48 ms·

FreeBSD 13.0 – Full Desktop Experience

320 points by tate 6y ago

mikece 6y ago
I would love to be able to switch to FreeBSD but the one thing holding me back is support for .NET Core (and lack of VS Code support if that also doesn't run on FreeBSD -- but that's moot if .NET Core support isn't there). Docker support would be nice but isn't essential since code can be checked in to a Linux-based build server and VS Code can attach to a Docker instance on another machine.
- shrubble 6y ago
  I guess that is the question, is it the fault of .NET core or FreeBSD , that it is not availabe for FreeBSD?
  - mikece 6y ago
    I blame Scott Hanselman for not achieving "dotNet Everywhere." :-)
    - mariusmg 6y ago
      Funny thing is there was a .NET Framework "port" to FreeNSD a long time ago called Rotor...
    - maxrev17 6y ago
      Looooool
  - Koshkin 6y ago
    Well, it's not the hardware vendor who is usually blamed for a lack of a device driver for Linux (or a BSD).
    - samus 6y ago
      Unless the vendor in question actively takes steps to make this more difficult.
  - mumblemumble 6y ago
    Maybe it's nobody's fault? I don't blame Microsoft for not spending limited resources on providing official support for an OS with (wildly guessing) 0.25% marketshare. And I don't blame FreeBSD for not spending limited resources on maintaining their own packages for an SDK with (wildly guessing) 0.75% marketshare among non-Windows users.
- shilch 6y ago
  (A port of) Visual Studio Code is available for FreeBSD (using it myself); `pkg install vscode`. If you would like to use docker, you could run a Linux distro in a virtual machine with docker daemon and configure your host docker command to use the daemon inside the VM. That's basically how docker works on macOS.
  - LeSaucy 6y ago
    For docker on freebsd to get any traction, it would need to be implemented with the vm behind the scenes. The beauty of the macOS/windows versions are that they require 0 setup/maintenance and are an implementation detail.
    - nix23 6y ago
      >docker on freebsd to get any traction Yeah no thanks....run bhyve..with buntu and than your docker...have (no) fun. That's "docker" for freebsd: https://bastillebsd.org/ https://bastillebsd.org/
      - canada_dry 6y ago
        Wow... bastille is a pretty capable container manager!
        nix23 6y ago
        Yes! I love to work with it.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 6y ago
      It seems like this should be relatively simple; build docker-cli as a native FreeBSD program, make a docker-machine backend for bhyve... port docker-machine to FreeBSD, I guess (I hope that's not hard; it's not doing anything OS-specific), and you should be good to go.
- jbverschoor 6y ago
  I dunno.. but the very first betas of dot net were actually available for FreeBSD. I remember downloading the spice for it way back. I’m surprised if it’s not available.
  - mikece 6y ago
    Are you talking about "Rotor" back in 2005 or 2006 right before Silverlight came out?
    - jbverschoor 6y ago
      Uff I think it was actually before 2005. Was a long time ago. I recall it was open source, which was a surprise to me. It was definitely called dot net. I think it was more towards 2001 or something, with the whole Java dispute between SUN and Microsoft. Visual J++ had some sort of dialect. (loved the IDE though, microsoft has always been good at developer tools). Before that I was more interested in fahrenheit // openscene graph between Microsoft and SGI.
      - mech422 6y ago
        You mean mono(1)? From Miguel de Icaza & Ximian - started around 2001? 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software)
- bpye 6y ago
  .NET Core can be build for FreeBSD [0] but it looks like there isn't official support. [0] - https://github.com/jasonpugsley/installer/wiki/.NET-5.0-Preview-3-for-FreeBSD https://github.com/jasonpugsley/installer/wiki/.NET-5.0-Prev...
- MuffinFlavored 6y ago
  > I would love to be able to switch to FreeBSD Curious what you think you would personally gain other than the much-repeated mantra of "they have organized man docs and a strong set of CLI userland tools because they are developed alongside the kernel"
  - imwillofficial 6y ago
    Well, I was thinking more like “They have organized man docs, and a strong set of CLI user land tools because they are developed alongside the kernel.” But I’m an Oxford comma man myself.
    - YooLi 6y ago
      Google Oxford comma. It’s not simply a comma before an ‘and’.
      - imwillofficial 6y ago
        I know, it was a joke on His dismissiveness. I'm only half as clever as I try to be
  - orhmeh09 6y ago
    Those sound like excellent gains in and of themselves.
  - nix23 6y ago
    ZFS DTRACE and pf....oh and the mantra.
    - mixedCase 6y ago
      BSD ZFS I believe uses the same code as Linux nowadays or was at least planning to. eBPF should cover your other two needs, by way of itself and through bpftrace.
      - 6y ago
- jcadam 6y ago
  Big sticking point for me is I'm doing development targeting Linux. As much as I feel *BSD is superior, I need the right tools to do my job.
- pimeys 6y ago
  Instead of _switching_, I just got a used ThinkPad from ebay for a secondary OS, installed FreeBSD to it and I'm having a blast exploring a non-Linux OS and trying things out on that side. You don't need to go all-in, but do things gradually and see if FreeBSD offers you any new insights how an operating system could look like. I also have a NixOS laptop and my main Arch Linux workstation for work use.
- 1MachineElf 6y ago
