Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2000 20:50:59 +0300 From: "Artem Koutchine" <matrix@ipform.ru> To: "Josh Paetzel" <jpaetzel@hutchtel.net>, <questions@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Information, new, propaganda:) Message-ID: <014801c049ac$a3717c20$0c00a8c0@ipform.ru> References: <010d01c04998$04ceeb20$0c00a8c0@ipform.ru> <001401c0499c$862d1080$0200000a@vladsempire.net>
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> Let me see if I am understanding the point you are trying to make.
>
> 1) www.freebsd.org doesn't contain any information about the new releases
> of freebsd that is useful to someone that is considering the move to
> freebsd.
not only that. I does not contain enough information about the current
releases,
the release politics, the philosophy of the system, the screebshots, the
attractions
for the people looking an alternative (such as screenshots of some software
running),
the news in the media, what other people say. Actually, some of it IS THERE,
but to
get it one needs to dig really deeply and be very insistive. So, basically
the site
is for
1) the users of FreeBSD
2) the set minds which already decided to switch to FreeBSD
> 2) You believe that if the website had a section (preferably on the front
> page) that ran over some of the important freebsd release details and so
> forth, that many more people who are undecided and monitoring the freebsd
> website for release info would "take the plunge" and become life-long
users
> and die hard advocates of freebsd, not only increasing the user base of
> freebsd, but also through their hard work of bringing in new users, cause
a
> geometric increase in the rate of growth of freebsd, resulting in a take
> over of the operating system market by freebsd within the foreseeable
> future.
NICELY PUT! Bravo! Hoever, release details should not be on the first page.
First page shoudl contain announcments, news, MEGA FEATURES some
other attraction stuff. That's IMHO.
> 3) You realize that the information you want is available, just not where
> you want it. For instance, the file RELNOTES.TXT that has been included
> with every freebsd distribution that I have ever seen documents the
changes
> and improvements over the previous version.
RELNOTES is nice, but the trick is to GET THERE. For me - it is okay place.
And i have been reading it since 2.2.1 and find it very useful and
completely
satisfactory. However, anybody can see that most (if not 99%) of the things
which are metioned in the RELNOTES have no meaning to a new user
coming from Windows. So, this is a nice doc for the current user, but hardly
any
help for a person wanting to become a user. The other thing is that I'd like
to know WHAT'S NEW IN 5.0-CURRENT, i won't run in a production env, but
i might try it at home. Where do i get that info?
> 4) You don't make it clear as to whether you are willing to help impliment
> any of these suggestions that you have.
Hmm.. Why not, i've been in WEB development and design since 96. Currently
I am a technical director. I think I could create a project plan for the
updates and
maybe even impliment some of the feature (however, that would be too slow,
since
i have almost not time).
My point is very simple. I think freebsd site should be much more friendlier
to the new user,
however, this is right ONLY if one of the goals of the project is too
attract more usual users.
I realize, that I might be wrong and actually FreeBSD positions itself as an
OS for professionals
in professional areas. Not for everyday home use. I don't even know, which
is better for us.
Now let's take a virtual tour on the freebsd.org site. I will pretend that i
have never seen
anything but Windows, however, i have heard of Linux, Macs, Beos and others.
I am a pretty
advanced user, i know a lot about hardware (i have assembled my PC myself)
and i know
how thinks are working on a programming level (say, i remember my shchool C
programming
classes):
Now. i type in: www.freebsd.org. On the first page it says:
FreeBSD is an advanced BSD UNIX operating system for the Intel compatible
(x86), DEC Alpha, and PC-98 architectures. It is developed and maintained by
a large team of individuals.
I think, "Well, Alpha is nice, this must be something really powerfull, I
wonder is okay for home use? I never
heard of PC-98 and BSD UNIX. What's UNIX anyway? I wonder who can explain
that to me"
Then i read:
"FreeBSD makes an ideal Internet or Intranet server."
And i think "Hmm, i always thoghts most of the stuff in Internet is working
on Win NT and Linux. I wonder
if what they say here is true. What percent of the servers are FreeBSD? Is
my provider running FreeBSD"
The i read:
"Visit our gallery for examples of FreeBSD powered applications and
services."
Well, i might as well look at them... or leave it for later. I don't know.
No, i click now.
"1246 commercial organizations
553 non-profit organizations
259 personal sites"
My God! I not not going to browse all of them. I'd take a loot at a couple
of personal sites.
Well, i didn't notices anything about FreeBSD of them. I just don't get it
how they are related
to FreeBSD. If they are on a FreeBSD power server, that is nice. But i don't
need a server.
