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Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!munnari.oz.au!news.Hawaii.Edu!ames!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!spool.mu.edu!caen!usenet.coe.montana.edu!bsd.coe.montana.edu!nate From: nate@bsd.coe.montana.edu (Nate Williams) Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.questions Subject: Re: Patchkit folks, get FreeBSD! Date: 25 Sep 1993 22:09:10 GMT Organization: Montana Stateu University, Bozeman MT Lines: 89 Message-ID: <282fi6$703@pdq.coe.montana.edu> References: <27prct$if2@pdq.coe.montana.edu> <CDvBvq.61@strix.cluster.sub.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: bsd.coe.montana.edu In article <CDvBvq.61@strix.cluster.sub.org>, Ulf Andrick <ura@strix.cluster.sub.org> wrote: I write: >: Note, with the library fixes in FreeBSD, most everything compiles with >: both gcc2 and gcc1, so I would advise EVERYONE to upgrade to FreeBSD who >: is now running patchkit systems. There will NOT be another old-style >: patchkit release, since ALL of the patchkit folks have moved onto doing >: a brand-new release. > >: I need to do one more change to my upgrade script, but after that I'll >: announce it's availablity more publically. The script allows you to >: upgrade your system from ANY 386BSD 0.1 system to FreeBSD. > >How much disc space will an upgrade need? My /usr parition already has >been brought up to 108 % by the 0.2.4 patch kit. Will the upgrade do it >without etc01 installed and without adding enormous amounts of the like? Everything of consequence in the etc01 distribution is either totally outdated, or has been integrated into the FreeBSD release where it belongs. You can delete /patch and /usr/othersrc if you like, or at least back it up if you are concerned that you'll be missing something you need later. (Highly doubtful, unless you are dependant on one of the old shells or the old PD software, of which I believe all have newer versions out now) > >How many MB will I have to move to my machine in order to upgrade? Memory: If it runs 386BSD, it will run FreeBSD Disk: About the same as the source and binary distribution of 386BSD 0.1. The binaries are a bit larger due to some necessary fixes in the floating point handling of the stdio libraries, but overall things are very similar. (And there is no othersrc or any patchkit files to take up space. >: So, all you who are running patched up versions of 386bsd, realize that >: most of your problems have been addressed in FreeBSD, and if they haven't >: been addressed, they will *only* be addressed by upgrading to FreeBSD. > >: Sorry to be a bear about this, but we do this for fun, and no-one has a >: patchkit system around anymore to help with bug fixes and such. Jordan is in the process of creating a new patchkit system, but in the meantime the old patchkit mechanism was getting out of hand. (How big was the last release? 40MB it seemed ;-P) The reason for the new release far outweigh trying to create a new patchkit. The old (original) patchkit fixed many bugs, but it required you to run the original 386BSD distribution, and then rebuild your entire system plus keep around all of the patches, and the original release was not as well integrated as the FreeBSD release. Basically, the FreeBSD folks tried to clean things up, and make things easier for *new* users and *old* users by creating FreeBSD. You can upgrade from 386BSD to FreeBSD, and you no longer have to go through convolutions to get an updated operatingsystem installed on your machine. >I hesitate to get a whole new OS just because, for instance, I'm >enervated by that `status 0' message on the screen or whatever problem >there is, of which I don't even know whether it is a bug. It may have been fixed in FreeBSD. (And I've no idea what a plain 'status 0' message is w/out additional context) >But of course, these small problems may sum up in the course of time and >when there is nobody who wants to tell how to fix them ... But the issue isn't that no-one wants to tell, it's that they may have been fixed, and there is no way to tell unless you upgrade. (And that even if we wanted to help, we can't since there is no group actively supporting 386BSD 0.1 anymore) >Of course, an outright crash, as I just had somewhat diminishes my >hesitance, but on the other hand, noone will guarantee that I won't have >any crashes with another OS. I can say with certainty that you will experience LESS crashes with FreeBSD over 386BSD 0.1 once the system is installed and running. Nate -- nate@bsd.coe.montana.edu | Freely available *nix clones benefit everyone, nate@cs.montana.edu | so let's not compete with each other, let's work #: (406) 994-4836 | compete with folks who try to tie us down to home #: (406) 586-0579 | proprietary O.S.'s (Microsloth) - Me