  It's coming. Progress is being tracked in these places: https://github.com/dotnet/source-build/issues/1139 https://github.com/dotnet/source-build/issues/1139 https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/issues/14537 https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/issues/14537
Qahlel 6y ago
I have seen FreeBSD and other non-mainstream OS (as in not: windows, macos, linux variants) keep going but I have never seen a "reason" to use those except for the bragging rights. Can the developpers of these OS please enlighten me why I or anyone should use them?
- Koshkin 6y ago
  [Not an OS developer] In my (admittedly limited) experience, a BSD somehow works better when you need an "appliance" that you can turn on and forget about.
- jxy 6y ago
  Stability. I don't have to chase the "next shinny thingamajig". For example, I have a code that uses OSS that worked 20 years ago on FreeBSD, and it still works now.
- tlhunter 6y ago
  If you hop in one of the BSD subreddits you'll find that every other post is someone asking your same question. You might find some enlightenment there.
  - Koshkin 6y ago
    Unfortunately, most of the answers that I have seen come down to saying one and the same thing, namely, that a BSD is better because its userland is "part of the OS." Though could be true, this is not very enlightening.
    - ragnese 6y ago
      I agree. That's not a very compelling argument at all, IMO. I've read some other stuff, too, though, such as praise for the ports system and FreeBSD's "jails" feature. But I imagine it's a little like Linux distros. If you don't already use Linux, it's kind of hard to understand why anyone cares about the minor differences between distros.
    - 0xFFFE 6y ago
billfruit 6y ago
Does steam work on Freebsd?
- thesuitonym 6y ago
  In some cases, better than Linux: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=linux_games_bsd&num=1 https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=linux_ga...
  - moistbar 6y ago
    Just FYI, that info is now 10 years old. I recently researched switching to FreeBSD and found that the NVidia drivers don't support Vulkan, which is a requirement for DXVK to work, not to mention a lot of Linux ports. Can't comment on the other manufacturers' drivers though.
  - Jonnax 6y ago
    Nexuiz, OpenArena, World of Padman. I've got nothing against those games but they're ancient. They'd run on a 15 year old ThinkPad with integrated graphics. Steam Proton allows you the run new games on Linux like Final Fantasy XV, Witcher 3, Death Stranding, Hitman 2, Doom Eternal. Actual blockbuster games from the last few years.
    - thesuitonym 6y ago
      It's a 10 year old article. Of course the games are old. It might be that things are different now, or the same. But it still answers the question: Does steam work on FreeBSD (Yes), and is still accurate (Sometimes better)
      - moistbar 6y ago
        Considering the age of the article, and the fact that I'm unable to find any information on Vulkan support for any manufacturer's drivers, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Steam (more specifically Proton) doesn't work as well as it does on Linux.
n00bdude 6y ago
How much more difficult is it to navigate a FreeBSD install vs. Linux? I currently use xfce4 with Ubuntu but have been considering putting FreeBSD on an old laptop
- latch 6y ago
  I just spent this past weekend playing with FreeBSD. Pretty sure the answer comes down to whether your hardware is supported. I gave up trying to install it on my XPS due to the lack of support for 802.11ac and issues with video. But it installed fine on my desktop (wired network).
  - n00bdude 6y ago
    Thanks for answering - an XPS is actually what I was considering to install on
nilsb 6y ago
I used to spend hours on getting things like window managers, X11, etc. set up just the way I wanted them to be. However, the older I get the less enthused I am about having to play around with config files to get basic features like suspend/resume to work on my daily work notebook.
- perfmode 6y ago
  I am solemnly transitioning from neovim to JetBrains for this reason. Feels weird to be on a subscription model for my fundamental text editing needs. Life on the teat.
  - nullserver 6y ago
    I miss when vim was my full IDE. But on a large project, I could not it keep it from thrashing the system while indexing.
    - hpoe 6y ago
      I'd plug Doom Emacs my friend, all the power of a full IDE with all the keybindings of Vim.
      - patrec 6y ago
        If you think Doom Emacs has all the power of a full IDE, you have no clue about IDEs.
        jhardy54 6y ago
        Instead of being rude and snarky, maybe you could highlight some IDE-only features that you find compelling?
        vulcan01 6y ago
        Have you tried setting up LSC on either vim or emacs? It does everything an IDE does, aside from a debugger. Compile time errors are highlighted as soon as you're done typing, and many other IDE-like features.
Koshkin 6y ago
And for some of us (not sure how many), there's Debian kFreeBSD.
- tannhaeuser 6y ago
  AFAIK, that has been deprecated at around the same time as LSB (2015?) due to systemd and gnomisms such as gnome's login, dbus, etc. invading every single package. I guess, nowadays the Devuan developers maintain a Debian version that should be as close to a starting point for a new Debian system running on a FreeBSD kernel as it gets.
- rleigh 6y ago
