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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.carno.net.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!munnari.OZ.AU!uunet!in1.uu.net!207.22.81.9!europa.clark.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!howland.erols.net!newsxfer3.itd.umich.edu!agate!theos.com!deraadt From: deraadt@theos.com (Theo de Raadt) Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.advocacy,comp.unix.bsd.misc,comp.os.linux.misc Subject: Re: Linux vs BSD Date: 08 Feb 1997 09:05:55 GMT Organization: Theo Ports Kernels For Fun And Profit Lines: 75 Message-ID: <DERAADT.97Feb8020555@zeus.theos.com> References: <32DFFEAB.7704@usa.net> <5dao3t$t7a@cynic.portal.ca> <5dd624$b05@oden.abc.se> <5dg6kt$fil@cynic.portal.ca> <5dh0lh$rlt@news.accesscom.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: zeus.theos.com In-reply-to: kevinb@aic1.accesscom.com's message of 8 Feb 1997 04:49:53 GMT Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.os.linux.advocacy:83024 comp.unix.bsd.misc:2410 comp.os.linux.misc:157107 In article <5dh0lh$rlt@news.accesscom.com> kevinb@aic1.accesscom.com (Kevin Brown) writes: Furthermore, it's widely known that the reasons for the divergence between the BSD camps were largely political (The creation of OpenBSD, in particular, seems to be more politically motivated than technically motivated). Yes that is why OpenBSD started. Australia also used to be this place where europe sent criminals. But oh my things seem to have changed a fair bit. (If you visit Sydney, ensure you visit the Russian Foxtrot submarine they have on walk-through display at the museum!) The vitality and value of any organization is _not_ determined by the reasons for it's creation. On the BSD side, each kernel comes with a single distribution, and the kernels themselves are separately maintained. Changes, bugfixes, etc. that make it into one distribution probably aren't necessarily integrated into any of the others, even if the changes are applicable. Well, we try to integrate changes and bugfixes made by the other projects. Like tonight I've got some fixes to apply to calendar(1); FreeBSD fixed a bug which someone found on January 1... And I need to test a change inspired by a problem a NetBSD developer in France spotted. That's just me; it's a big group, I've no idea what others are working on ;-) How much does the FreeBSD camp learn about portability from the NetBSD camp? Since FreeBSD runs only on the x86 platform, how can you tell that the portability ideas are even well-tested on that platform? Well, for example, we use FreeBSD malloc() because it helps performance a lot. But we had to fix it for 64-bit operation. (And we keep having to re-fix it when they ship new versions, because they haven't integrated our fixes to it.) So there's a minor developer issue. But to a user running FreeBSD the code _works_, and it doesn't matter whether it is portable or not. I don't see how you can create a fuss about something which does not affect any users. One simply cannot write really cpu-portable code until one has the platforms to learn those hard lessons on, and hence I don't think you can go around faulting FreeBSD for not attacking a problem they don't have. How much does the NetBSD camp learn from the FreeBSD camp about kernel performance and stability? Very little. Essentially nothing. I'd say about 1-2 minor things a month. We are pulling in a lot of NetBSD and FreeBSD changes and bugfixes. I'm not being critical here, I'm genuinely curious. Then you should go compare yourself; you should know it's nearly worthless to ask an opinion on such matters! Or are you simply asking to create a public fuss? ;-) The BSD side of things has always seemed to be a bit fragmented to me. The Linux community *feels* more whole, even if perhaps it's not. Really, there's good changes being done by all the groups. These operating systems are all following evolutionary paths (Linux too). Just as with the commercial systems, divergence is natural and unstoppable. It's just another project. And now it's time to visit the corner store and mull over which brand of milk to buy. Hey.. maybe I'll even pick a fight with the proprietor by asking him to bring in my favorite brand ;-) -- This space not left unintentionally unblank. deraadt@theos.com www.OpenBSD.org -- We're fixing security problems so you can sleep at night.