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I really don't like using projects like linuxulator or the linux compatibility layer (are those different?). I'm running FreeBSD because I prefer it over Linux.

I really don't like using projects like linuxulator or the linux compatibility layer (are those different?). I'm running FreeBSD because I prefer it over Linux. I don't want to make it like Linux. If we give in to that we'll end up importing more and more linuxisms and in the end everything will require those. Bedides, the FreeBSD port of codium works fine and with a few setting changes you can install even the proprietary extensions like the Remote SSH. There's a few tools I don't use because they don't have a FreeBSD port. I've asked the developers and they were like 'just use the compatibility layer'. But nope, then I'll just pick something else. Right now I have nothing using the Linux compatibility layer at all which is great.

vermaden 9mo ago
> (are those different?) Its the same thing - just different naming. > I'm running FreeBSD because I prefer it over Linux. Me too but there are things that will not be ported (at least soon) anyway ... that is where Linux Compat Layer helps. Even simple watching movies with DRM bullshit (Widevine) or using a Brave browser that is not in the FreeBSD Ports ... or running Linux games ... or CUDA workaround ... and no NopeVidia will not provide official CUDA support anytime soon. Also please remember that entire The Matrix (1999) movie was rendered [1] on FreeBSD machines in Linux Compat Layer because the software used to do that was not natively available on FreeBSD an yet it sill run faster on FreeBSD in Linux Compat Layer then natively on Linux. Let that sink in. Even today [2] playing Linux games in Linux Compat Layer is faster then natively on Linux - with more FPS and more 'stable' gameplay. Hope that helps. [1] https://freebsd.org/press/press-rel-1/ https://freebsd.org/press/press-rel-1/ [2] https://youtube.com/watch?v=lK6eRbz9DkM https://youtube.com/watch?v=lK6eRbz9DkM
- jabbywocker 9mo ago
  In the reference video you posted he literally states that the FreeBSD version was less stable than Linux, that he experienced repeated game crashes in FreeBSD, that frame rates would drop 50% without explanation and that the overall experience was better on Linux than FreeBSD or Windows. It should also be noted that it’s also not native on Linux either as he’s using Wine on both Linux and FreeBSD
- marxisttemp 9mo ago
  Why are you using a scam crypto browser?
  - morjom 9mo ago
    Brave does fall under crypto, yeah, but I don't know about it being a scam. You don't need to engage with the crypto/web3 and all of those can be disabled.
- anthk 9mo ago
  Maybe with games from 2004 and the like, the ones built to run with a single thread. With ntsync (and previously, esync/fsync) that's not true anymore with games designed for multiple cores.
wutwutwat 9mo ago
Leaving a potential solution on the table that could make your own life easier is silly to me. You don't have to use it for everything and you shouldn't worry about some Linux takeover. Id imagine that for user-land desktop environment related stuff there isn't much difference. Gnome on FreeBSD and gnome on Ubuntu can't be doing things that different from one another.
- wolvoleo 9mo ago
  Well if I wanted to make my life easier I would just use ubuntu or something. Or even Windows? Because even between Linux distros there's a lot of difference in terms of usability. FreeBSD is not something you can run without investing time to figure things out, you really have to be willing to think different. But that's good for me, I don't like going with the flow, I'm an anti-team player :) But by supporting options that have real ports, I stimulate those. By giving in to the easy way I will make that more palatable for developers. And Gnome and KDE have native ports. I really hate the opinionated design of Gnome so I don't use it, but I do use KDE. It does have a lot of cool tweaks by the maintainer to make it work properly.
  - wutwutwat 9mo ago
    I was just saying, is your goal for the os to get out of the way so you can get a job done, or is your job tinkering with your os. I've ran opensense which is a freebsd derivative, and I daily macOS/Darwin which is bsd. Honestly until I need to mess with some systemctl flags I get the same experience from bsd and Linux. Posix and all...
    - wolvoleo 9mo ago
      macOS is not BSD. It's a common misunderstanding, it borrows some userland but the kernel is radically different. But yeah my OS should get out of the way but I don't mind investing a little time in getting things working right. That includes picking the right tools. I was looking for a notetaking app and one of them was like 'just use the compatibility layer'. I think it was notesnook. I just picked obsidian instead which has a port. Still not ideal as it's electron but pretty much all these notetaking apps seem to be electron somehow. And I needed compatibility with android too. If there's something I could really not do without I would consider it but there's nothing like that right now.
drzaiusx11 9mo ago
Do the "linuxisms" inherent in a compatibility shim like linuxlator get exposed to users in day to day application use? I figured it'd be more like how proton provides windows APIs on Linux and applications "just work" as per normal. I admire your purist approach, but most folks don't have that luxury and just need to make do with what works today for their tooling of choice (or more common, what their employer thrusts upon them.)
- tomth 9mo ago
  Compatibility layers can also introduce security bugs. One of the reasons why it was removed from OpenBSD. BSD is more for purists anyway. Virtualization seems to be a better option than compatibility layers for the odd program that doesn't work natively. Maybe that it's different for Windows API's on Linux, because by virtualizing Windows, you're still dealing with an unfree OS.
  - bentley 9mo ago
    Theo de Raadt, 2010, on the removal of emulation: “we no longer focus on binary compatibility for executables from other operating systems. we live in a source code world.” (Since then, OpenBSD has gained support for virtualization for some operating systems including Linux, through the vmm(4) hypervisor.)
    - avadodin 9mo ago
      > Linux: Win32 is the only stable Linux ABI :( > OpenBSD: Whatever the C compiler produced last is the only OpenBSD ABI :D
  - anthk 9mo ago
    FreeBSD used to have compat libraries for old FreeBSD releases itself. With NetBSD it used to be the same. OpenBSD, well, by policy running old, insecure binaries it's basically a no-no.
    - LargoLasskhyfv 8mo ago
pjmlp 9mo ago
Which is the same reason I don't like Proton, as it in the end doesn't change Windows status quo as the platform for game developers, and hardly any different from using MAME, Vice, Stella, Mesen, Linux-UAE,....
- jamesnorden 9mo ago
  Valve tried really hard to steer the world into native Linux ports, it simply didn't pan out, that ship has already sailed.
  - pjmlp 9mo ago
    And now is subject to the whims of Microsoft, wherever Windows, DirectX, Visual Studio go, Valve must follow. Additionally, everyone is betting on Valve as if Steam would be around forever serving Linux gaming with Proton, except no one lives forever, and who knows what will happen to Valve, when current management passes the torch.
arch1e 9mo ago
Author here: I get where you’re coming from and long term, I agree. I don’t want FreeBSD to slowly turn into "Linux but different." For me though, the Linuxulator is about practicality today, not philosophy. It lets me use one or two tools (like the VS Code server) without changing how I actually run my system. Everything else stays native FreeBSD. It's optional, isolated, and doesn't pollute the base system. If native ports exist and work well, I'll always prefer those. But when something critical doesn't, the compatibility layer keeps FreeBSD usable in modern workflows instead of becoming limiting. So yeah.. I see it more as a bridge, not a direction.
musicale 9mo ago
I'm running macOS because it runs desktop applications, and the macOS desktop itself, fairly well. But I wouldn't mind if macOS (a BSD-flavored Unix) added support for linuxlator, and jails, pledge, and various other BSD-flavored things.

