiled packages.

I know what I said. I would rather use Windows.
Also I times I find FreeBSD easier to use than Windows.

I like the documentation of it. I like the structure of it.

Your friend knows that you use linux he installs some weird distro out there. he comes to you and ask hey how can I do that. Then you come and tell him Hmmmm I dont really use that distro it must be different here.

"
come on man, if you need to resort to windows then your freeBSD setup doesn't exactly win any points against GNU/Linux, maybe you should try Ubuntu if you want something mindbogglingly easy to install that will just work.
"

Nop I forgot to mention that I also have an iBook that has Mac OS X on it. For my resort to Windows is because I want to use Windows is specific areas where I cant on others.
Example
I use yahoo voice chat a lot. I cant find an alternative to that so I use Windows to chat.
I am aware of skype and I use it on Mac. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 03:52:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I rarely see stories bashing Windows, or bashing OS X, BSD or Solaris.


You want pro Linux stories, go to Slashdot or Linux Today. You want to hear the truth, stick around. OSNEWS is not a place where we sit around the campfire drinking GPL koolaid and singing kumbayaa. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 04:51:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Did you just say netfilter is better than pf? Good God man, have you really ever sat down to use both?

You also complain about OpenBSD's installer, there will never be one that is different as long as Theo lives - it's the way he likes it. The same goes for rc, it is the way Theo wants it and it shall remain so. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 05:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Quote: "You want pro Linux stories, go to Slashdot or Linux Today. You want to hear the truth, stick around. OSNEWS is not a place where we sit around the campfire drinking GPL koolaid and singing kumbayaa."

Oh my, another anonymous poster. Personally, i'd like to see osnews.com move to a *you must have an account to post* method. Anyone posting anonymously is just gutless imho.

Just because this is osnews.com doesn't mean that it's sole existance is to bash the GPL and GNU/Linux (which is what you're implying). It's a website designed to talk about operating systems, both good & bad. Comparisons will no doubt occur, as will the pissing contests "my os is better than yours" etc.

You are implying that it's OK for osnews.com to bash the GPL and GNU and Linux and praise everything else (possibly because your stance is anti Linux/GPL/GNU/FSF). You'll note in my previous post that I didn't say that you can't bash Linux etc. Just that if you're going to do that, then you should be fair and spread the tar with the brush around to other operating systems. Do I see Eugenia posting articles saying "Solaris 10 is crap because it has bugger all applications for it". No.

Whether or not Eugenia or others here at osnews.com have hidden agendas is irrelevant. If they paint themselves as an os website, then they should be fair and equal to all operating systems. That includes articles badmouthing said os and complimenting them. I've seen a large influx of anti Linux/GNU/GPL/FSF articles on osnews.com over the past several months, and it's a worrying trend. It lends me to believe that the credibility of osnews.com is questionable.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander - you seem to have not quite figured that part of my argument out yet. Hopefully your reading and comprehension skills have improved and you'll be able to figure out this post OK.

Dave Sat, 18 Jun 2005 05:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I use Windows because there are better software made for it like my 3D CAD program. The games I play once in a while are not available for Linux. An OS is never better than the software made for it.

/Magnus Sat, 18 Jun 2005 05:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? What scares me here is that you are at some educational institution... I hope it's a public lab lol. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 05:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You sir are a moron. What you said is like saying Nokia phones are better because they have more accessories (or switch out Nokia for Motorola). You can't determine the quality of something based on everything but it (it's accessories).
Please, go away and post on topic where you go. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 05:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Your friend knows that you use linux he installs some weird distro out there. he comes to you and ask hey how can I do that. Then you come and tell him Hmmmm I dont really use that distro it must be different here.

Actually, most distros are remarkably similar. I've used quite a few and while there are some differences, it's pretty easy to find your way around.

plus I do not need to go and seach for rpms and sources to compile the apps I need
I just browse my fancy little port directory or I use precompiled packages.

It's exactly the same in Linux. I see also that you mention RedHat6.2...you are aware that Linux distributions have improved a lot over the past few years, right?

I don't see a lot of objectivity from the Linux bashers... Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I agree, there's quite a few anonymous flamebaiters out there...I'm starting to wonder if the "anonymous" posting feature isn't kept only to accomodate astroturfers. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Haven't noticed any issues with the system on the kernel level, as a user. I don't hate microsoft either. Linux's development is rapid, just like most open source projects.

Whether Theo is right or not is not really the issue. He could have used better words for whatever point he was trying to make. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Actually, most distros are remarkably similar."
You said it yourself. They are similar but they are not the same. Slackware does not have many differences from Ubuntu.
Your friend uses Ubuntu and he asks you how to you install firefox for example. How do you answer him back if you were using Slackware?

