A Love Letter to FreeBSD

https://www.tara.sh/posts/2025/2025-11-25_freebsd_letter/

by rbanffy • 8 months ago

435 316 8 months ago

tuhgdetzhh2• 8 months ago

A love letter to the last operating system that isn’t trying to gaslight you. FreeBSD really is the anti-hype choice: no mascot-as-a-service, no quarterly identity crisis, just a system that quietly works until the heat death of the universe.

CalChris4• 8 months ago

Speaking of better vendor support, why doesn’t it support Apple Silicon yet? Obviously, Asahi has led the way on this and their m1n1 boot loader can be used out of the box. But OpenBSD has supported Apple Silicon for three years now.

movedx16• 8 months ago

Why does it have to? Why does everything have to supper everything? Why can’t a project have a focus on servers and that’s its “thing”?

Also it’s OSS — contribute that support if you’re so passionate about it.

wkat424210• 8 months ago

The why is simply: because nobody wants it enough to build it. Otherwise it would exist.

a96• 8 months ago

FreeBSD has always been the non-portable one.

movedx16• 8 months ago

Sigh. Yes. It’s the boring choice and therefore the better choice a lot of the time. Not all of the time, but most of the time.

Impatience and lost skills is why it’s not a mainstream player.

adastra225• 8 months ago

I so wish that FreeBSD was GPL. I know this won't be a popular opinion, but I believe that success Linux has had is because of copyleft, and *BSD are riding on the coat tails of that.

But I don't like Linux. I use it daily, but I don't like it. I wish FreeBSD held the position Linux does in the market today. That would be heaven.

a-dub• 8 months ago

freebsd didn't have the hardware support base that linux did and suffered a huge delay in rearchitecture when x86 smp hardware became widely available. (only one cpu could be in the kernel at a time, the "bkl", was a major impediment in the early 00s). freebsd had better resource scheduling at the time and a beloved networking stack, but linux caught up with cgroups etc. i think linux was also just a trendy vanguard of sorts as the world learned of open source software by and of the internet.

CalChris4• 8 months ago

GCC vs LLVM. It isn’t the license.

bigfishrunning• 8 months ago

I don't know about that... Llvm didn't exist until 2003. The BSDs and Linux both existed for a long time before that, and Linux already had much more momentum at that point.

blueflow• 8 months ago

I think that's less because of the license and more because people found patching gcc to be a big pain.

hnthrowaway0328• 8 months ago

Can you please elaborate the str of Freebsd vs Linux?

pyvpx• 8 months ago

It’s a nice belief for some but wholly divorced from historical facts and circumstances

cerved3• 8 months ago

It'll never happen. You can't distribute ZFS under GPL

dardeaup• 8 months ago

Agreed. I'd say it goes much deeper than that in the case of FreeBSD though. It's just an ideological thing that can't be changed.

sbseitz3• 8 months ago

Comes in binary form from Debian and Ubuntu. I can add it to any other distribution via DKMS. Same core ZFS code as BSD uses.

cesarb3• 8 months ago

but I believe that success Linux has had is because of copyleft

No, the success Linux has had is because it ran on the machines people had at home, and was very easy to try out.

An instructive example would be my own path into Linux: I started with DJGPP, but got annoyed because it couldn't multi-task (if you started a compilation within an IDE like Emacs, you had to wait until it finished before you could interact with the IDE again). So I wanted a real Unix, or something close enough to it.

The best option I found was Slackware. Back then, it could install directly into the MS-DOS partition (within the C:\LINUX directory, through the magic of the UMSDOS filesystem), and boot directly from MS-DOS (through the LOADLIN bootloader). That is: like DJGPP, it could be treated like a normal MS-DOS program (with the only caveat being that you had to reboot to get back to MS-DOS). No need to dedicate a partition to it. No need to take over the MBR or bootloader. It even worked when the disk used Ontrack Disk Manager (for those too young to have heard of it, older BIOS didn't understand large disks, so newer HDDs came bundled with software like that to workaround the BIOS limitations; Linux transparently understood the special partition scheme used by Ontrack).

It worked with all the hardware I had, and worked better than MS-DOS; after a while, I noticed I was spending all my time booted into Linux, and only then I dedicated a whole partition to it (and later, the whole disk). Of course, since by then I had already gotten used to Linux, I stayed in the Linux world.

What I've read later (somewhere in a couple of HN comments) was that, beyond not having all these cool tricks (UMSDOS, LOADLIN, support for Ontrack partitions), FreeBSD was also picky with its hardware choices. I'm not sure that the hardware I had would have been fully supported, and even if it were, I'd have to dedicate a whole disk (or, at least, a whole partition) to it, and it would also take over the boot process (in a way which probably would be incompatible with Ontrack).

sellmesoap5• 8 months ago

I'd say with modern hardware, like the xe Intel iGPUs on 11th gen Intel and up got driver attention quickly. Some things like realtek 2.5gb NICs took a little while to integrate but I think realtek offered kernel modules. I remember NIC compatibility was sparse when I started playing with it around 1999-2000. What trips me up is command flags on gnu vs freebsd utils, ask me about the time I DOSed the Colo from the jump machine using the wrong packet argument interval.

adastra225• 8 months ago

I don’t disagree with what you say. But why did Linux work on all that hardware? I assert that if you trace that line of thinking to its conclusion, the answer is the GPL.

