3 ms·

I don't want a OS where I have to read man pages and documentation to get around. The whole self documentation excuse is the same reason why Emacs is slowly los

by melony 5y ago

I don't want a OS where I have to read man pages and documentation to get around. The whole self documentation excuse is the same reason why Emacs is slowly losing market share. People want software that is intuitive, and failing that, have all answers available on their favorite search engine. Short of baking a chatbot or search engine into OpenBSD, relying purely on self documentation is not sustainable. Though the idea of Clippy being powered by GPT3 does sound appealing.

Koshkin 5y ago
Sure, you could make the OS CLI "intuitive" (by which I am sure you mean discoverable) by supplying the 'help' command, but in the end wouldn't this still amount to reading a bunch of text?..
lcall 5y ago
You can still use search engines, but once you learn your way around the documentation, you might find it is more reliable and quicker. To me, it seems worthwhile to have fewer 0-day bugs to worry about, and more reliable separation between user accounts (fewer privilege escalation bugs, etc etc). (I also recommend setting default umask to 0077 for the same reason, except while using pkg_add -- I have a wrapper script that undoes it temporarily for that due to issues encountered.) There are reasons people use Windows or Apple (perceived convenience), and reasons not to (long-term cost/benefit decisions for known uses). In case it becomes useful to anyone: One way to traverse the docs is (occasionally helpful) is using something like http://man.bsd.lv/ http://man.bsd.lv/ for OBSD docs, like putting in an "=" (w/o quotes) in the search field then clicking "apropos" shows all the commands -- a useful way to learn "what is available in the base system"; or doing full-text searches (can be learned locally, I have an awkward script for it if needed), (Edit: s/what is available/what is available in the base system/ .) And: I find the ~"only 2 remote holes in the default install since about 1996" to be very impressive. Edit: Another way to look at it might be by priorities. I have come to see priorities of some systems roughly as: OpenBSD: security, openness, correctness (including of documentation), portability. Linux: features, performance, openness, breadth of everything, compatibility, convenience (distributions vary in specifics of course; debian and/or devuan continue to impress me in their own way). FreeBSD: performance, stability, openness. NetBSD: portability, stability?, maybe enjoyment for its developers, openness. (I know least here.) Windows / Apple: profitability while targeting preferences of specific groups who want different specific kinds of convenience, it seems.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
chousuke 5y ago
"Intuitive" is often a code word for "familiar to me". A full-blown general purpose OS cannot be completely intuitive; the user always needs something to build from. For what it's worth, I think OpenBSD is intuitive because of its consistency. It's certainly been more intuitive to me than any other OS; it just makes sense as a whole in a way that no other OS quite does, and that's refreshing in a world where users are expected not to understand what their tools are and how they work. OpenBSD just builds its intuitive bits on things you may not yet know. Fortunately, it has excellent documentation to get you started.
mrweasel 5y ago
Don't take this as argumentation against what you're saying, because it makes a lot of sense. However, I would love for my phone or Mac to at least have the option of reading the documentation, but it's not easily accessible. Some things a deemed so intuitive that it doesn't need documentation, yet I still can't use it or find it. On OpenBSD, if you're stuck on something in ksh, cwm, pf or any other built in tool, the man page is right there. Easily accessible, easy to read and comprehensive. When I play around on my OpenBSD box, the man pages is often my first choice over a search engine. Also, not confuse man pages on OpenBSD with Linux man pages. Those two are remarkably different. Many Linux tools have good and comprehensive man pages. On OpenBSD everything has great man pages.
ori_b 5y ago
> and failing that, have all answers available on their favorite search engine. Luckily, the manpages are available on your favorite search engine!
xet7 5y ago
Oh, having man pages included is much better than "read the source code". Unfortunately search engines are unreliable, some "search engine optimized" virus pages could be first, and not some bank or docs website.
szundi 5y ago
This is not math what you can derive from some axioms, this is a system and software that other people invented. Good luck feeling and thinking just like all of those 41234 people involved.
tiew9Vii 5y ago
If you used Linux for any amount of time it'll take a couple of days to get familiar with OpenBSD and they you will be more at home with it than Linux. To me OpenBSD is similar to what Slackware was, as simple as it possibly can be, with the advantage of a BSD being coherent and consistent. I'm a long time Linux user and only used OpenBSD recently. I often find myself Googling Linux configs. I did use Google for OpenBSD to get started but found after a day I wasn't and relying on the man pages instead for system settings etc. They really are short, concise and complete, everyone says this but until you use them it's hard to understand. I use Emacs I don't know Emacs. Emacs is a completely different beast to OpenBSD. Emacs is a huge rabbit hole and you spend as much time building your own Emacs as you do using Emacs. OpenBSD i've set up once which was simple as someone never using it before, and then forgot about it. It's been sat ticking away in a corner, no interruptions. As much as I really like OpenBSD I don't think I can use it as a primary desktop. There's a few compromises on hardware support, no docker for my day job and I've read the desktop experience is slower than Linux just because it hasn't had the money and people Linux has had with drivers etc. I'd really recommend anyone try OpenBSD for it's simplicity and educational purposes. If you use it as your main OS you will likely be dissapointed with some of the limitations, as a server / secondary educational device you might be pleasantly surprised.

