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From: root@dyson.iquest.net (John S. Dyson)
Subject: Re: Linux vs. FreeBSD ...
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References: <3188C1E2.45AE@onramp.net> <4mouan$cpb@agate.berkeley.edu> <4mpch5$97t@ennui.ops.best.com> <4mplph$n1s@agate.berkeley.edu>
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 00:38:29 GMT
Lines: 78
In article <4mplph$n1s@agate.berkeley.edu>,
Nick Kralevich <nickkral@america.CS.Berkeley.EDU> wrote:
>
>There is a distinction between hardware BUGS and BROKEN hardware.
>I am not talking about broken hardware (such as bad SIMMS), but rather,
>I am talking about are BUGS in hardware, such as the [1] RZ1000 chipset
>bug, the CMD640 chipset bug, or the Pentium bug [2], which affect a wide
>number of people.
>
> [1] RZ1000 bug: http://pentium.intel.com/procs/support/rz1000/rztest.htm
> [2] Linux software patches for these two chipsets and the pentium bug have
> been incorporated into the main Linux kernel. Are patches available
> for FreeBSD?
>
Don't need the fixes for the chipset problems, Linux did, and the pentium bug
thing can be done by a compiler hack.
>
>Hardware BUGS can be considered "environment problems", and if they can
>be worked around, they should.
>
We do.
>
>According to Terry, 3 out of 5 EIDE interfaces have bugs. If the
>FreeBSD core team is going to take the moral high ground and not try to
>work around those bugs ("it's a hardware problem, let the hardware guys
>fix it"), then I'm sure the Linux community would be more than happy to
>help out those users.
>
Actually, again some people really on the outside who don't know what they are
talking about, like you, Nick, don't appear to realize that the FreeBSD-core
team doesn't make all of the decisions or do all of the work. Unlike Linux,
we have an open development, with multiple people making changes to the
master sources. BTW, Terry is a cherished, respected and wordy :-) contributor,
but NOT a core team member. Why do you think that all people who are
pro-FreeBSD are in the -core team -- if you think so, you are very wrong.
>
>Of course, if they DO work around those bugs, then, by your definition,
>they are a "suspect" operating system.
>
The whole matter of this argument is suspect.
>
>Oh well. I guess it's a no win situation. *sigh* In that case,
>I'll stick with the "suspect" operating system. I would rather have
>somthing that works then listen to people make excuses for somthing that
>doesn't work.
>
Well, the FreeBSD IDE-CDROM support is not stellar, and probably the worst part
of the system. However, I regularly get 8.5MBytes/sec read perf on my
WD IDE drive through the filesystem (I can coerce 9.2-9.5 in ideal conditions.)
-- how does Linux do? I guess we don't have EIDE support, do we :-). We
(FreeBSD) just do server things better.
>
>I am not saying that it is OK for hardware to have bugs, but rather,
>that an operating system should try to help out the unfortunate user
>who gets stuck with the buggy hardware. The answer "[it was]
>your choice to buy the hardware" isn't exactly encouraging when
>the operating system can (and should) work around the problem.
>
We do work around bugs. FreeBSD should have better IDE CDROM drivers,
but we don't -- sorry!!! We focus primarily on the serious server market,
with workstations being a bonus. Some Linux people have delusions of
overtaking Microsoft in the marketplace -- because Linux is superior to
NT... Silly argument -- the OSes are different, with different capabilities.
NT has everything that I need for my OA stuff -- Linux doesn't... Bzzzt,
wrong market. Even when Linux gets Wordperfect (which runs on FreeBSD
already), it doesn't solve the lack of compatibility with the rest of
the OA tools.
FreeBSD is focusing on the server market, and serious workstations... I
guess Linux is striving to replace DOS :-). It might succeed -- maybe...
John