vermaden 9mo ago

> (are those different?) Its the same thing - just different naming. > I'm running FreeBSD because I prefer it over Linux. Me too but there are things that will not be ported (at least soon) anyway ... that is where Linux Compat Layer helps. Even simple watching movies with DRM bullshit (Widevine) or using a Brave browser that is not in the FreeBSD Ports ... or running Linux games ... or CUDA workaround ... and no NopeVidia will not provide official CUDA support anytime soon. Also please remember that entire The Matrix (1999) movie was rendered [1] on FreeBSD machines in Linux Compat Layer because the software used to do that was not natively available on FreeBSD an yet it sill run faster on FreeBSD in Linux Compat Layer then natively on Linux. Let that sink in. Even today [2] playing Linux games in Linux Compat Layer is faster then natively on Linux - with more FPS and more 'stable' gameplay. Hope that helps. [1] https://freebsd.org/press/press-rel-1/ https://freebsd.org/press/press-rel-1/ [2] https://youtube.com/watch?v=lK6eRbz9DkM https://youtube.com/watch?v=lK6eRbz9DkM

jabbywocker 9mo ago
In the reference video you posted he literally states that the FreeBSD version was less stable than Linux, that he experienced repeated game crashes in FreeBSD, that frame rates would drop 50% without explanation and that the overall experience was better on Linux than FreeBSD or Windows. It should also be noted that it’s also not native on Linux either as he’s using Wine on both Linux and FreeBSD
marxisttemp 9mo ago
Why are you using a scam crypto browser?
- morjom 9mo ago
  Brave does fall under crypto, yeah, but I don't know about it being a scam. You don't need to engage with the crypto/web3 and all of those can be disabled.
anthk 9mo ago
Maybe with games from 2004 and the like, the ones built to run with a single thread. With ntsync (and previously, esync/fsync) that's not true anymore with games designed for multiple cores.

wutwutwat 9mo ago

Leaving a potential solution on the table that could make your own life easier is silly to me. You don't have to use it for everything and you shouldn't worry about some Linux takeover. Id imagine that for user-land desktop environment related stuff there isn't much difference. Gnome on FreeBSD and gnome on Ubuntu can't be doing things that different from one another.

wolvoleo 9mo ago
Well if I wanted to make my life easier I would just use ubuntu or something. Or even Windows? Because even between Linux distros there's a lot of difference in terms of usability. FreeBSD is not something you can run without investing time to figure things out, you really have to be willing to think different. But that's good for me, I don't like going with the flow, I'm an anti-team player :) But by supporting options that have real ports, I stimulate those. By giving in to the easy way I will make that more palatable for developers. And Gnome and KDE have native ports. I really hate the opinionated design of Gnome so I don't use it, but I do use KDE. It does have a lot of cool tweaks by the maintainer to make it work properly.
- wutwutwat 9mo ago
  I was just saying, is your goal for the os to get out of the way so you can get a job done, or is your job tinkering with your os. I've ran opensense which is a freebsd derivative, and I daily macOS/Darwin which is bsd. Honestly until I need to mess with some systemctl flags I get the same experience from bsd and Linux. Posix and all...
  - wolvoleo 9mo ago
    macOS is not BSD. It's a common misunderstanding, it borrows some userland but the kernel is radically different. But yeah my OS should get out of the way but I don't mind investing a little time in getting things working right. That includes picking the right tools. I was looking for a notetaking app and one of them was like 'just use the compatibility layer'. I think it was notesnook. I just picked obsidian instead which has a port. Still not ideal as it's electron but pretty much all these notetaking apps seem to be electron somehow. And I needed compatibility with android too. If there's something I could really not do without I would consider it but there's nothing like that right now.

drzaiusx11 9mo ago

Do the "linuxisms" inherent in a compatibility shim like linuxlator get exposed to users in day to day application use? I figured it'd be more like how proton provides windows APIs on Linux and applications "just work" as per normal. I admire your purist approach, but most folks don't have that luxury and just need to make do with what works today for their tooling of choice (or more common, what their employer thrusts upon them.)

tomth 9mo ago
Compatibility layers can also introduce security bugs. One of the reasons why it was removed from OpenBSD. BSD is more for purists anyway. Virtualization seems to be a better option than compatibility layers for the odd program that doesn't work natively. Maybe that it's different for Windows API's on Linux, because by virtualizing Windows, you're still dealing with an unfree OS.
- bentley 9mo ago
  Theo de Raadt, 2010, on the removal of emulation: “we no longer focus on binary compatibility for executables from other operating systems. we live in a source code world.” (Since then, OpenBSD has gained support for virtualization for some operating systems including Linux, through the vmm(4) hypervisor.)
  - avadodin 9mo ago
    > Linux: Win32 is the only stable Linux ABI :( > OpenBSD: Whatever the C compiler produced last is the only OpenBSD ABI :D
- anthk 9mo ago
  FreeBSD used to have compat libraries for old FreeBSD releases itself. With NetBSD it used to be the same. OpenBSD, well, by policy running old, insecure binaries it's basically a no-no.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 8mo ago

pjmlp 9mo ago

Which is the same reason I don't like Proton, as it in the end doesn't change Windows status quo as the platform for game developers, and hardly any different from using MAME, Vice, Stella, Mesen, Linux-UAE,....

jamesnorden 9mo ago
Valve tried really hard to steer the world into native Linux ports, it simply didn't pan out, that ship has already sailed.
- pjmlp 9mo ago
  And now is subject to the whims of Microsoft, wherever Windows, DirectX, Visual Studio go, Valve must follow. Additionally, everyone is betting on Valve as if Steam would be around forever serving Linux gaming with Proton, except no one lives forever, and who knows what will happen to Valve, when current management passes the torch.

arch1e 9mo ago

Author here: I get where you’re coming from and long term, I agree. I don’t want FreeBSD to slowly turn into "Linux but different." For me though, the Linuxulator is about practicality today, not philosophy. It lets me use one or two tools (like the VS Code server) without changing how I actually run my system. Everything else stays native FreeBSD. It's optional, isolated, and doesn't pollute the base system. If native ports exist and work well, I'll always prefer those. But when something critical doesn't, the compatibility layer keeps FreeBSD usable in modern workflows instead of becoming limiting. So yeah.. I see it more as a bridge, not a direction.

musicale 9mo ago

I'm running macOS because it runs desktop applications, and the macOS desktop itself, fairly well. But I wouldn't mind if macOS (a BSD-flavored Unix) added support for linuxlator, and jails, pledge, and various other BSD-flavored things.