*BSD News Article 54777


Return to BSD News archive

Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!yarrina.connect.com.au!munnari.OZ.AU!spool.mu.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!blackbush.xlink.net!news.ppp.net!news.Hanse.DE!wavehh.hanse.de!cracauer
From: cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de (Martin Cracauer)
Subject: Re: Free BSD vs. NET/BSD - whats the diff?
Message-ID: <1995Nov9.134256.5996@wavehh.hanse.de>
Organization: BSD User Group Hamburg
References: <1995Oct31.094013.7072@venus.gov.bc.ca> <imybtubccy.fsf@brownlee.cs.uidaho.edu> <47pcus$fcn@park.uvsc.edu>
Date: Thu, 9 Nov 95 13:42:56 GMT
Lines: 42

Terry Lambert <terry@lambert.org> writes:

>Faried Nawaz <fn@uidaho.edu> wrote:
>] In article <4767rj$pce@usenet.rpi.edu> "Jon << JaMah! >> H. Mah" <mahj> writes:
>] 
>] $ The most characteristic difference between NetBSD and FreeBSD is that FreeBSD
>] $ has been far more polished, and its design goals specifically entail the i386
>] $ (and 486 and Pentium) Architecture.  NetBSD is *slightly* less polished and its
>] $ design goals focus more upon creating a system that is geared more towards
>] $ cross-platform interoperability (one NetBSD for SPARC, i386, hp300, and a load
>] $ of others).
>] 
>] How do you mean ``polished''?

>I personally define it as having install media that doesn't need
>another OS already running and a dd command to get it onto a box.

It was not that bad for the i386 port, it had a boot disk with
everything you need to partition a hard disk. And most other ports use
`tar` to populate the disk you formatted under the alien OS :-)

>Possibly NetBSD will be correcting this in their November release
>for the non-Intel versions?

I'm afraid the install issues are not too much improved. 

I'm not even sure the i386 can finally *edit* an existing disk label,
not just override it and hope the previously existing partitions are
still ok (that depends mostly on the ability to guess the disk
parameters, the parameters as guessed by the BIOS :-).

I don't really know, don't care for installation, so let's wait.

Just for note, NetBSD might be less polished than FreeBSD when it
comes to installation. I don't think that is true for operating and
using the system.

Martin
-- 
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Martin Cracauer <cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de>  - BSD User Group Hamburg, Germany 
"As far as I'm concerned,  if something is so complicated that you can't ex-"
"plain it in 10 seconds, then it's probably not worth knowing anyway"- Calvin