Many people and organizations adapted BSD to run on their hardware, but they had no obligation to upstream those drivers. Linux mandated upstreaming (if you wanted to distribute drivers to users).

lizknope• 8 months ago

FreeBSD was also picky with its hardware choices. I'm not sure that the hardware I had would have been fully supported

Copy / paste of my comment from last year about FreeBSD

I installed Linux in fall 1994. I looked at Free/NetBSD but when I went on some of the Usenet BSD forums they basically insulted me saying that my brand new $3,500 PC wasn't good enough.

The main thing was this IDE interface that had a bug. Linux got a workaround within days or weeks.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CMD640

The BSD people told me that I should buy a SCSI card, SCSI hard drive, SCSI CD-ROM. I was a sophomore in college and I saved every penny to spend $2K on that PC and my parents paid the rest. I didn't have any money for that.

The sound card was another issue.

I remember software based "WinModems" but Linux had drivers for some of these. Same for software based "Win Printers"

When I finally did graduate and had money for SCSI stuff I tried FreeBSD around 1998 and it just seemed like another Unix. I used Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, Ultrix, IRIX. FreeBSD was perfectly fine but it didn't do anything I needed that Linux didn't already do.

toast04• 8 months ago

What would FreeBSD as GPL give you? You could fork it and release FreeGPL with that license tomorrow. (Minus ZFS, but that's in contrib)

Some users of FreeBSD prefer more freedoms than GPL offers. The contributors must not be put off by providing more freedoms.

Places I've worked have contributed changes to FreeBSD and Linux, mostly for the same reason ... regardless of any necessity from distributing code under license, it's nicer to keep your fork close to upstream and sending your changes upstream helps keep things close.

unexpectedtrap4• 8 months ago

IANAL, but you can’t actually just relicense code, even if it’s under BSD‐like license. What you can do is to release this code in the binary form without providing the source code.

assimpleaspossi6• 8 months ago

>I believe that success Linux has had is because of copyleft, and *BSD are riding on the coat tails of that.

Apparently many here are unaware of the history and story as to what stalled FreeBSD in a long lawsuit involving ATT. You need to read up on that. Copyleft had nothing to do with it.

movedx16• 8 months ago

Linux is OK. It’s a mess compared to BSD, but it’s OK. It’s the lazy man’s solution. It’s mainly for people who only want to “docker compose up” and walk away. The art of the OS has been lost. People think the OS is something to be abstracted away as much as possible and it’s evil and hard to secure. Shame.

stackghost4• 8 months ago

I'd offer in counterargument that Linux is for getting things done, whereas BSD seems to be largely for people who view the OS itself as the hobby.

I have zero interest in tinkering with my operating system. I mostly want it to just get out of my way, which Linux does well 95% of the time.

unexpectedtrap4• 8 months ago

I feel the same, because it seems that the only desktop-ready OS under GPL today is GNU/Linux, and it feels too bloated nowadays (not to mention that Linux is effectively stuck under GPLv2). Something like FreeBSD feels much lighter and better still being desktop‐ready. Looks like that guys from Hyperbola think the same and that’s why they are doing HyperbolaBSD. Btw there’s some progress in GNU Hurd, but they are still far from being desktop-ready.

Klonoar3• 8 months ago

There needs to be a new rule in technical discussion communities that outlaws bland comments that just spew "too bloated" and "feels much lighter". It is completely useless fluff description text.

wkat424210• 8 months ago

I had to laugh at the progress in gnu hurd. I've been hearing that one since the 90s

zie2• 8 months ago

I don't understand this thinking. The GPL is more restrictive than the FreeBSD license. You have more freedoms with the FreeBSD license than you do with the GPL(of any version).

I wish FreeBSD held the position Linux does in the market today. That would be heaven.

Well The BSD's were embattled with a lawsuit from AT&T at the time Linux came around, so it got a late start as it were, even if it's a lot older.

jeffjeffbear2• 8 months ago

I have seen this particular idea come up a lot lately.

Personaly I think Intel's early investment in linux had a lot to do with it. They also sold a compiler and marketed to labs and such which bought chips. So linux compatibility meant a lot to decision makers.

AMD the underdog went more in on Linux compat than NVIDIA. Which may have been a business decsion.

I dunno, maybe the GPL effect was more a market share thing with developers than a copyleft thing.

Nota Bene: I do love copyleft and license all my own projects AGPL

adastra225• 8 months ago

The Linux vs BSD fight happened before NVIDIA vs AMD was a thing.

wkat424210• 8 months ago

I wish FreeBSD held the position Linux does in the market today. That would be heaven.