"
It's exactly the same in Linux. I see also that you mention RedHat6.2...you are aware that Linux distributions have improved a lot over the past few years, right?
"

what exactly the same with Linux? you mean Linux distros I guess?
No some Linux distros do not have package management at all. You have to look for the source and compile then run there is no other way.

The topic was mainly about the Linux kernel. we are talking about something else now. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? > Oh my, another anonymous poster. Personally, i'd like to see
> osnews.com move to a *you must have an account to post*
> method. Anyone posting anonymously is just gutless imho.

Well I for one would just stop posting. I don't particularly want an account or to routinely use some pseudonym to post replies on a forum. If you think tying some random string of text to your net presence makes you 'brave,' then I think you should get out more. It certainly hasn't improved the quality of your response, since you replied to an obvious troll with whiny flaming.

http://dot.kde.org/1030073479/1030203696/1030250106/1030251209/1030...

On the bright side, it did permit me to see that being a prolix flamer is normal for you. Pretty funny, actually. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Meanwhile Linux is for server use and not for desktop, opensource is for everyone !

www.reactos.org
www.haiku-os.org Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? don't want to kiss girls!? ;-) Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:26:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? LoL kiss who then? guys?
or wait there is another choice hmmmm nobody! Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "Unlike Linux, which is a clone of Unix"
What? First of all "Linux" is not a clone of Unix. [...]

I think what he meant was that BSD is UNIX. Since it's one of the original UNIXen around, whereas Linux is a Unix-like operating system. So he tries to reuse the old Coca Cola slogan: "can't beat the real thing"... I'm not sure why this should be an advantage however, sounds more like some ill guided snobism.

"I think our code quality is higher, just because that's really a big focus for us,"
Umm...right. That's why fortune 500 companies choose either Windows or a Linux distribution to use in their workplace.
That has nothing do to with quality. As you say they often choose Windows over Linux. Does it mean it's better than Linux? I think he is right with saying that OpenBSD's code quality is higher. Maybe you might remember that they did a code audit for OpenBSD. Audited every single line of code in there. Nobody has done something like that for Linux and I do believe the code quality overall is better in BSD.

"De Raadt says his crack 60-person team of programmers, working in a tightly focused fashion and starting with a core of tried-and-true Unix, puts out better code than the slapdash Linux movement."
60 people..wow that's seems like a lot to a reader who is unfamiliar with software developement. Let's compare that to the several thousand developers around the world contributing to open source software developement or major companies such as Novell and Red Hat who contribute their resources as well. The author also failed to mention LSB certification which promotes standards or mention that developers such as Novell, Red Hat and Mandriva (formally Mandrakesoft) are certified members.

Here the talk is not about mass, but about class. working in a tightly focused fashion is the key word and that can make a huge difference. For example how many people are working on Apple's Safari browser? How many worked on KHTML? How come that Apple in the short time since they came out with Safari have brought KHTML much more forward and made it more standards compliant than a huge horde of programmers around the world in many more years? tight focus!.

"There's also a difference in motivation. "Linux people do what they do because they hate Microsoft. We do what we do because we love Unix,"
The reason why Sun or Apple are typically not attractive are vendor lock-in or less support for software. For example Apple recently announced their plans to run OSX on Intel processors but to restrict OSX to hardware they sell. Also studios cannot run some software such as XSI from Softimage on OSX. There's other reasons but I'm sure you all get my point.

I really hear that anti-M$ stuff so often from the Linux guys (which per se isn't a bad thing, most of us Mac guys also do not sympathize with M$), but it makes them appear as if their sole motivation was being against Microsoft. I do believe that if you have a positive motivation (Doing something because you like/love it) can bring you further than a negative motivation (Doing something because you hate the other one).

Also, sorry but if you think that Linux is used more in Film Studios than Mac OS X you'll have to adjust your world view. The few examples you can see where people really used Linux for modeling and rendering in 3D studios are just about the number of place where Linux really took over. There's not tip of the iceberg and there's no iceberg either. From a productivity standpoint Linux is still way behind OS X, and artsy people, like designers definitely prefer the Mac OS GUI to anything else. The big majority of creative people still work with Macs. More so ever since OS X and more so ever since Final Cut Pro, Motion and Shake was taken over by Apple. You also get Maya for the Mac etc. For the creative workstation OS X is still king of the hill.

Commercial creative software ist still vastly more available on the Mac and most of the open source stuff is available, too (I'm using GIMP and CinePaint myself on OS X). Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Your friend uses Ubuntu and he asks you how to you install firefox for example. How do you answer him back if you were using Slackware?

Bad example, there's a standalone installer for Firefox on the Firefox web site.

However, if we say there wasn't, it wouldn't be very difficult. If I didn't know Ubuntu I'd take five minutes to look around the menus. Then I'd see Synaptic, click on it and get on with it.