by melony 5y ago

Koshkin 5y ago

Sure, you could make the OS CLI "intuitive" (by which I am sure you mean discoverable) by supplying the 'help' command, but in the end wouldn't this still amount to reading a bunch of text?..

lcall 5y ago

You can still use search engines, but once you learn your way around the documentation, you might find it is more reliable and quicker. To me, it seems worthwhile to have fewer 0-day bugs to worry about, and more reliable separation between user accounts (fewer privilege escalation bugs, etc etc). (I also recommend setting default umask to 0077 for the same reason, except while using pkg_add -- I have a wrapper script that undoes it temporarily for that due to issues encountered.) There are reasons people use Windows or Apple (perceived convenience), and reasons not to (long-term cost/benefit decisions for known uses). In case it becomes useful to anyone: One way to traverse the docs is (occasionally helpful) is using something like http://man.bsd.lv/ http://man.bsd.lv/ for OBSD docs, like putting in an "=" (w/o quotes) in the search field then clicking "apropos" shows all the commands -- a useful way to learn "what is available in the base system"; or doing full-text searches (can be learned locally, I have an awkward script for it if needed), (Edit: s/what is available/what is available in the base system/ .) And: I find the ~"only 2 remote holes in the default install since about 1996" to be very impressive. Edit: Another way to look at it might be by priorities. I have come to see priorities of some systems roughly as: OpenBSD: security, openness, correctness (including of documentation), portability. Linux: features, performance, openness, breadth of everything, compatibility, convenience (distributions vary in specifics of course; debian and/or devuan continue to impress me in their own way). FreeBSD: performance, stability, openness. NetBSD: portability, stability?, maybe enjoyment for its developers, openness. (I know least here.) Windows / Apple: profitability while targeting preferences of specific groups who want different specific kinds of convenience, it seems.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

chousuke 5y ago

"Intuitive" is often a code word for "familiar to me". A full-blown general purpose OS cannot be completely intuitive; the user always needs something to build from. For what it's worth, I think OpenBSD is intuitive because of its consistency. It's certainly been more intuitive to me than any other OS; it just makes sense as a whole in a way that no other OS quite does, and that's refreshing in a world where users are expected not to understand what their tools are and how they work. OpenBSD just builds its intuitive bits on things you may not yet know. Fortunately, it has excellent documentation to get you started.

mrweasel 5y ago

Don't take this as argumentation against what you're saying, because it makes a lot of sense. However, I would love for my phone or Mac to at least have the option of reading the documentation, but it's not easily accessible. Some things a deemed so intuitive that it doesn't need documentation, yet I still can't use it or find it. On OpenBSD, if you're stuck on something in ksh, cwm, pf or any other built in tool, the man page is right there. Easily accessible, easy to read and comprehensive. When I play around on my OpenBSD box, the man pages is often my first choice over a search engine. Also, not confuse man pages on OpenBSD with Linux man pages. Those two are remarkably different. Many Linux tools have good and comprehensive man pages. On OpenBSD everything has great man pages.

ori_b 5y ago

> and failing that, have all answers available on their favorite search engine. Luckily, the manpages are available on your favorite search engine!

xet7 5y ago

Oh, having man pages included is much better than "read the source code". Unfortunately search engines are unreliable, some "search engine optimized" virus pages could be first, and not some bank or docs website.

szundi 5y ago

This is not math what you can derive from some axioms, this is a system and software that other people invented. Good luck feeling and thinking just like all of those 41234 people involved.

tiew9Vii 5y ago

If you used Linux for any amount of time it'll take a couple of days to get familiar with OpenBSD and they you will be more at home with it than Linux. To me OpenBSD is similar to what Slackware was, as simple as it possibly can be, with the advantage of a BSD being coherent and consistent. I'm a long time Linux user and only used OpenBSD recently. I often find myself Googling Linux configs. I did use Google for OpenBSD to get started but found after a day I wasn't and relying on the man pages instead for system settings etc. They really are short, concise and complete, everyone says this but until you use them it's hard to understand. I use Emacs I don't know Emacs. Emacs is a completely different beast to OpenBSD. Emacs is a huge rabbit hole and you spend as much time building your own Emacs as you do using Emacs. OpenBSD i've set up once which was simple as someone never using it before, and then forgot about it. It's been sat ticking away in a corner, no interruptions. As much as I really like OpenBSD I don't think I can use it as a primary desktop. There's a few compromises on hardware support, no docker for my day job and I've read the desktop experience is slower than Linux just because it hasn't had the money and people Linux has had with drivers etc. I'd really recommend anyone try OpenBSD for it's simplicity and educational purposes. If you use it as your main OS you will likely be dissapointed with some of the limitations, as a server / secondary educational device you might be pleasantly surprised.