Date: Sun, 28 Feb 1999 16:58:42 -0800 From: "Robert A. Bruce" <rab@pike.cdrom.com> To: Dave Yost <Dave@Yost.com> Cc: freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG, rab@pike.cdrom.com Subject: Re: The Linux PR firestorm disaster (w.r.t. FreeBSD) Message-ID: <199903010058.QAA24952@pike.cdrom.com> In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sat, 27 Feb 1999 16:56:06 PST." <v04104408b2fc8ab8acfc@[205.219.69.138]>
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Dave Yost <Dave@Yost.com> said... >First order of business, I think is that http://www.freebsd.org/ must have a >prominent main heading: > FreeBSD vs. linux and others >which leads to some simple, forthright information suitable for nontechnical >journalists and TV news people. It should also have a big, forbidding table >with lots of X marks for stuff FreeBSD has that linux doesn't and as much >technical backup material as possible. What does FreeBSD have that Linux doesn't? I don't think that such a table would be very "forbidding". Seriously, I am working on a chart to hand out at the FreeBSD booth at LinuxWorld next week, and I am having a hard time coming up with a list of things that FreeBSD does better than Linux. Most claims of FreeBSD superiority boil down to: 1. "FreeBSD is more reliable", with no objective evidence to back up that claim. 2. "FreeBSD has better performance", with little evidence to back up that claim either. FreeBSD seems to have better performance on network intensive applications when the system is heavily loaded (http://advisor.gartner.com/n_inbox/hotcontent/hc_2121999_3.html) but I haven't seen any clear evidence that FreeBSD outperforms Linux in other areas or under other conditions. There are other points that people bring up, such as better kernel architecture, etc. But that is pretty meaningless to an typical end-user. If I was trying to come up with the opposite list (areas where Linux beats FreeBSD) the job would be much easier: 1. Linux runs on way more platforms (sparc, powerpc, mips,... heck it even runs on a PalmPilot). 2. Linux has better support for realtime operations. 3. Linux supports more perephrials (USB, etc.) 4. Linux has real multiprocessor threads 5. Linux has a lot more native commercial applications. 6. etc... So if you can send me a list of areas where FreeBSD beats Linux, I would greatly appreciate it. If you can back up any claims of better performance/reliability with published reports or repeatable benchmarks, that would be great. But I am happy to take anecdotes too. The chart is pretty sparse right now, so I am not picky. -bob To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message
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