This, BTW, was exactly what I did when I installed Kubuntu on my laptop. I had never used the distro before and it took me less than 5 minutes (probably less than 2) to find my way around to installing new software.

what exactly the same with Linux? you mean Linux distros I guess?
No some Linux distros do not have package management at all. You have to look for the source and compile then run there is no other way.

Perhaps, but not a lot of people use these distros (and certainly very few newbies). All modern Linux distros have package managers (with GUI front-ends) or other advanced software installation apps.

It seems your knowledge of Linux is quite outdated.

The topic was mainly about the Linux kernel. we are talking about something else now.

You're the one who brought installing software into this. If you change the subject, don't complain if others follow suit. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I don't particularly want an account or to routinely use some pseudonym to post replies on a forum.

Why? What do you have to hide?

It seems to me a lot of anonymous posters feel that being part of the "unnamed mass" gives them some credibility, as if they were the random voice of Joe Anybody. I do believe that astroturfers will in fact use this to their advantage.

I have yet to hear a single good argument in favor of anonymous posting.

Well I for one would just stop posting.

I'm not convinced this would be such a huge loss. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:41:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Oh my, another anonymous poster. Personally, i'd like to see osnews.com move to a *you must have an account to post* method.

Exactly what is that going to achieve?. If I post under an assumed name with a gmail account - exactly how are you going to find my true identity?

Just because this is osnews.com doesn't mean that it's sole existance is to bash the GPL and GNU/Linux

True but I'm not about to let you guys hijack OSNEWS and turn it into a PRO linux/GPL site.

Actually here's something for Eugenia/OSNews to consider:

You're only allowed to post in news items you select when you register. You will get read-only perms for all news groups. If you get modded down from a news item 5 times, your posting rights are suspended for a week. This way, guys like Anon-he-moos aren't allowed to post trolls in Windows/Mac/BSD/Solaris news items and guys like me aren't allowed to post anti GPL views in a Linux news item. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This way, guys like Anon-he-moos aren't allowed to post trolls in Windows/Mac/BSD/Solaris news items

Please indicate where and when I have posted any trolls?

Just because you disagree with what I say, that doesn't mean it qualifies as a troll. In fact, I've come to realize that people call me a troll when they can't counter my arguments through logic. Of course, if you weren't posting as an anonymous user I could probably remember which argument you weren't able to respond to. I guess that's one way in which posters hide behind the "anonymous" name...

FYI, except for two or three times over the past couple of years, the only times I've been modded down was when I replied to comments that were themselves modded down.

In any case I am strongly in favor of an account-based system for posting.

True but I'm not about to let you guys hijack OSNEWS and turn it into a PRO linux/GPL site.

You'll recall that the original poster was asking for balance, not for OSNews to adopt an opposite bias. It is in fact true that, over the last couple of days, there have been quite a few anti-GPL, Linux-bashing stories linked on OSNews. Meanwhile, there have been virtually no linked articles that indulged in Windows or OSX bashing (or BSD bashing, for that matter).

A little honesty and objectivity, that's all we ask for. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 06:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Ok sorry firefox is a bad example. Just pick any other application I guess you see where I am leading this. It is known that there is no standard way on Linux distros to install applications. Slackware does not install software like debian or redhat. Each has it's own way.

"
Perhaps, but not a lot of people use these distros (and certainly very few newbies). All modern Linux distros have package managers (with GUI front-ends) or other advanced software installation apps.

It seems your knowledge of Linux is quite outdated.
"

Not really. Two months ago I was requested to work on a project that involves embedded Linux. (Sorry I would not called that distro 'for newbies' like you did)
The distro was shipped along with the hardware and there was sticker on it that it has LINUX on it. So, go figure now that LINUX.

You can find it here http://embeddedx86.com/

Refering to my Linux knowledge is outdated may be true because I do not use it on daily basis. However, I know enough about it.

And it that project we have faced several memory management issues but eventually it was worked around.

So, may be you are calling this a bad example too but hey it is Linux.
lets go to distro watch and see how many Linux distros have your fancy gui package management stuff.

yea remember package management is only an example you know but it seems that you insisted to keep it.
And it always down to one issue. what is Linux without GNU tools ? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 07:23:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Yes.
You always hear Linux never GNU/Linux. Only Debian does that. It pisses RMS off you know that. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 07:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I not understand one simple thing: "exclude the base system ... OpenBSD don't use the same 'garbage' that linux use (KDE, Gnome, gcc,....) ? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 07:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? butt Sat, 18 Jun 2005 08:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Sloberts Sat, 18 Jun 2005 08:16:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This is democracy. You have a bunch of pigs fighting to put their opinions on top of others. I dont think we need each others opinion. Fudge it. Im speaking to a bunch of time-wasting morons. I even wasted my time reading around 60 posts. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 08:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? That article is by Daniel Lyons. I wonder whether Theo actually said all that. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 09:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I thought Theo had not used Linux? How can hesay those thing then? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 10:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You are right. All pigs trying to prove their point. Well the question is why are we users trying to argue on such a foolish matter as if its an OS War. We dont deserve to use an OS then. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 10:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Aside from the kernel and tools, most of the software that runs atop *BSD is also commonly used on linux systems. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 10:55:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Although I'm a GNU/Linux system administrator I kinda agree with what Theo said. Personally I also think that a highly focused core team of programmers can produce a better and higher quality code than all those "bazaar" teenage hackers all around the world. Linux can be bigger but that doesn't mean it's a better quality and cleaner OS than FreeBSD or OpenBSD.

