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Thanks again for replying! You've been very fair and thoughtful with each response. I hope you try out netbsd 10 even if it's just for fun, and not for an artic

Thanks again for replying! You've been very fair and thoughtful with each response. I hope you try out netbsd 10 even if it's just for fun, and not for an article. Check out unitedbsd.com when you have time....NetBSD has a friendly community, and some of the developers are on there I believe. We can help you install NetBSD ;) I have to be honest and say (as I did in another comment) that I don't think the review was quite fair. It seemed rushed. I can't prove this, but it seems like you were up against a deadline and just spun up a VM of NetBSD, and went from there. You're smart enough to do even some reading before and during the install process to give readers an idea about what NetBSD is like. Nothing about the project or it's goals either. >Hmmmm. I am not sure I agree here. I think it needs a fair level of domain expert knowledge to know what a kernel is, and what the difference between an OS and a distro is. I would disagree slightly there. I think once an ordinary user installs linux on their laptop, they start to learn a little about it. As they read more, they learn a little about kernels, distros, and operating systems. I certainly did, and I don't think it takes expert knowledge to at least understand what those concepts are. Not everyone does it, but plenty of people do. >Really? That astonishes me. The reason I wrote what I did is because you were describing someone at 2 am frantically trying to solve some problem with their OS and, I just don't see that happening on a brand new install of a fairly niche OS. A tech problem generally? Sure, I could easily imagine that. But who is putting NetBSD on their main machine without doing any reading or thinking about the consequences of it before wiping their current OS? >I picked the first option or the next step or whatever seemed most obvious. In my first experiences installing the BSD family of operating systems in VM's I still took a second to read what was presented to me, and think about what I was about to do. Again, it's a menu driven install, and ignoring the part that asks you about installation of binary packages, or a root password, or configuring your network, seems odd to me. I need to do (some) of those things on windows or MacOS don't I? >I had never heard of `pkgin` before, and if that was an option install then I probably would have skipped it. In the menu it's "enable installation of binary packages." Again, I feel like this was a rushed review. >I am aware the xBSD world does not see it like that. I feel that it is my duty as an industry observer to attempt to make them aware of it........I expected resistance to this, and I am getting it. :-) Right now, in fact. :-D :) I would argue that installing the three biggest BSD OS's is far simpler and less time consuming than gentoo or arch...... Again, thanks for responding to my comments.

lproven 4y ago
I am enjoying this conversation, so thank you (and you're welcome :-) ). > It seemed rushed It was. Virtually everything I write is now. :-( That's life on a website as opposed to in print. But C21 life is generally rushed, I find. > But who is putting NetBSD on their main machine without doing any reading or thinking Ahh, now, there is an important thing. I wasn't "on my main machine". I was not proposing it would be. I put it in a VM. I think that is how most techies try out new OSes these days. Especially FOSS OSes. Try before you buy. Give it a test drive, no cost, no commitment. And in that context, yes, I do feel it's something one might do casually, without a lot of research, on the spur of the moment, for example at 1AM after one's partner has gone to bed or something. > Nothing about the project or it's goals either. Well, I tried to point out in the closing paragraphs why one might want a modern-but-minimal OS on vintage hardware. I cited the example of keeping an old version of Mac OS X around on a PowerMac running Classic MacOS: so one can download stuff from the internet, transfer stuff to/from USB keys or other media the old OS might not understand, and so on. As a comparison: there was a new release of Classic AmigaOS just last year or so: https://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/index.php/news/1-latest-news/290-amigaos-42-for-all-classic-amigas-released-and-available https://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/index.php/news/1-late... After a ~30 year gap. AFAIK that release comes with no web browser, no TCP/IP, no networking at all. 680x0 Amigas don't come with USB either, and many don't have CD drives as standard. What I was getting at with that was: on such a machine, having NetBSD around as well, so you can grab stuff off the Internet, or a modern optical disk, could be handy. That was me trying to justify the relevance of the project and its goals. Apparently not clearly enough. :-(
- nortonham 4y ago
  I would say a rushed review isn't fair, but I don't write OS reviews for a living. >That was me trying to justify the relevance of the project and its goals. Apparently not clearly enough. :-( That isn't the same as the project's stated goals, although it does say something about why it might useful to someone. In that sense it's fair enough. >And in that context, yes, I do feel it's something one might do casually, without a lot of research, on the spur of the moment, for example at 1AM after one's partner has gone to bed or something. Ok, fair enough. Having done that, I eventually was able to feel comfortable in NetBSD, especially in a VM, with what was available to me: essentially the official docs and google. I was able to get the OS up and running, and make it feel usable for me.

lproven 4y ago

I am enjoying this conversation, so thank you (and you're welcome :-) ). > It seemed rushed It was. Virtually everything I write is now. :-( That's life on a website as opposed to in print. But C21 life is generally rushed, I find. > But who is putting NetBSD on their main machine without doing any reading or thinking Ahh, now, there is an important thing. I wasn't "on my main machine". I was not proposing it would be. I put it in a VM. I think that is how most techies try out new OSes these days. Especially FOSS OSes. Try before you buy. Give it a test drive, no cost, no commitment. And in that context, yes, I do feel it's something one might do casually, without a lot of research, on the spur of the moment, for example at 1AM after one's partner has gone to bed or something. > Nothing about the project or it's goals either. Well, I tried to point out in the closing paragraphs why one might want a modern-but-minimal OS on vintage hardware. I cited the example of keeping an old version of Mac OS X around on a PowerMac running Classic MacOS: so one can download stuff from the internet, transfer stuff to/from USB keys or other media the old OS might not understand, and so on. As a comparison: there was a new release of Classic AmigaOS just last year or so: https://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/index.php/news/1-latest-news/290-amigaos-42-for-all-classic-amigas-released-and-available https://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/index.php/news/1-late... After a ~30 year gap. AFAIK that release comes with no web browser, no TCP/IP, no networking at all. 680x0 Amigas don't come with USB either, and many don't have CD drives as standard. What I was getting at with that was: on such a machine, having NetBSD around as well, so you can grab stuff off the Internet, or a modern optical disk, could be handy. That was me trying to justify the relevance of the project and its goals. Apparently not clearly enough. :-(

nortonham 4y ago
I would say a rushed review isn't fair, but I don't write OS reviews for a living. >That was me trying to justify the relevance of the project and its goals. Apparently not clearly enough. :-( That isn't the same as the project's stated goals, although it does say something about why it might useful to someone. In that sense it's fair enough. >And in that context, yes, I do feel it's something one might do casually, without a lot of research, on the spur of the moment, for example at 1AM after one's partner has gone to bed or something. Ok, fair enough. Having done that, I eventually was able to feel comfortable in NetBSD, especially in a VM, with what was available to me: essentially the official docs and google. I was able to get the OS up and running, and make it feel usable for me.