I wonder what people do with it. Anyway, let me take a look at the
commercial organizations:
Here i see a couple of providers and hosters at the top, also some adult
hosting. Well, i say,
so what. This must be definitely server only OS. Well, i'll just scroll down
(i might scroll). WOW!
I see Yahoo! here. Nice, nice. I wonder why Yahoo chose FreeBSD instead of
Win NT or
LINUX. Well, let;s read ahead.
"The quality of FreeBSD combined with today's low-cost, high-speed PC
hardware makes FreeBSD a very economical alternative to commercial UNIX
workstations. It is well-suited for a great number of both desktop and
server applications."
Hmm. Applications. Let's take a look at them:
"FreeBSD can handle nearly any task you would expect of a UNIX workstation,
as well as many you might not expect:"
Okay, UNIX workstation is nice, but what's UNIX anyway and what UNIX
workstation supposed to do?
I wonder if i can play my games on it and write the reports, notes, email
just as now but with all this
Windows mess.
"FreeBSD is a true open system with full source code"
That would interesting to look at. I might still remember my C classes. Are
the sources in C?
I doubt that they are in Pascal.
"Because FreeBSD is based on 4.4BSD"
Hmm. what's 4.4BSD?
"it is easy to compile and run programs"
Hmm. that's now what i want. I just want to run programms.
'X Window workstation. From an inexpensive X terminal to an advanced X
display"
I wonder what this means.
"And much more. Accounting, action games, MIS databases, scientific
visualization, video conferencing, Internet relay chat (IRC), home
automation, multiuser dungeons, bulletin board systems, image scanning, and
more are all real uses for FreeBSD today. If you have an innovative
application for FreeBSD, let us know so we can add it to our gallery. "
Oh! That;s my kind of stuff. So, it CAN do something else than server stuff.
Damn, i'd love too see the
screenshots of it working.
"FreeBSD also includes an extensive packages collection and ports collection
that bring precompiled and easy-to-build software right to your desktop or
enterprise server. There is also a growing number of commercial applications
written for FreeBSD"
I have no idea what's packages and ports. Lemme look at commerical apps.
Damn! Whatta hell, where are the apps. Some vendors. I am not going to visit
all of them to see
what they have done. Besides, this list of vendors does say anything. I
don;t know anyone of them.
Ah, well, let's continue with the other stuff:
"Easy to install"
Hmm. That's nice. I wonder how the installer looks like.
"Cutting edge features
FreeBSD offers advanced networking, performance, security and compatibility
features today which are still missing in other operating systems, even some
of the best commercial ones."
Oh! Some of the real stuff. Let me see.
"A complete operating system based on 4.4BSD"
All this talk about 4.4BSD does not tell me anything. I don;t know what that
is and if it is good or bad.
"Bounce buffering gets around a limitation in the PC's ISA architecture that
limits direct-memory access to the first 16 megabytes. "
Hmm.. this stuff is old. Does it support my fully PCI pc?
"Merged virtual memory and filesystem buffer cache continuously tunes the
amount of memory used for programs and the disk cache."
That's no cutting edge. Windows has been doing this since 95.
"Compatibility modules enable programs for other operating systems to run on
FreeBSD, including programs for Linux, SCO, NetBSD, and BSDI."
Linux compatibility? That nice. SO, do i get two in one or what?
"Dynamically loadable kernel modules " - hmm, desription sounds nice. But
windows has the same, i think,
since 95. VXDs look like this.
"Shared libraries " - you mean DLLs? What;s new about DLLs?
Now, featurea are really outdates.
``FreeBSD has an outline-structured visual configuration editor ... you can
enter the configuration of every device the OS supports and can therefore
get a successful installation on the first try almost every time. IBM,
Microsoft, and others would do well to emulate FreeBSD's approach.''
---Brett Glass, Infoworld, April 8 1996.
1996? Well, too old of a note, but a nice feature too.
Let me look at publications.
"This is a recent (May 1997) publication from ..."
Recent 97? What? You have to be kidding...
And why is it all japanese? Is it japanese OS?
And what this little neat hell animal doing here? I have wasted 1 hour and I
am confused. I still
don;t know if it can do what i need it to do, i have no idea how it looks
like and how easy it is installed
and where is has drivers for my hardware (i doubt that considering the
features listed).
I'll give Linux a try. (that's the whole another story.. selective the
distro and stuff...)
That how the trip to freebsd.org might look for a windows user (and not the
stupidest one).
What do you say?
Regards,
Artem
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