For a very professional, unbiased comparison of *BSD with Linux I highly recommend reading this article
http://www.over-yonder.net/~fullermd/rants/bsd4linux/bsd4linux1.php Sat, 18 Jun 2005 11:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? This statement pretty much describes the origins and cardinal difference between *BSD and Linux:

"BSD is what you get when a bunch of Unix hackers sit down to try to port a Unix system to the PC. Linux is what you get when a bunch of PC hackers sit down and try to write a Unix system for the PC."

or this one:

"BSD is designed. Linux is grown." Sat, 18 Jun 2005 11:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "It's terrible," De Raadt says. "Everyone is using it, and they don't realize how bad it is. And the Linux people will just stick with it and add to it rather than stepping back and saying, 'This is garbage and we should fix it.'"

If the Linux devs had worked the same way as OpenBSD devs does we would still be at kernel 2.2 now. Perhaps OpenBSD has a more clean design but people wants performance and features more than that! I tried OpenBSD 3.6 recently. It couldn't even untar a large file without X11 becoming unresponsive and the mouse jumping around. That really sucks for a modern operating system! Sat, 18 Jun 2005 12:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? New kernel has arrived.Works like a charm.Oh has address randomization by default:-).Not a silver bullet but makes an attack somewhat more difficult and that's good. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 12:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Doesn't Theo always emphasize he has NO experience (he said so in an interview lately) at all with Linux?! Well, then, he's known for being extremly arrogant, too (read the last interviews with him). The Linux kernel might not be perfect, but imho it is the best solution for the average desktop on x86 machines - where things like hardware support matter and linux is by far superior to the BSDs (at least in my experience) when it comes to hardware support - there is currently. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 12:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? The problem is that those arguments just don't make any sense... Unix is a whole lot more than a kernel, in fact the kernel, if it implements a very finite number of functions, is just fine; which is probably why there are so many kernels which are usable for Unix.

But Unix is a whole lot more than that, and the things that make Linux a *nix aren't Linux; a lot of it is GNU. And that was more like an ITS hacker sitting down and porting Unix to the Free world...

Anyway, "PC Hacker" is just a horrible attempt to discredit and insult people based solely on the small fact that yes, Linus started Linux on a PC.
And if you take a look at Sun's stock, one of the few companies that sells non-PC's, you may realize that no matter how inferior the PC is - it's something that's not gonna be put off by your elitist attitude.

Maybe you should join the rest of society instead of fighting it over stupid differences. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 14:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? you need to research your crap, most of the stuff you said was false!

You are just as biased as this author is.

In my opinion, the BSD people are a larger unpaid workforce lol Sat, 18 Jun 2005 14:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Knot 500 PC's together and you have probably a top 10 super computer depending on the PC's architecture:-)

How "PC hackers" are there? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 14:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 15:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I've no doubt that OpenBSD is relatively secure or that the code quality of it is relatively good. But this article does read a lot like yet another FUD story against Linux. Seems also almost like someone willing to write FUD against Linux might have used Theo de Raadt and his comments because of knowing how arrogant the man can be with his black-and-white sour grape attitudes towards Linux.

I'm pretty sure that even if Linux was known to be much more secure and stable than OpenBSD, Theo wouldn't probably like or use it... The man is, like Linux said, difficult...

The last comment made by that Lok Technologies guy seems rather ridiculous too:

"You know what I found? Right in the kernel, in the heart of the operating system, I found a developer's comment that said, 'Does this belong here?' "Lok says. "What kind of confidence does that inspire? Right then I knew it was time to switch."

Switch operating system just because of a comment in the source code?!? What about some real issues like performance or bugs etc.

Nevertheless, I do hope that Linux kernel developers would take security seriously. For example, the new kernel development model, with all those fast changes, has its pros and cons and may sometimes cause stability and security issues. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 15:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Big deal, woohoo! I for one am neither impressed or won over by this guys obvious disdane for linux

he can take hith phalace and bendit round and up his cracker jam it.. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I find all this to be silly crap. Seriously!

I have used both. They both have their roles in the grander scheme of computing.

On my home system I use Slackware Linux. I am also partial to several others but Slack is the workhorse. Being productive is my goal.