  I used to run it. Initially as a VM on Debian, later inside a jail on FreeBSD. It worked nicely. The main criticism I have of it is that it is a solution in search of a problem. Why would I use it in preference to either vanilla FreeBSD or vanilla Debian? I eventually made the move and just went to vanilla FreeBSD. It avoids the potential for any subtle incompatibilities you might encounter between the FreeBSD kernel and a foreign userland that was never intended to be used with it. Don't get me wrong, it's a great technical achievement. But I'm sceptical that it has major value.
aphextron 6y ago
The problem with BSD on a laptop has always been wifi drivers. Is it anywhere near usable yet?
- tedunangst 6y ago
  Yes.
  - topkeks 6y ago
    Another comment in this thread with one of the most common laptops disagrees. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26492848 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26492848
JediPig 6y ago
I would buy a modern , fully supported , freebsd laptop in a heart beat, 11th gen cpu or ryzen 4800 / 5900hx... However its a pain to find one fully compatible.
jchw 6y ago
> sysctl hw.acpi.lid_switch_state=S3 Hmm. This makes it seem like it just blindly sleeps on lid events. I prefer sleep on lid close to wait a bit then check to see if any displays are connected and on. That works a lot better for docked setups. On Linux, some part of systemd handles this. Is there an alternative in FreeBSD?
sedatk 6y ago
> "Full Desktop Experience" > Now, write all these obscure commands on terminal, and edit all these cryptic text files. :/ I love FreeBSD in many ways, but seeing bar for desktop experience that low saddens me.
- Blikkentrekker 6y ago
  Methinks you have a different cultural understanding from the auctor of this article. Terminal commands are typically not seen as some inferior way to do this, in want of a better solution to eventually be developed, they are given because they are the fastest, clearest way of doing something, especially in online discourse. Explaining via text, or even images, how to navigate a dialog window to achieve something is quite a bit more involved than telling a man to copy a simple command. There exists a dialog window based interface to `pkg`, as far as I know; it is simply seldom used as it is considered inefficient compared to the terminal commands.
  - aflag 6y ago
    I think the problem raised is that it should just work, not require tinkering, regardless of how you do the tinkering.
    - Blikkentrekker 6y ago
      I'm not sure how the philosophy of minimal install vs. full install has anything to do with a “desktop experience”. The “tinkering” is nothing more than installing optional software which one may or may not want, in this case suspending and installing XFCE.
      - aflag 6y ago
        Why would someone not want suspending to be enabled if their machine is capable? Why is DBUS, NTP and slim (I don't even know what that one is) not enabled by default when the user signals they want to use xfce? You have to have a lot of knowledge to just have a basic install in your laptop. Compare that to windows, macos and ubuntu that drop you in a desktop friendly environment as soon as you finish the install. I know that's not FreeBSD's goal nor am I saying that it ought be. I'm just stating the fact that it is not an easy to use system for the uninitiated and it will require at least a little bit of browsing the internet and trying things for all but the most experienced FreeBSD users, if they choose to adopt it as their desktop system.
walrus01 6y ago
I really like the idea here - I was using a FreeBSD desktop 18 years ago with KDE2. But in terms of actually being able to get things done as a desktop workstation, and software I can run natively on it, I could replicate almost exactly the same setup starting from a bare bones debian bullseye (testing) install, then adding xorg and xfce4 and customizing xfce4. That's the setup I'm using now - I ended up adding a ton of gnome and kde related libraries so that I can run software derived from both projects. Yes it uses multiple gigabytes of disk space, but now I have a solid setup that can run just about any Linux GUI application, and Windows 10 inside virtualbox full screen on a second monitor to the side.
- movedx 6y ago
  I bought a MBP, turned it on and started working. I'm partly joking here, but overall I've been trying to use Linux as a desktop environment for nearly 20 years now. It's come a long way but it feels fragile to me. I've been able to do something as simple as a reboot, only to find the graphics go wonky and I'm left with a terminal to debug it. I even ran FreeBSD as a desktop OS too. That worked well but was also fragile (less so than Linux. The BSDs are solid options.) Maybe as I get older, wiser (ha!) and more patient and I'll give these things a try again (because there are Apple/Mac related issues slowly cropping up) and perhaps they will work better. I even gave Windows 10 a serious try recently, using all the latest console emulators to get a better (Linux/iTerm like) experience, VScode, etc. The "sub system for Linux" worked well for a bit before it didn't (file permissions, moving between the two operating systems, etc.) Ideally I wish I could find the experience I desire within a FreeBSD based desktop environment because then so many hardware options become available to me. Old and new.
  - whalesalad 6y ago
    I am the same way. I have always yearned to be one of those people who daily driver linux - but I have never been more productive than I am on macos.
    - pimeys 6y ago
      I'm completely opposite. If I don't get my tiling wm setup with just the apps I need, I'm totally lost and lose all my productivity. Be it Windows 10, macOS or the default installation of Ubuntu or Fedora. Therefore I always use either nixos or freebsd for all my work.
amelius 6y ago
Does it run NVidia's CUDA?

