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Xref: sserve comp.os.386bsd.questions:13507 comp.os.386bsd.misc:3563 Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!quagga.ru.ac.za!Braae!g89r4222 From: csgr@cs.ru.ac.za (Geoff Rehmet) Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.questions,comp.os.386bsd.misc Subject: Re: How UTTERLY Amazing! (Was Re: FreeBSD vs NetBSD) Date: 30 Sep 1994 19:21:10 GMT Organization: Rhodes University Computing Services Lines: 61 Message-ID: <36hof6$de4@quagga.ru.ac.za> References: <358o3g$p95@umd5.umd.edu> <jmonroyCwKFI2.6C0@netcom.com> <hart.780959657@apanix.apana.org.au> Reply-To: csgr@cs.ru.ac.za NNTP-Posting-Host: braae.ru.ac.za X-Newsreader: NN version 6.5.0 #4 (NOV) In <hart.780959657@apanix.apana.org.au> hart@apanix.apana.org.au (Leigh Hart) writes: >jmonroy@netcom.com (Jesus Monroy Jr) writes: >>: FreeBSD 2.0 is just around the corner as well (perhaps not as close as >>: NetBSD), but I need things up and running in the next month or so. Are >>: there any compelling reasons to wait to FreeBSD 2.0 instead of using NetBSD >>: 1.0 when its released? >>: >> There are as many reasons to wait for 386bsd R1.0 as >> any of the others. Flame-fests aside: both NetBSD and FreeBSD are now *very* far from the original 386BSD. (Basically, there are still some parts of the i386 tree in FreeBSD 2.0 which originate from 386BSD. I assume that roughly the same goes for NetBSD 1.0.) FreeBSD 2.0, for instance, is no longer based on 386BSD, but is rather based on 4.4-Lite -- if you did a cvs checkout of the initial code in our tree you would (if you were lucky) get 4.4-Lite back. Gauging by some email which I exchanged with Lynne Jolitz, the Jolitzes are more interested in the documentation than in a stable production operating system. Thus, I would say that anyone who is expecting any more stability than was available in 386BSD-0.1 may be in for a shock. (Lynne did not answer my questions about stability.) I think that it is fair enough to assume that 386BSD 1.0 should rather be taken as a set of reference bits and documentation of *how* certain parts of the system work. It will probably require someone else to go and make it all stable. When I asked Lynne about whether 386BSD-1.0 would be based on 4.4-Lite, and if they had things like LFS, she brushed that question aside, commenting that they were not going include new code just because it was a new feature, and would rather stick to things that had good technical merit. (My paraphrasing is not very good here - but Lynne can clarify this if she disagrees with my summary.) We've already flamed this issue to death. Those of us who are interested in stable systems for production use can happily go back to NetBSD or FreeBSD and keep using those. Any cute ideas that might come out of 386BSD-1.0 will surely find their way into the other *BSD. When 386BSD-1.0 comes up on the ftp sites, I think it may still be useful to pull it down for reference purposes -- I don't think we should all ignore it. However, it will probably be more of a reference than anything else. Leave the Jolitzes to do whatever they want. If they come up with some useful ideas, we can use them. 386BSD might still be useful for teaching purposes in OS courses. (Although, I suspect that XINU or MINIX are probably still better for situations where you want to teach students about OS's.) Geoff. Oh, I nearly forgot - Jesus, I won't see any follow-ups you make, because you're in my kill file. (ie: don't waste your time.) -- Geoff Rehmet, Computer Science Department, Rhodes University, South Africa FreeBSD core team: csgr@freebsd.org | ____ _ o /\ csgr@cs.ru.ac.za, geoff@neptune.ru.ac.za |___ _-\_<, / /\/\ finger rehmet@cs.ru.ac.za for PGP public key | (*)/'(*) /\/ / \ \