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Serious question - what do you all think of specifically (now) specializing in FreeBSD to work on either virtual networking stacks or storages? I have a good am

Serious question - what do you all think of specifically (now) specializing in FreeBSD to work on either virtual networking stacks or storages? I have a good amount of experience already and it seems quite niche compared to general DevOps work but also does seem like a lot of big companies are using FreeBSD based setups. Dead end career or ?

pdntspa 4y ago
I would like to know too, I have been enjoying working with the OS and really like it for what it is, and also as a potential alternative to the Docker Devops hegemony BSD in general seems like a potential pivot into embedded space too, there's a lot of interesting electronics out there that run it
fanf2 4y ago
It has some advantages in that derivatives of the BSD networking code turns up all over the place, so it can be useful to know your way around it - and the Richard Stevens TCP/IP illustrated books are a very helpful guide. But I wouldn’t deliberately specialize: get a job working with BSD or Linux, and learn by doing; but keep an eye on the other kernels to see how they do it, and to get a broader basis for your skills.
CoolCold 4y ago
I'll reply in that way - their way of thinking is still in Sysadmins field, for good or bad. They dismiss/don't realize that the world has shifted for Dev guys doing bit of Ops and all that DevOps things. I see it used by more and more very special cases (this one from Meta employee who did networking at Yandex before), but out of general usage. Just over this year: https://redd.it/x3ewxf - IBM Cloud ditches FreeBSD https://redd.it/wf7h34 - Hetzner drops FreeBSD support https://redd.it/ui9z0m - Digital Ocean doing the same
- nix23 4y ago
  >https://redd.it/wf7h34 https://redd.it/wf7h34 - Hetzner drops FreeBSD support Not true, i send them an email about it, the Answer was kind of: They had problem's with the Boot process on some machines, however you can send them the image and they will put i on a USB-Stick then open a web-terminal for you..for free, they still support FreeBSD but not in the Rescue-Media-Way. BTW thanks for the great Answer from Robin...Hetzner is still great ;)
  - CoolCold 4y ago
    Even if it's technically doable doesn't mean [for me] it's not the same as supported/the same level of usability as before support dropped. Or see it other way around - will require more efforts as before. I see no value in extra efforts.
    - nix23 4y ago
      They have not droped support, the rescue-media is i think just debian and ubuntu?...what if you want something else? Did they droped support for rhel then? Another solution you can live boot linux and write the image onto your hardware, like you do it on oraclecloud, when you want..for example archlinux or a bsd.
nix23 4y ago
True many big companys work with bsd, proffesional firewalls often have bsd...because the secred sauce they deploy with their appliances, also sony ps 3/4/5, many industrial iot devices, cdn's like netflix. It's kind of invisible in the west...but the opposite in countrys like japan where bsd is named as often as linux.

pdntspa 4y ago

I would like to know too, I have been enjoying working with the OS and really like it for what it is, and also as a potential alternative to the Docker Devops hegemony BSD in general seems like a potential pivot into embedded space too, there's a lot of interesting electronics out there that run it

fanf2 4y ago

It has some advantages in that derivatives of the BSD networking code turns up all over the place, so it can be useful to know your way around it - and the Richard Stevens TCP/IP illustrated books are a very helpful guide. But I wouldn’t deliberately specialize: get a job working with BSD or Linux, and learn by doing; but keep an eye on the other kernels to see how they do it, and to get a broader basis for your skills.

CoolCold 4y ago

I'll reply in that way - their way of thinking is still in Sysadmins field, for good or bad. They dismiss/don't realize that the world has shifted for Dev guys doing bit of Ops and all that DevOps things. I see it used by more and more very special cases (this one from Meta employee who did networking at Yandex before), but out of general usage. Just over this year: https://redd.it/x3ewxf - IBM Cloud ditches FreeBSD https://redd.it/wf7h34 - Hetzner drops FreeBSD support https://redd.it/ui9z0m - Digital Ocean doing the same

nix23 4y ago
>https://redd.it/wf7h34 https://redd.it/wf7h34 - Hetzner drops FreeBSD support Not true, i send them an email about it, the Answer was kind of: They had problem's with the Boot process on some machines, however you can send them the image and they will put i on a USB-Stick then open a web-terminal for you..for free, they still support FreeBSD but not in the Rescue-Media-Way. BTW thanks for the great Answer from Robin...Hetzner is still great ;)
- CoolCold 4y ago
  Even if it's technically doable doesn't mean [for me] it's not the same as supported/the same level of usability as before support dropped. Or see it other way around - will require more efforts as before. I see no value in extra efforts.
  - nix23 4y ago
    They have not droped support, the rescue-media is i think just debian and ubuntu?...what if you want something else? Did they droped support for rhel then? Another solution you can live boot linux and write the image onto your hardware, like you do it on oraclecloud, when you want..for example archlinux or a bsd.

nix23 4y ago

True many big companys work with bsd, proffesional firewalls often have bsd...because the secred sauce they deploy with their appliances, also sony ps 3/4/5, many industrial iot devices, cdn's like netflix. It's kind of invisible in the west...but the opposite in countrys like japan where bsd is named as often as linux.