I get more done using a Linux in a day than 100 Windull "chimps" playing Everquest, chatting, sending e-mails, surfing porn sites while they should be working.

If you need a true server you should have the option to load either BSD or Linux. Liberty Rocks!

I suspect this article was another silly "yellow" journalism and another attempt to rake muck on two great open-source code bases. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Check the main function of sshd :

http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/usr.bin/ssh/sshd.c?rev=1....

And tell me if you think it's clean .. personnaly, I would not like maintain that ! Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:06:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? linux is not for losers. We use it at work(Redhat) and everybody loves it. it is rock stable and we get the job done.
these babies are running 24/7 and they do not crash.

the NTs are always giving problems. I am not of the tech guys, but I don't why, maaybe 'El ni;o factor' is in the air and they crash.

Now we are going to swith to Redhat and we made the decision of getting rid of the NTs.

I trust linux. I know there are lot of crappy versions of it, but I would go with Redhat,Slackware and Suse. I haven't seen Mandrake working but a friend of mine has his server running the last version and he loves it.

nothing against linux. i have a Mac but I love linux too. it just needs to be polished a little bit more and it needs more mainstream apps. but i think the open source community is doing a great job. Brazil is running Linux, schools, goverment, etc....and they can handle it. Other countries are doing the same.

-2501 Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? i read Mastercard has been hacked and as far as i know
they run SOlaris(which is derived from BSD)
so i think not even bsd and Solaris are very secure...
Simon Lok analyzed Linux source code and decided to dismiss it and jump on Openbsd but did he analyze Openbsd source code? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I always take his comments as a rock star's opinion.
U2 sucks. Then what? Enjoy the musics. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I think this is kinda good for the BSD's as it drums up some type of marketing for them, that said, I think it shouldnt be this guy.
For one in his interview before this when asked about questions on Linux he came off as an ass, when asked about if there were parts of Linux he would like to see adopted, doesnt mean ported, adopted into BSD he said, no, while the NetBSD was honest, he said he would like to see some of the fuctionality, such as real time support, drivers etc. So your telling me that he doesnt want more divers for OpenBSD?

When asked if there is sharing he said it doesnt happen, but the NetBSD guy says it goes both ways. So which is it?

He says that Linux is just a kernal, which is true, and that OpenBSD is the whole thing, it gives him flexebility, and lets him move fast. Ok so if you make changes to product X the whole system could be effected. (I know there are some advantages to have the system as a whole.)How does that let you move faster now you have to worry about every packege when you make a change, not only that but if it does let you move faster where are all the drivers? how come you havent gotten around to having more software and a better installation?

And now this? "It's terrible," De Raadt says. "Everyone is using it, and they don't realize how bad it is. And the Linux people will just stick with it and add to it rather than stepping back and saying, 'This is garbage and we should fix it.'" But he just admited he has never ran Linux, how does he know its terrible? how does he know its so bad?

Anyways, the BSD's should have a spokesperson that drums up sopport for them, but it should deffinetly be someone else, he's deffinetly an ass.

As for those that want to try the BSD's go for it, I use Linux, but I got a couple of Live BSD cd's that I pop in to play around with, and PCBSD is looking real good. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Slackware does not install software like debian or redhat. Each has it's own way.

Perhaps, but for "consumer" distros they're all similar, and for other distros it takes but a 5 minute search on Google to figure it out.

Not really. Two months ago I was requested to work on a project that involves embedded Linux.

You're kidding, right? You can't compare Desktop Linux vs. Embedded Linux. It's not at all the same thing. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:28:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "No some Linux distros do not have package management at all. You have to look for the source and compile then run there is no other way.

The topic was mainly about the Linux kernel. we are talking about something else now."

Please start naming them, I'd love to hear it. Here, let me do it for ya:
Linux From Scratch.


Woops, that's all of 'em that I've heard of:
Slacware: Slackpacks (.tgz)
RedHat, Mandrake, Suse, derivatives: RPM
Ubuntu, Debian, Knoppix, derivatives: .Deb
Arch: Arch Packages (.tgz but are not slackpacks, and aren't distributed outside of repos)

I think Lycoris and Lindows are .deb. I don't know what XandrOS uses.

Well those are just the ones I've used. Maybe in your grand wisdom, oh moron who can't spell his own name, you can tell me about all these distributions that lack packages?

Now please come up with some form of unique identity and quit posting as anonymous; it's really annoying. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 16:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Two stupid articles from forbes in a day, please stop reffering to them. Making such low-grade articles, with very low content is good for economics. I want facts ! Sat, 18 Jun 2005 17:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? @ Chris
LoL I do not have to provide a name
I can just put Jack or Chris or even moron.