320 points by tate 6y ago

I would love to be able to switch to FreeBSD but the one thing holding me back is support for .NET Core (and lack of VS Code support if that also doesn't run on FreeBSD -- but that's moot if .NET Core support isn't there). Docker support would be nice but isn't essential since code can be checked in to a Linux-based build server and VS Code can attach to a Docker instance on another machine.

shrubble 6y ago
I guess that is the question, is it the fault of .NET core or FreeBSD , that it is not availabe for FreeBSD?
- mikece 6y ago
  I blame Scott Hanselman for not achieving "dotNet Everywhere." :-)
  - mariusmg 6y ago
    Funny thing is there was a .NET Framework "port" to FreeNSD a long time ago called Rotor...
  - maxrev17 6y ago
    Looooool
- Koshkin 6y ago
  Well, it's not the hardware vendor who is usually blamed for a lack of a device driver for Linux (or a BSD).
  - samus 6y ago
    Unless the vendor in question actively takes steps to make this more difficult.
- mumblemumble 6y ago
  Maybe it's nobody's fault? I don't blame Microsoft for not spending limited resources on providing official support for an OS with (wildly guessing) 0.25% marketshare. And I don't blame FreeBSD for not spending limited resources on maintaining their own packages for an SDK with (wildly guessing) 0.75% marketshare among non-Windows users.
shilch 6y ago
(A port of) Visual Studio Code is available for FreeBSD (using it myself); `pkg install vscode`. If you would like to use docker, you could run a Linux distro in a virtual machine with docker daemon and configure your host docker command to use the daemon inside the VM. That's basically how docker works on macOS.
- LeSaucy 6y ago
  For docker on freebsd to get any traction, it would need to be implemented with the vm behind the scenes. The beauty of the macOS/windows versions are that they require 0 setup/maintenance and are an implementation detail.
  - nix23 6y ago
    >docker on freebsd to get any traction Yeah no thanks....run bhyve..with buntu and than your docker...have (no) fun. That's "docker" for freebsd: https://bastillebsd.org/ https://bastillebsd.org/
    - canada_dry 6y ago
      Wow... bastille is a pretty capable container manager!
      - nix23 6y ago
        Yes! I love to work with it.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 6y ago
    It seems like this should be relatively simple; build docker-cli as a native FreeBSD program, make a docker-machine backend for bhyve... port docker-machine to FreeBSD, I guess (I hope that's not hard; it's not doing anything OS-specific), and you should be good to go.
jbverschoor 6y ago
I dunno.. but the very first betas of dot net were actually available for FreeBSD. I remember downloading the spice for it way back. I’m surprised if it’s not available.
- mikece 6y ago
  Are you talking about "Rotor" back in 2005 or 2006 right before Silverlight came out?
  - jbverschoor 6y ago
    Uff I think it was actually before 2005. Was a long time ago. I recall it was open source, which was a surprise to me. It was definitely called dot net. I think it was more towards 2001 or something, with the whole Java dispute between SUN and Microsoft. Visual J++ had some sort of dialect. (loved the IDE though, microsoft has always been good at developer tools). Before that I was more interested in fahrenheit // openscene graph between Microsoft and SGI.
    - mech422 6y ago
      You mean mono(1)? From Miguel de Icaza & Ximian - started around 2001? 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mono_(software)
bpye 6y ago
