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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!nntp.coast.net!chi-news.cic.net!newsfeed.internetmci.com!EU.net!ieunet!maths.tcd.ie!maths.tcd.ie!not-for-mail From: tim@maths.tcd.ie (Timothy Murphy) Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.advocacy,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc,comp.unix.advocacy,comp.unix.misc Subject: Re: Linux vs FreeBSD Date: 10 Dec 1995 18:43:15 -0000 Organization: Dept. of Maths, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland. Lines: 68 Message-ID: <4af9o3$dc7@bell.maths.tcd.ie> References: <489kuu$rbo@pelican.cs.ucla.edu> <mkl.818175063@dagobert.rob.cs.tu-bs.de> <4ab2i4$pv@pell.pell.chi.il.us> <4ac46s$hfh@bell.maths.tcd.ie> <4ack8a$11b@parody.tecc.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: bell.maths.tcd.ie Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.os.linux.advocacy:29928 comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:10177 comp.unix.advocacy:12015 comp.unix.misc:19993 james@parody.tecc.co.uk (James Raynard) writes: >On the contrary, any good book on system administration should explain >how to mount file systems (and hopefully how to use the apropos command). >You then read the system's man pages for the specifics of how to do what you >want to do on the particular system you are using. Or you can read the FAQ >for an appropriate newsgroup (which, being a good Net citizen, you should >always do before posting to it 8-) >>Some people answered this by claiming that no documentation was necessary, >>since FreeBSD is identical to any other BSD. >Please could you cite a posting where someone has claimed that FreeBSD >doesn't need any documentation. I don't keep a record of postings I read; but several people said more or less exactly that. In fact it seems to me that what you have said above amounts to the same thing. Why tell us that "any good book on system administration" tells you how to mount a file system, unless you think it is an answer to my query about mounting floppies? Again, your whole posting seems to imply that _you_ believe FreeBSD doesn't need any documentation, since "any good book on ..." will satisfy the need. [Nb I defined FreeBSD documentation as documentation which comes with FreeBSD. It was clear from the rest of my posting from which your exerpt above came that "documentation" referred to FreeBSD documentation in this sense.] I would also like to see the posting in >which it was claimed that "FreeBSD is identical to any other BSD". You are just being pedantic. You yourself seem to believe that "any good book" on BSD will explain how to use FreeBSD. You must therefore believe that FreeBSD is simply an examplar of the BSD species with no special features requiring separate documentation. If I am right in that -- and if I am not then you have not explained your position clearly -- then you hold precisely the view I was arguing against. To repeat it in a nutshell: I do not believe a person unfamiliar with Unix and running FreeBSD on their PC at home could possibly discover what to do by reading books on BSD. I am told there is now good documentation on FreeBSD. If that is so -- I have not yet been able to check it out -- then I for one would be more than happy, since I believe that Linux and FreeBSD are good for one another, and that one does not have to hate one to like the other. Fortunately, the people who are actually responsible for FreeBSD (I am thinking in particular of Jordan Hubbard), as opposed to the army of camp followers, seem to hold exactly the same view on this matter as I do. -- Timothy Murphy e-mail: tim@maths.tcd.ie tel: +353-1-2842366 s-mail: School of Mathematics, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland