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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.carno.net.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!munnari.OZ.AU!news.ecn.uoknor.edu!news.wildstar.net!serv.hinet.net!news.uoregon.edu!tezcat!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!arclight.uoregon.edu!newsfeed.direct.ca!nntp.portal.ca!cynic.portal.ca!not-for-mail From: cjs@cynic.portal.ca (Curt Sampson) Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.linux.networking,comp.os.linux.setup,comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc,comp.unix.bsd.misc Subject: Re: Linux vs BSD Date: 23 Jan 1997 13:02:46 -0800 Organization: Internet Portal Services, Inc. Lines: 51 Message-ID: <5c8jlm$50u@cynic.portal.ca> References: <32DFFEAB.7704@usa.net> <5c155c$p6u@raven.eva.net> <5c19pg$rf6@lynx.dac.neu.edu> <5c39sk$ddl@troma.rv.tis.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: cynic.portal.ca Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.os.linux.misc:153971 comp.os.linux.networking:66008 comp.os.linux.setup:93672 comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc:5712 comp.unix.bsd.misc:2003 In article <5c39sk$ddl@troma.rv.tis.com>, Mark Sienkiewicz <mark@troma.rv.tis.com> wrote: >Ideally, someone would do an analysis and write-up describing if >there is any evidence to support the claims, but I doubt anyone >would do that. For example, I've taken to using BSD and have >little interest in Linux; many people use Linux and have little >interest in BSD. Who will do the comparison? There are a number of people out there who use both. I don't see a comparison being very useful because it's not generally the factors that are being discussed here (`stability' and `network performance') that people are interested in. It seems to me that people tend to use those factors to justify decisions they've made for personal or emotional reasons. The stability and performance of a system depends a great deal on the person running it. Both from reading the usenet and from personal experience, it appears to me that many of the more experienced system administrators perfer BSD systems to Linux systems, which may explain why BSD systems often have the appearance of being more stable than Linux systems. Offhand, I can think of only three truly major differences between Linux systems and BSD systems. 1. Design and source code quality. The quality of the design and source code in the BSD kernels is far, far above that of Linux. This is important only to kernel hackers or would-be kernel hackers, a very, very small percentage of users. 2. Binary-focus vs. source-focus. Linux is focused on people who prefer to avoid compilers if at all possible. I don't know anyone who regularly builds a full Linux userland from source. (I'm not even sure a buildable full userland source tree exists.) The installation tools for binary packages tend to be better than those under BSD systems. The BSD developers have much better configuration and source code control, and much better build systems. 3. Advocacy. The Linux folks are a lot more rabid. :-) If anyone has any comments to make on these points, I'd be interested to hear them. Please note that I'm not intending to insult anyone here, and that if you feel insulted I'd prefer you go post somewhere else instead. cjs -- Curt Sampson cjs@portal.ca Info at http://www.portal.ca/ Internet Portal Services, Inc. Vancouver, BC (604) 257-9400 De gustibus, aut bene aut nihil.