.NET Core can be build for FreeBSD [0] but it looks like there isn't official support. [0] - https://github.com/jasonpugsley/installer/wiki/.NET-5.0-Preview-3-for-FreeBSD https://github.com/jasonpugsley/installer/wiki/.NET-5.0-Prev...
MuffinFlavored 6y ago
> I would love to be able to switch to FreeBSD Curious what you think you would personally gain other than the much-repeated mantra of "they have organized man docs and a strong set of CLI userland tools because they are developed alongside the kernel"
- imwillofficial 6y ago
  Well, I was thinking more like “They have organized man docs, and a strong set of CLI user land tools because they are developed alongside the kernel.” But I’m an Oxford comma man myself.
  - YooLi 6y ago
    Google Oxford comma. It’s not simply a comma before an ‘and’.
    - imwillofficial 6y ago
      I know, it was a joke on His dismissiveness. I'm only half as clever as I try to be
- orhmeh09 6y ago
  Those sound like excellent gains in and of themselves.
- nix23 6y ago
  ZFS DTRACE and pf....oh and the mantra.
  - mixedCase 6y ago
    BSD ZFS I believe uses the same code as Linux nowadays or was at least planning to. eBPF should cover your other two needs, by way of itself and through bpftrace.
    - 6y ago
jcadam 6y ago
Big sticking point for me is I'm doing development targeting Linux. As much as I feel *BSD is superior, I need the right tools to do my job.
pimeys 6y ago
Instead of _switching_, I just got a used ThinkPad from ebay for a secondary OS, installed FreeBSD to it and I'm having a blast exploring a non-Linux OS and trying things out on that side. You don't need to go all-in, but do things gradually and see if FreeBSD offers you any new insights how an operating system could look like. I also have a NixOS laptop and my main Arch Linux workstation for work use.
1MachineElf 6y ago
It's coming. Progress is being tracked in these places: https://github.com/dotnet/source-build/issues/1139 https://github.com/dotnet/source-build/issues/1139 https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/issues/14537 https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/issues/14537

Qahlel 6y ago

I have seen FreeBSD and other non-mainstream OS (as in not: windows, macos, linux variants) keep going but I have never seen a "reason" to use those except for the bragging rights. Can the developpers of these OS please enlighten me why I or anyone should use them?

Koshkin 6y ago
[Not an OS developer] In my (admittedly limited) experience, a BSD somehow works better when you need an "appliance" that you can turn on and forget about.
jxy 6y ago
Stability. I don't have to chase the "next shinny thingamajig". For example, I have a code that uses OSS that worked 20 years ago on FreeBSD, and it still works now.
tlhunter 6y ago
If you hop in one of the BSD subreddits you'll find that every other post is someone asking your same question. You might find some enlightenment there.
- Koshkin 6y ago
  Unfortunately, most of the answers that I have seen come down to saying one and the same thing, namely, that a BSD is better because its userland is "part of the OS." Though could be true, this is not very enlightening.
  - ragnese 6y ago
    I agree. That's not a very compelling argument at all, IMO. I've read some other stuff, too, though, such as praise for the ports system and FreeBSD's "jails" feature. But I imagine it's a little like Linux distros. If you don't already use Linux, it's kind of hard to understand why anyone cares about the minor differences between distros.
  - 0xFFFE 6y ago

billfruit 6y ago

Does steam work on Freebsd?

thesuitonym 6y ago
In some cases, better than Linux: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=linux_games_bsd&num=1 https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=linux_ga...
- moistbar 6y ago
  Just FYI, that info is now 10 years old. I recently researched switching to FreeBSD and found that the NVidia drivers don't support Vulkan, which is a requirement for DXVK to work, not to mention a lot of Linux ports. Can't comment on the other manufacturers' drivers though.
- Jonnax 6y ago
  Nexuiz, OpenArena, World of Padman. I've got nothing against those games but they're ancient. They'd run on a 15 year old ThinkPad with integrated graphics. Steam Proton allows you the run new games on Linux like Final Fantasy XV, Witcher 3, Death Stranding, Hitman 2, Doom Eternal. Actual blockbuster games from the last few years.
  - thesuitonym 6y ago
    It's a 10 year old article. Of course the games are old. It might be that things are different now, or the same. But it still answers the question: Does steam work on FreeBSD (Yes), and is still accurate (Sometimes better)
    - moistbar 6y ago
      Considering the age of the article, and the fact that I'm unable to find any information on Vulkan support for any manufacturer's drivers, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Steam (more specifically Proton) doesn't work as well as it does on Linux.

n00bdude 6y ago

How much more difficult is it to navigate a FreeBSD install vs. Linux? I currently use xfce4 with Ubuntu but have been considering putting FreeBSD on an old laptop

latch 6y ago
I just spent this past weekend playing with FreeBSD. Pretty sure the answer comes down to whether your hardware is supported. I gave up trying to install it on my XPS due to the lack of support for 802.11ac and issues with video. But it installed fine on my desktop (wired network).
- n00bdude 6y ago
  Thanks for answering - an XPS is actually what I was considering to install on

nilsb 6y ago

I used to spend hours on getting things like window managers, X11, etc. set up just the way I wanted them to be. However, the older I get the less enthused I am about having to play around with config files to get basic features like suspend/resume to work on my daily work notebook.

perfmode 6y ago
I am solemnly transitioning from neovim to JetBrains for this reason. Feels weird to be on a subscription model for my fundamental text editing needs. Life on the teat.
- nullserver 6y ago
  I miss when vim was my full IDE. But on a large project, I could not it keep it from thrashing the system while indexing.
  - hpoe 6y ago
    I'd plug Doom Emacs my friend, all the power of a full IDE with all the keybindings of Vim.
    - patrec 6y ago
      If you think Doom Emacs has all the power of a full IDE, you have no clue about IDEs.
      - jhardy54 6y ago
        Instead of being rude and snarky, maybe you could highlight some IDE-only features that you find compelling?
      - vulcan01 6y ago
        Have you tried setting up LSC on either vim or emacs? It does everything an IDE does, aside from a debugger. Compile time errors are highlighted as soon as you're done typing, and many other IDE-like features.

Koshkin 6y ago

And for some of us (not sure how many), there's Debian kFreeBSD.

tannhaeuser 6y ago
AFAIK, that has been deprecated at around the same time as LSB (2015?) due to systemd and gnomisms such as gnome's login, dbus, etc. invading every single package. I guess, nowadays the Devuan developers maintain a Debian version that should be as close to a starting point for a new Debian system running on a FreeBSD kernel as it gets.
rleigh 6y ago
I used to run it. Initially as a VM on Debian, later inside a jail on FreeBSD. It worked nicely. The main criticism I have of it is that it is a solution in search of a problem. Why would I use it in preference to either vanilla FreeBSD or vanilla Debian? I eventually made the move and just went to vanilla FreeBSD. It avoids the potential for any subtle incompatibilities you might encounter between the FreeBSD kernel and a foreign userland that was never intended to be used with it. Don't get me wrong, it's a great technical achievement. But I'm sceptical that it has major value.

aphextron 6y ago

The problem with BSD on a laptop has always been wifi drivers. Is it anywhere near usable yet?

tedunangst 6y ago
Yes.
- topkeks 6y ago
  Another comment in this thread with one of the most common laptops disagrees. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26492848 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26492848

