NetBSD/amiga 1.0 was my first unix. It was much harder to install, update and admin than most contemporary OSes, but, wow, it was multi-user and open-source bef

NetBSD/amiga 1.0 was my first unix. It was much harder to install, update and admin than most contemporary OSes, but, wow, it was multi-user and open-source before the term open-source had been popularized. Years later, when I switched to Linux, I was surprised by how much more usable it was. Early Linux distributions put effort into enabling color ls, virtual consoles and readline. Then came package installers, etc. The BSDs lagged behind Linux in usability because they kept focusing on other aspects of operating system design, dismissing things like graphical installers as unnecessary frill. "man tar" was the canonical advice. New users getting stuck in the middle of the installation procedure were being welcomed by the BSD community with internal jokes like "RTFM!" and "man man". Development mailing-lists were also filled with comments ridiculing Linux as bloated (due to having bash with readline as /bin/sh) and not a real UNIX (due to not being a direct descendant of the AT&T sources). Not to mention all the attacks on the GPL and GNU as not being sufficiently free. It was a cult, essentially. Hopefully the BSD community has grown up since then, but it has already lost most of the mind share to Linux and macOS, which is arguably the only usable BSD desktop available to users who couldn't figure what to do with the "man man" advice.