From owner-freebsd-questions Tue Nov 30 9:45:54 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mail.rpi.edu (mail.rpi.edu [128.113.100.7]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 74B5514E84 for ; Tue, 30 Nov 1999 09:45:50 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from drosih@rpi.edu) Received: from [128.113.24.47] (gilead.acs.rpi.edu [128.113.24.47]) by mail.rpi.edu (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id MAA31546; Tue, 30 Nov 1999 12:45:42 -0500 Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Sender: drosih@mail.rpi.edu Message-Id: In-Reply-To: References: Date: Tue, 30 Nov 1999 12:39:30 -0500 To: Martin Horcicka , freebsd-questions@freebsd.org, misc@openbsd.org, netbsd-users@netbsd.org From: Garance A Drosihn Subject: Re: Why so many BSDs? Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG At 8:27 AM +0100 11/30/99, Martin Horcicka wrote: >Hi, > >the thing I've never understood is why you are developing three BSD >systems separately - well, they are not too separate because if one >system implements a thing the other two will probably port it. When you say "you are developing", it sounds as if there is one unified group which is sitting down and producing three different operating systems (such as Microsoft producing Win98, WinNT, and WinCE). In fact, there are three different groups working on three different open-source BSD-ish operating systems. It's like asking Ford and General Motors why they don't get together and produce just one model of car. The three groups have different priorities. That's the great thing about it. Each group has enough people in it who have the same general priorities that the group is able to keep improving *their* operating system along *their* line of priorities. All three groups are interested in good ideas, and if one of the groups implements something that the other groups like, and it doesn't conflict with that group's priorities, then they are very likely to pick it up. Again, this is a good thing. --- Garance Alistair Drosehn = gad@eclipse.acs.rpi.edu Senior Systems Programmer or drosih@rpi.edu Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message