JediPig 6y ago

I would buy a modern , fully supported , freebsd laptop in a heart beat, 11th gen cpu or ryzen 4800 / 5900hx... However its a pain to find one fully compatible.

jchw 6y ago

> sysctl hw.acpi.lid_switch_state=S3 Hmm. This makes it seem like it just blindly sleeps on lid events. I prefer sleep on lid close to wait a bit then check to see if any displays are connected and on. That works a lot better for docked setups. On Linux, some part of systemd handles this. Is there an alternative in FreeBSD?

sedatk 6y ago

> "Full Desktop Experience" > Now, write all these obscure commands on terminal, and edit all these cryptic text files. :/ I love FreeBSD in many ways, but seeing bar for desktop experience that low saddens me.

Blikkentrekker 6y ago
Methinks you have a different cultural understanding from the auctor of this article. Terminal commands are typically not seen as some inferior way to do this, in want of a better solution to eventually be developed, they are given because they are the fastest, clearest way of doing something, especially in online discourse. Explaining via text, or even images, how to navigate a dialog window to achieve something is quite a bit more involved than telling a man to copy a simple command. There exists a dialog window based interface to `pkg`, as far as I know; it is simply seldom used as it is considered inefficient compared to the terminal commands.
- aflag 6y ago
  I think the problem raised is that it should just work, not require tinkering, regardless of how you do the tinkering.
  - Blikkentrekker 6y ago
    I'm not sure how the philosophy of minimal install vs. full install has anything to do with a “desktop experience”. The “tinkering” is nothing more than installing optional software which one may or may not want, in this case suspending and installing XFCE.
    - aflag 6y ago
      Why would someone not want suspending to be enabled if their machine is capable? Why is DBUS, NTP and slim (I don't even know what that one is) not enabled by default when the user signals they want to use xfce? You have to have a lot of knowledge to just have a basic install in your laptop. Compare that to windows, macos and ubuntu that drop you in a desktop friendly environment as soon as you finish the install. I know that's not FreeBSD's goal nor am I saying that it ought be. I'm just stating the fact that it is not an easy to use system for the uninitiated and it will require at least a little bit of browsing the internet and trying things for all but the most experienced FreeBSD users, if they choose to adopt it as their desktop system.

walrus01 6y ago

I really like the idea here - I was using a FreeBSD desktop 18 years ago with KDE2. But in terms of actually being able to get things done as a desktop workstation, and software I can run natively on it, I could replicate almost exactly the same setup starting from a bare bones debian bullseye (testing) install, then adding xorg and xfce4 and customizing xfce4. That's the setup I'm using now - I ended up adding a ton of gnome and kde related libraries so that I can run software derived from both projects. Yes it uses multiple gigabytes of disk space, but now I have a solid setup that can run just about any Linux GUI application, and Windows 10 inside virtualbox full screen on a second monitor to the side.

movedx 6y ago
I bought a MBP, turned it on and started working. I'm partly joking here, but overall I've been trying to use Linux as a desktop environment for nearly 20 years now. It's come a long way but it feels fragile to me. I've been able to do something as simple as a reboot, only to find the graphics go wonky and I'm left with a terminal to debug it. I even ran FreeBSD as a desktop OS too. That worked well but was also fragile (less so than Linux. The BSDs are solid options.) Maybe as I get older, wiser (ha!) and more patient and I'll give these things a try again (because there are Apple/Mac related issues slowly cropping up) and perhaps they will work better. I even gave Windows 10 a serious try recently, using all the latest console emulators to get a better (Linux/iTerm like) experience, VScode, etc. The "sub system for Linux" worked well for a bit before it didn't (file permissions, moving between the two operating systems, etc.) Ideally I wish I could find the experience I desire within a FreeBSD based desktop environment because then so many hardware options become available to me. Old and new.
- whalesalad 6y ago
  I am the same way. I have always yearned to be one of those people who daily driver linux - but I have never been more productive than I am on macos.
  - pimeys 6y ago
    I'm completely opposite. If I don't get my tiling wm setup with just the apps I need, I'm totally lost and lose all my productivity. Be it Windows 10, macOS or the default installation of Ubuntu or Fedora. Therefore I always use either nixos or freebsd for all my work.

amelius 6y ago

Does it run NVidia's CUDA?