@ a nun, he moos
No I am not kidding I was talking about Linux in general, however in the back of your mind you always thought I was refering to desktop which I wasnt.

back to Chris
I was talking about package management to show how scattered each distro is. Isnt it the Linux way that If you do not like one distro you create your own? yea I can just tell you hey here is a list of linux distros that do not have package management.

MyFancyLinux
LinuxIs4Losers
etc

Oh let me check distro watch and give you a list of distros that do not have package management that allows you to use it natively just like debian's, and please do not tell me RPM because it sucks.

so lets see
Using their list on the right I will just browse to the web and search for packages

KNOPPIX
Xandros
Vector
Yoper
puppy
aLinux

You can go down that list and see yourself. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 18:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? most any remotely mainstream distro will have some type of package management, Gentoo has Portage (for all of you *BSD guys), Debian and it's derviatives use dpkg (apt), Fedora uses yum (rpm)..... and the list continues.

Anyway, point is... linux administration is generally very easy and to jump from one distro to another is no problem for anyone who is has any degree whatsoever of linux experience.

another thing... If you BSD guys are so gung-ho on package management... maybe try Gentoo, it's package management is derived from ports hence the mane "Portage"

I use FreeBSD a little bit and like it, I mostly use Gentoo Linux though and for those who talk about stability I have a Gentoo Desktop system that is regularly updated with somewhat bleeding edge code that has an uptime of 137 days (my multimedia box)... a server should fare better Sat, 18 Jun 2005 19:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Your complaint is what? That the file is large? Sat, 18 Jun 2005 19:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? RPM is an excellent package managers; rpm's are notorious for being badly done. Now, rpm gets on a lot of people's nerves because it's complicated and not compact; but then again a lot of things aren't compact and we hail them as killer apps (Photoshop). Would you say Photoshop sucks because people distribute corrupted input files for it? You'd just be showing your own ignorance for saying that.

Your distributions addressed:
KNOPPIX - .deb
Xandros - .deb
Vector - .tgz (has repos too)
Yoper - rpm
puppy - Source Only (one would note it lives in 64MB of RAM and is often used on REALLY old computers)
aLinux - rpm (was peanut linux; also a tiny dist)

You may wish to learn how to use distrowatch. Of these distros some will lack package management:
Core, LFS, Lunar, Murix, Onebase, ROCK, Sorcerer, Source Mage, T2, TA
--Taken from: http://distrowatch.com/stats.php?section=packagemanagement

I removed gentoo from the list because it has ebuilds and portage.


"LoL I do not have to provide a name
I can just put Jack or Chris or even moron. "
Then don't refer to yourself as 'I' anymore; there's about 80 "Anonymous's" here and we don't know for which the pronoun 'I' refers.

I'm sick of having to respond to anon@partofanip. Sat, 18 Jun 2005 23:13:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I think most BSD'ers are insulted by portage actually. They'd probably be much happier with Crux or even Arch; both have something a lot more like ports.

Arch has what Ports should be: A system to easily build packages; then a package manager handles installing and removing the package. Fully source is silly and should have been a first step towards management. They should have been later accompanied by at least rudimentary binary package management. Gentoo does this too I think with ebuilds.
I think most people get mad at gentoo for assuming they have gnumake; that was the complaint I've heard! Sat, 18 Jun 2005 23:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? About packages, you got the picture I guess, thanks for the link. Yes I didnt know that they can sort them neatly like that. This is the 4th time I visit this website by the way.

Now we come to my nickname I do not know why you are sick of it. I am positive that you can identify me whether using my anonymous nickname or my unique IP I can because you directly reply to me Sun, 19 Jun 2005 00:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Yes, because you're replying to me and acting like I know who you are :-p.

It's the first time I've ever tried to find that on distrowatch, I rarely use the site; it's not nearly verbose enough for my tastes.

I'm sick of it because there's about 17 other people who use it; that or you post a LOT. Sun, 19 Jun 2005 00:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I guess I don't get it? I've used Windows since 3.1. When my company and personal computers running Windows 98 messed up, we could use the installation cd to repair the installation and keep going. We upgraded to XP and the good times are over. Not only does XP give Microsoft control of our business computers via activation, but trying to restore an installation has been crippled in the name of DRM.

At that point, for the first, time we got to thinking, Microsoft can't be the only operating system out there. During the search we looked at Mac and then through a good friend were put onto Linux. We finally decided on Xandros because it installs in about fifteen minutes and just works. I couldn't believe how much software could come with an operating system and be installed in only fifteen minutes for US$39.00. Xandros has improved every year since 2002 and continues to improve. I know that there are members of the Linux Community that hate Xandros but whatever works is the best-right? Xandros license agreement is one of the best. It allows me to use Xandros on as many personal computers as I own and one business computer. Thats a great license.

