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I fucking love FreeBSD. Seriously, I use it any chance I can. I have a Debian VM that I use to do development on because of the tool chain I have to use. But fo

I fucking love FreeBSD. Seriously, I use it any chance I can. I have a Debian VM that I use to do development on because of the tool chain I have to use. But for my production personal websites that I run I choose FreeBSD. Nothing in this article makes me want to change my mind. On the contrary seeing this article on a 'Linux' website generally lowers my opinion of both the 'Linux Community' and LWN. If LWN had fewer articles like this, and more articles actually communicating useful information to me, I might actually read it more. I used to use Debian almost exclusively, but ever since this systemd BS I've gone FreeBSD as much as possible. This isn't about personalities, it's about me not caring about the problems that systemd is trying to solve.

floatboth 10y ago
The article isn't bad tho… it's pretty much a transcript of a talk with the same title by a FreeBSD Core member. The comments… yeah, there are people whining about "Marxists" "ruining projects" or something. Welp.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago
  HN has those kind of people too.
- justin66 10y ago
  LWN comments don't get any better when they stick to technical matters, sadly.
- ue_ 10y ago
  As a semi-Marxist myself, I just laugh at such comments.
- Anthony-G 10y ago
  I skimmed through the comments and most of them seem to be at odds with the content of the article (which seems to offer constructive opinion). The very first comment is frankly bizarre.
autoreleasepool 10y ago
Agreed. I use FreeBSD every single day for development. It fucking rocks. My only gripe is we're still waiting for KDE Plasma 5...
- floatboth 10y ago
  You can try the KDE porting team's plasma5 branch right now…
  - autoreleasepool 10y ago
    I couldn't get it to compile :(
corbet 10y ago
The purpose of the article was certainly not to try to change your mind. I saw a talk by a FreeBSD core team member that I thought was interesting, so I wrote about it. Are you saying LWN should not venture into *BSD space?
- loeg 10y ago
  As an LWN subscriber and a FreeBSD developer, please continue to cover BSD topics. I love the style and quality of LWN.
  - markjdb 10y ago
    +1 Another FreeBSD developer here. I pay for an LWN subscription to help keep on top of what's happening in Linux and to support the high-quality coverage.
- robert_foss 10y ago
  As a Linux developer, please continue reporting high-level content like this from comparable projects.
VA3FXP 10y ago
This is my exact situation too. Give me simple config (nee .ini) files to grep/edit, and I can have a system running _the way I want_ faster then any other method. I can understand it, I can edit it, I can fix it. IMO systemd and the like are too much like hand-waving voodoo. It's like trying to interact with an adolescent AI: Computer run service abc123 I don't feel like it. With config files: Computer run service abc123 Error on line #5 of abc123.conf Bingo! I wish they had just named systemd as HAL. It would have let me avoid months of hair-pulling.
- chriswarbo 10y ago
  > I wish they had just named systemd as HAL. It would have let me avoid months of hair-pulling. There's already a HAL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HAL_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HAL_(software) It's deprecated since its functionality was merged into udev. Then udev was merged into systemd...
  - VA3FXP 10y ago
    I know, I was trying to make an AI joke. But I'm afraid I can't do that. =) It's jokes all the way down.
jeamland 10y ago
Hi, I'm the guy who wrote and presented the original piece. None of it was meant to discourage you from using FreeBSD. I had nothing to do with the LWN summary but the whole point of the piece was to look at what FreeBSD could be doing better from a community standpoint.
- JdeBP 10y ago
  You do let useful contributions slip through the cracks from time to time. A case in point: Baptiste Daroussin wrote up documentation for EVFILT_FS in kevent. FreeBSD actually has had this for a decade, not that one would know it from the doco (because contrary to the norm the code was patched without amending the doco to match). This was in 2010. The doco patch was never actually added. * https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2010-September/020037.html https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2010-Sep...
  - jeamland 10y ago
    Pretty sure every project does but in our case that's the problem with having a large project. Did the doc change happen or should I chase Baptiste?
    - JdeBP 10y ago
      Nonetheless, it's one thing that you could do better; and that's what you said that you wanted to look at. There's a long tail of small useful contributions -- even from the people with the FreeBSD.org mailboxes (-: -- that simply don't make it. There's nothing about EVFILT_FS in the 11.0 kqueue() manual.
    - ysleepy 10y ago
      Also the "surface" the community sees is not very inviting. Bugzilla is horrible to use, browsing it gives you the strong impression it is abandoned. The wiki is also always outdated, or you can't tell. The forums are a nice addition, but they are only visited by beginners, devs or advanced users don't wanna go there. GitHub pull requests are ignored, because we still sit on SVN (and lol perforce - is that still around?). Don't get me wrong, I love FreeBSD, but some of the effort and friction is unnecessary.
VyseofArcadia 10y ago
>I used to use Debian almost exclusively, but ever since this systemd BS I've gone FreeBSD as much as possible. This isn't about personalities, it's about me not caring about the problems that systemd is trying to solve. Thankfully for those of us unwilling or unable to make the jump to FreeBSD there is still Slackware.
psibi 10y ago
> If LWN had fewer articles like this, and more articles actually communicating useful information to me, I might actually read it more. As a occasional reader of LWN, I like the fact that they cover other topics apart from LWN. It's always good to learn/see how other communities operate.
imode 10y ago
is said Debian VM under FreeBSD? if that's the case, what do you use for your VMs? qemu? virtualbox? I'm not sure as to the state of virtualization on FreeBSD...

floatboth 10y ago

The article isn't bad tho… it's pretty much a transcript of a talk with the same title by a FreeBSD Core member. The comments… yeah, there are people whining about "Marxists" "ruining projects" or something. Welp.

GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago
HN has those kind of people too.
justin66 10y ago
LWN comments don't get any better when they stick to technical matters, sadly.
ue_ 10y ago
As a semi-Marxist myself, I just laugh at such comments.
Anthony-G 10y ago
I skimmed through the comments and most of them seem to be at odds with the content of the article (which seems to offer constructive opinion). The very first comment is frankly bizarre.

autoreleasepool 10y ago

Agreed. I use FreeBSD every single day for development. It fucking rocks. My only gripe is we're still waiting for KDE Plasma 5...

floatboth 10y ago
You can try the KDE porting team's plasma5 branch right now…
- autoreleasepool 10y ago
  I couldn't get it to compile :(

corbet 10y ago

The purpose of the article was certainly not to try to change your mind. I saw a talk by a FreeBSD core team member that I thought was interesting, so I wrote about it. Are you saying LWN should not venture into *BSD space?

loeg 10y ago
As an LWN subscriber and a FreeBSD developer, please continue to cover BSD topics. I love the style and quality of LWN.
- markjdb 10y ago
  +1 Another FreeBSD developer here. I pay for an LWN subscription to help keep on top of what's happening in Linux and to support the high-quality coverage.
robert_foss 10y ago
As a Linux developer, please continue reporting high-level content like this from comparable projects.

VA3FXP 10y ago

This is my exact situation too. Give me simple config (nee .ini) files to grep/edit, and I can have a system running _the way I want_ faster then any other method. I can understand it, I can edit it, I can fix it. IMO systemd and the like are too much like hand-waving voodoo. It's like trying to interact with an adolescent AI: Computer run service abc123 I don't feel like it. With config files: Computer run service abc123 Error on line #5 of abc123.conf Bingo! I wish they had just named systemd as HAL. It would have let me avoid months of hair-pulling.

chriswarbo 10y ago
> I wish they had just named systemd as HAL. It would have let me avoid months of hair-pulling. There's already a HAL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HAL_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HAL_(software) It's deprecated since its functionality was merged into udev. Then udev was merged into systemd...
- VA3FXP 10y ago
  I know, I was trying to make an AI joke. But I'm afraid I can't do that. =) It's jokes all the way down.

jeamland 10y ago

Hi, I'm the guy who wrote and presented the original piece. None of it was meant to discourage you from using FreeBSD. I had nothing to do with the LWN summary but the whole point of the piece was to look at what FreeBSD could be doing better from a community standpoint.

JdeBP 10y ago
You do let useful contributions slip through the cracks from time to time. A case in point: Baptiste Daroussin wrote up documentation for EVFILT_FS in kevent. FreeBSD actually has had this for a decade, not that one would know it from the doco (because contrary to the norm the code was patched without amending the doco to match). This was in 2010. The doco patch was never actually added. * https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2010-September/020037.html https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2010-Sep...
- jeamland 10y ago
  Pretty sure every project does but in our case that's the problem with having a large project. Did the doc change happen or should I chase Baptiste?
  - JdeBP 10y ago
    Nonetheless, it's one thing that you could do better; and that's what you said that you wanted to look at. There's a long tail of small useful contributions -- even from the people with the FreeBSD.org mailboxes (-: -- that simply don't make it. There's nothing about EVFILT_FS in the 11.0 kqueue() manual.
  - ysleepy 10y ago
    Also the "surface" the community sees is not very inviting. Bugzilla is horrible to use, browsing it gives you the strong impression it is abandoned. The wiki is also always outdated, or you can't tell. The forums are a nice addition, but they are only visited by beginners, devs or advanced users don't wanna go there. GitHub pull requests are ignored, because we still sit on SVN (and lol perforce - is that still around?). Don't get me wrong, I love FreeBSD, but some of the effort and friction is unnecessary.

VyseofArcadia 10y ago

>I used to use Debian almost exclusively, but ever since this systemd BS I've gone FreeBSD as much as possible. This isn't about personalities, it's about me not caring about the problems that systemd is trying to solve. Thankfully for those of us unwilling or unable to make the jump to FreeBSD there is still Slackware.

psibi 10y ago

> If LWN had fewer articles like this, and more articles actually communicating useful information to me, I might actually read it more. As a occasional reader of LWN, I like the fact that they cover other topics apart from LWN. It's always good to learn/see how other communities operate.

imode 10y ago

is said Debian VM under FreeBSD? if that's the case, what do you use for your VMs? qemu? virtualbox? I'm not sure as to the state of virtualization on FreeBSD...