Date: Fri, 10 Jan 2003 10:16:55 -0600 From: Mike Meyer <mwm-dated-1042647415.83d2d5@mired.org> To: "James Hicks" <ytwok_karate@hotmail.com> Cc: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: freebsd curiosity Message-ID: <15902.61943.130745.854799@guru.mired.org> In-Reply-To: <F141Ud9mTP2vZXqimrM00000d34@hotmail.com> References: <F141Ud9mTP2vZXqimrM00000d34@hotmail.com>
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In <F141Ud9mTP2vZXqimrM00000d34@hotmail.com>, James Hicks <ytwok_karate@hotmail.com> typed: > First of all, is freebsd a real UNIX? By that I'm asking whether or > not there is real UNIX code in it or is it a clone just like linux > is? It's not a clone like Linux is, but there is no longer any AT&T-derived code in it. See the reference previously posted for details. > Second, what type of file system does it use? It's called ffs (fast file system). It's sometimes called ufs as well. > Does it have a journaling one like ext3? No, but softupdates gives you the features you probably want from one. > Do UNIX systems require any kind of defrag? The answer depends on the file system. Historically, it's been no for most file systems. There aren't defrag tools in the FreeBSD ports tree, so I'd say no one who knows enough to write one has felt that there was any need for one. > I was told by my UNIX instructor that freebsd had hardware > recognition trouble. Is this true and if so has it been fixed? FreeBSD recognizes a different set of hardware - probably smaller - than Linux. Making new hardware work on either system is an ongoing volunteer effort, and FreeBSD has fewer volunteers than Linux. In practice, I've never had hardware that wasn't recognized that I couldn't return. > I have also read that a lot of sysadmins are nervous of putting > mission critical apps on a enterprise linux system and prefer to use > freebsd. What is the problem that I'm hearing that linux has? There are two problems. First, the focus on Linux development seems to be on performance rather than stability. FreeBSD does things the other way around. Performance shortages you can cover by spending a bit extra. Stability performances you can't cover at all. For desktop applications, there's just barely enough difference to notice. For mission critical applications - well, minor changes are a problem. Second, most linux distributions are aimed at the desktop. This makes adopting them to a server application difficult. There are linux distributions that are targeted to the server market, but by moving to those you've moved into a smaller user base than FreeBSD has, negating some of the advantages of Linux. Given that FreeBSD can run Linux applications, you might as well stay with FreeBSD for most things in this case. > Do you believe the berkeley system to have code that has better > stability than the GNU systems? Having carefully examined one Linux device driver, and done work on a couple of BSD ones, yes, I believe that to be the case. I still shudder whenever I think about the Linux device driver. And it was from one of the stars of the Linux community. <mike -- Mike Meyer <mwm@mired.org> http://www.mired.org/consulting.html Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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