I never thought of myself as a loser. I guess I'll have to go home and rethink my life while I am using Xandros to get things done, of course. Sun, 19 Jun 2005 01:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You got it right:-) :

Microsoft can't be the only operating system out there

whatever works is the best-right? Sun, 19 Jun 2005 06:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I smell bullshit. Pretty much every interview I've seen Theo do, he's very tight lipped on Linux. Will even refuse to comment. Says he has no opinion, BECAUSE HE HAS NEVER USED IT. I've used Linux for years. I've watched it grow, I know about the problems they're talking about because I've experienced them. It's definitely not as stable as it used to be, but it does get "faster."

Yeah, Linux has problems, yeah, the code is sloppy. But I have to be wayyyy more patient for things to work with OpenBSD than I do with Linux. I don't care anymore, it's worth it. I prefer to use OpenBSD as a workstation, because it's so goddamned simple. I have never, EVER had it crash. It's pretty fast to me, runs on old junk that won't boot Linux. Runs on new junk too, sometimes I send a dmesg and I get a patch back. How cool is that? I do stuff, and I get the results I expect. I can't honestly say that has always happened with Linux.

If I want to shut something off, configure something, read a manual, it's a lot less frustrating with OpenBSD. Some setup takes more work, but I learned a lot more that way. Brains need exercise too. Sometimes it's nice to have the option of clicking a bunch of buttons, but once those buttons stop working, and that's the only way to interface with an app, where do you go from there? OpenBSD won't ever be newbie friendly. I remember that scaring me off when I heard about it. Came to realize that's a good thing. There's too much damn hand holding going on. I'm all about the free software revolution, I'm generally very friendly and willing to help people with it a little, but it's getting too easy to jump in the pool. Things are getting too corporate...that scares me about Linux. It was bad enough before.

Lack of quality pisses everyone off with everything else. It's why mechanics laugh at people who buy Dodges and why GM is struggling. Don't pick an OS just because it's hip, try them all and figure out which one you like that way. Or you're a poseur, and it will be brought to your attention. Sun, 19 Jun 2005 06:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? You may wish to learn how to use distrowatch. Of these distros some will lack package management:
Core, LFS, Lunar, Murix, Onebase, ROCK, Sorcerer, Source Mage, T2, TA

While Onebase's package management system does allow for installation from source, binary packages are also available. Onebase does not belong on that list. The argument could be made that Sorceror (and therefore Source Mage and Lunar) also have a package management system that is similar in idea to Gentoo's Portage (albeit strictly from source) which was removed from your list for reasons that you previously stated.

Point? If you are going to flame someone for a comment in a web forum, at least put some research into it ;-) Sun, 19 Jun 2005 08:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I believe it was Winston Churchill that said:
"Democracy is the worst form of government -- except for all the rest." Sun, 19 Jun 2005 08:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Don't pick an OS just because it's hip, try them all and figure out which one you like that way

I did and came to the conclusion they all suck.Only some a great deal less than others.So i purchaged 3 removable HD's besides 2 SATA HD's an have installed SuSE 9.3 as base.The rest OpenBSD,FreeBSD,Solaris on the removable HD's.

Brains need exercise too. Sometimes it's nice to have the option of clicking a bunch of buttons, but once those buttons stop working, and that's the only way to interface with an app, where do you go from there?

True,but would you have plunged into OpenBSD without having used Linux first?Once you have "mastered" the basics of OpenBSD such as getting the ports tree :" setenv CVSROOT anaoncvs@anoncvs.nl.openbsd.nl" + "cvs get ports",etc, and have installed some nice wm and all the apps you could possible need,where do you go from there and what makes it at that point different from Linux?

Even with a "hand-holding" OS you can do pretty nasty things as well.

Oh well i guess you're right when you said:"Don't pick an OS just because it's hip, try them all and figure out which one you like that way." Sun, 19 Jun 2005 10:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? "I agree he's a bit of an ass, but isn't the bashing that linux supporters do against windows exactly because it has 'a different design principle'? Sorry, but your comment is not justified at all!"

It goes both ways, Windows users bash Linux too and there's a good reason why neither group should be held responsible.

There are a lot of people using the internet; anonymity, or at least the feeling of being anonymous, makes a lot of those people feel bolder and more outspoken with their opinions without fear of reprisal. The result is people behaving themselves poorly, usually picking fights by making false statements against something they feel a personal dislike for.

Because OSNews covers operating systems, and these people need something to be critical about they will attack an operating system, usually one that makes an easy target or one that they have tried and weren't able to figure out before getting angry at (often prematurely). Most of these people are usually thought of as children but the truth is they can just as easily be adults who's body's happened to grow up before their minds were ready.

Anyway that's just my $0.02 Sun, 19 Jun 2005 21:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? I did and came to the conclusion they all suck.Only some a great deal less than others.So i purchaged (sic) 3 removable HD's besides 2 SATA HD's an have installed SuSE 9.3 as base.The rest OpenBSD,FreeBSD,Solaris on the removable HD's.

They all suck in one way or another, I never said otherwise. It doesn't mean you can't find one OS you LIKE or at least tolerate. OpenBSD just sucks the least for me for doing actual work and day to day use. I still use Linux so I can play UT, use the features of a printer that there's no support for under OpenBSD, etc.

True,but would you have plunged into OpenBSD without having used Linux first?Once you have "mastered" the basics of OpenBSD such as getting the ports tree :" setenv CVSROOT anaoncvs@anoncvs.nl.openbsd.nl" + "cvs get ports",etc, and have installed some nice wm and all the apps you could possible need,where do you go from there and what makes it at that point different from Linux?

Would I have plunged into OpenBSD with out having used Linux first? There's no way I could have known I was going to use Linux in the first place.

What makes it different? I think that's a silly question, but I think I know what you really mean by it. The difference for me is that the apps are older and mostly very stable. There aren't as many apps, but there are more than I would ever use or need. And almost all the crucial apps I depend on are there already, in the ports tree, or a package and I don't have to hunt them down and build them myself often. It doesn't spontaneously slow down, crash or just act zany, and if it is doing that, it takes a LOT less time to hunt down the problem. Generally, fixes are fast for most bugs, they just don't sit around forgotten for years in Bugzilla. If hardware isn't fully supported, it's usually somewhat supported. There's usually at least a workaround. SSH is faster, there's very strong network performance with the card supported, and ppp is much better and more solid. I could go on forever, but I have more important things to do than dick around online all day long.

Could someone make OpenBSD look or behave like Linux and set it up so you never have to use the CLI? Sure. Why would you want to?

Oh, you don't have to 'master' OpenBSD to use it.

Even with a "hand-holding" OS you can do pretty nasty things as well.

Once again, I never said otherwise. Nasty things? I was trying to tactfully say that there is too much coddling going on, rather than people going out and learning things for themselves. Because they're lazy, or stupid, whatever. People should recognize when newbs are using software just to be 'cool,' and make these newbies really think about why they're doing it. Unix and unix-like isn't for everyone.

Oh well i guess you're right when you said:"Don't pick an OS just because it's hip, try them all and figure out which one you like that way."

Of course I am right about that. I am right about everything I said! Man, I am so conceited. Sun, 19 Jun 2005 22:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Seriously, the first page into this and most of the arguments are from idiots with a lack of reading comprehension...

For example:
"Unlike Linux, which is a clone of Unix"

What? First of all "Linux" is not a clone of Unix. SCO has been unsuccessful in court at proving Linux has any Unix code. Linux may be Unix like but that doesn't mean it's a clone (copy) of Unix. Also this comment basically generalizes all Linux OS are the same which they are not. While RPM based distributions use the same Linux commands there are distributions that differ with the tools/software offered.


What are you, stupid? Linux is a Unix Clone... CLONE . If it had Unix code in it it would be unix (as BSD is, arguably), but it has none, and is therefor a clone. It was made as a substitute kernel for the GNU utilities, which were open source copies of Unix utilities.

You must have thought they meant "Clone" as in "cloned sheep" but that would make Linux System V and not Linux, so even that assumption makes you an idiot. God, how could you possibly not get that?

"De Raadt says his crack 60-person team of programmers, working in a tightly focused fashion and starting with a core of tried-and-true Unix, puts out better code than the slapdash Linux movement."

60 people..wow that's seems like a lot to a reader who is unfamiliar with software developement. Let's compare that to the several thous

Again, what are you, mentally deficient? The whole point was that his SMALL team can produce better code than thousands of other people seem to be able to, simple because they care more about the code than adding features for the sake of having them.

I've stopped reading the rest of these at this point because I don't think this will get any better... morons. Mon, 20 Jun 2005 03:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? What the hell?

Theo de Raadt saying "Linux is crap" is like the rest of us saying "the sky is blue". It's not any great revelation that he's saying this. And we get 200 comments of people taking his troll bait?

Use OpenBSD if you think it's good. Use Linux if you think it's good. But, just as Theo de Raadt says, don't just blindly follow the crowd - make your own judgement. This is also no great revelation. Mon, 20 Jun 2005 06:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? he is so right!!! finally someone took a realistic look at the pile of crap that is linux... Mon, 20 Jun 2005 06:26:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? There's usually at least a workaround.

That's not an option for a mission critical server. Mon, 20 Jun 2005 07:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? yes it is Mon, 20 Jun 2005 13:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? One would consult the HCL before building a mission critical server, wouldn't one? Mon, 20 Jun 2005 13:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://www.osnews.com/thread? http://www.osnews.com/thread? Dude, there's no difference printing with a Linux or BSD, you either use lpr or cups - it's still the same on both. Mon, 20 Jun 2005 18:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments