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From: peter@nmti.com (Peter da Silva)
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.linux.advocacy,comp.os.linux.setup,comp.unix.bsd.misc
Subject: Re: Linux vs BSD
Date: 5 Feb 1997 01:22:34 GMT
Organization: Network/development platform support, NMTI
Lines: 44
Message-ID: <5d8ncq$jgr@web.nmti.com>
References: <32DFFEAB.7704@usa.net> <slrn5fejrn.353.bet@onyx.interactive.net> <5d7spf$8n6@web.nmti.com> <5d8ikn$801$1@venus.mcs.net>
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Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.os.linux.misc:156474 comp.os.linux.advocacy:82611 comp.os.linux.setup:95737 comp.unix.bsd.misc:2298
In article <5d8ikn$801$1@venus.mcs.net>, Leslie Mikesell <les@MCS.COM> wrote:
> What does 'a lot more stable' mean? I put Linux on a box last
> April or so because I couldn't get the FreeBSD available then
> to run the on-board adaptec controller. The Linux distributions
> available then wouldn't either, but I had no trouble finding
> boot disk images that worked and the kernel soon included the
> driver.
Well "a lot more stable" isn't equivalent in any sense with "has more
drivers". It generally is associated with high uptimes, good response
under load, non-catastrophic failure modes, that sort of thing.
> I've had trouble with debian on a couple of machines too - they
> hang during the probe for the cm206 CDROM. But you can't condemn
> Linux because a particular distribution screws up the install
> procedure.
No, of course not. But when Linus recommends Red Hat and it doesn't work,
you have to wonder about the ones he *didn't* recommend.
> It's not quite the same with freeBSD, since there
> wasn't a different package to try when the install failed...
I've had FreeBSD installs fail and got past it by getting a kernel with
the drivers I needed too. Why on earth *wouldn't* you be able to do that?
> I suspect that anyone switching from a year-old version of either to
> the current version of the other would see an improvement. Either way.
I'm running a year old version of FreeBSD and the current version of Linux
and I don't see any improvement. I see a less reliable package system (it
still managed to install packages without their prerequisites, even though
they were supposed to fix that), a kernel that had to be patched for an
adaptor it claimed to support (Adaptec 1742! Not rocket science), and an
awfully scattered source tree that doesn't make it easy to do either
comprehensive builds or partial ones. The only advantage it's had for me
is that it runs Scriptum. If FreeBSD 2.2 does, I'm not sure why I'll keep
it around.
--
The Reverend Peter da Silva, ULC, COQO, BOFH.
Har du kramat din varg, idag? `-_-'