*BSD News Article 94896


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From: Charles McCrobie <mccrobie@usdesign.com>
Newsgroups: misc.forsale.computers.workstation,alt.dec,biz.dec,biz.dec.workstations,comp.sys.dec,comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.openbsd.misc
Subject: Re: FS: Dec Alphastation 500/500 Must sell
Date: Thu, 01 May 1997 12:32:50 -0400
Organization: U.S. Design
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Pim van der Eijk wrote:

[ snip ]

> 
> As for OpenBSD, NetBSD, FreeBSD, the same argument holds expect for the
> fact that the user base of these systems seems (?) to be much smaller
> than Linux's,  although I've heard some UNIX specialists in a company
> I've worked for praise NetBSD over the commercial UNIX this company was
> selling.  Also,  I don't understand why there have to be three competing
> *BSD projects,  the Linux gang seems better at keeping proselytes and
> dissidents involved in the main stream ..

Yes the user base does seem smaller.  I for one prefer BSD 4.4 (*BSD)
over
System-V look-alikes (Linux).  It seems that software first appears on
Linux,
then some kind sole ports it to FreeBSD.  There was a very recent thread
in
the FreeBSD news group about "competing" projects.  I got the feeling
there
were personality conflicts serious enough to warrant three different
flavors.

As I understand it, NetBSD is now running on MicroVAX II and VAX 3100's.

The installation of either Linux or FreeBSD seems relatively straight
forward.
However, at least for FreeBSD, there is a list of supported hardware
that you'll
first want to check out before buying any system to run it on.