I don't. That would break everything I love about it. If it was as big as Linux there would be a lot of corpo suits influence, constant changes, constant drive to make it 'mainstream' etc. All the things I hate about Linux.

alex11384• 8 months ago

I know this is the noob perspective but they should try (yes, I'm already aware of GhostBSD) to make getting into the desktop a little bit easier, it can be very hard to bootstrap anything and learn if you're new to it

shevy-java3• 8 months ago

That's where Linux fails too IMO. Both GNOME and KDE really suck in my opinion. Or perhaps suck is too strong a word. I find both to be hugely problematic.

That does not mean they do not work, mind you - GNOME succeeds in dumbing things down that even 60 years old grandmas could use it (until they misclick and then are presented with 20 windows all put side to side). And KDE gives a lot of flexibility in tweaking it how you may want it (if we ignore Nate's donation widget). But it just is still waaaaaaay too complicated and convoluted to use. I am better off just describing my system in .yml files and then have ruby autogenerate any configuration value than struggle through annoying widgets to find some semi-random semi-new setting (or none such setting existing such as is the case in GNOME). I'd wish we could liberate these DEs from upstream developers and their dictatorship. I mean, we, can, e. g. patch out the code that shouldn't exist (like Nate's Robin Hood widget), but I mean on a global basis as-is. We as users should be in full control of EVERYTHING - every widget. Everything these widgets do, too. And everything they don't do right now but should do. Like in evince, I hate that I can't have tabs. That annoys me. I am aware that libpapers changes this, but boy ... just try to discuss this with GNOMEy devs. That's just a waste of time. I want to decide on everything here - upstream must not be able to cripple my system or influence it in no way I approve of.

jwrallie• 8 months ago

Hmm... I am sure your yaml config files would also not please your grandma. Anyway if you don't like change, there are other DEs apart from those two are more fitting. Try XFCE or Mate, they will look and behave the same years after setting them up.

wkat424210• 8 months ago

I love KDE. Especially because it gives me agency. I'm not stuck with the choices the developers made like with gnome that's super opinionated. And I find things easy to find and confuse.

It's probably not for a grandma but I don't care. It doesn't have to be. For me the more software is suitable for the mainstream, the less suitable it is to me.

Not sure what you mean by donation widget, I use KDE on FreeBSD as daily driver (and on the latest version) and I've never seen it. I donate monthly to KDE but it doesn't have any way of knowing that.

assimpleaspossi6• 8 months ago

After you install the base system, install your favorite desktop by doing "pkg install <your_favorite_desktop>" and it's done.

What's so difficult?

alex11384• 8 months ago

"Before FreeBSD can render a graphical environment, it needs a kernel module to drive the graphics processor. Graphics drivers are a fast-moving, cross-platform target, which is why this is developed and distributed separately from the FreeBSD base system."

"To enable the driver, add the module to /etc/rc.conf file, by executing the following command: ..."

https://docs.freebsd.org/en/books/handbook/x11/

I get that this isn't brain surgery. But come on

grahamjperrin4• 7 months ago

No, it's not done. You forgot configuration.

grahamjperrin4• 7 months ago

The current expectation is that the desktop script, which was originally scheduled for inclusion with FreeBSD Installer for 15.0, will be included with 15.1.

A blocker, although this bug was not the reason for rescheduling:

https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=290024

kosolam• 8 months ago

As a small user I find it hard to find a use case where I’d want a bsd for some reason. I even installed ghostbsd in a vm to try it but it seemed very similar to linux so I didn’t understand what’s the upside?

cerved3• 8 months ago

ZFS and jails are two things FreeBSD does very well

sbseitz3• 8 months ago

ZFS on Linux and BSD share the same code now. Hope this helps.

waynesonfire• 8 months ago

and pf.

quotemstr2• 8 months ago

Linux has btrfs and multiple containerization and security sandboxing options. ZFS and jails aren't Linux differentiators.

assimpleaspossi6• 8 months ago

You don't have to reinstall with every software upgrade. Reliability and long term uptime are the norm.

loeg2• 8 months ago

These statements could equally describe Linux, macOS, or even Windows.

ggm• 8 months ago

A small thing, but the mechanistic approach to bundling packages into bigger meta state, is (in my personal opinion) better than the somewhat ad-hoc approach to both writing and including things in an apt/dpkg.

If the product is python, thats what it is. there is no python-additonal-headers or python-dev or bundle-which-happens-to-be-python-but-how-would-you-know.

There is python, and there are meta-ports which explicitly 'call' the python port.

The most notable example being X11. Its sub-parts are all very rational. fonts are fonts. libs are libs. drm is drm. drivers are drivers.

(yes, there is the port/pkg confusion. thats a bit annoying.)

loeg2• 8 months ago

1990s nostalgia.

keyle• 8 months ago

These rose tinted glasses are pretty strong. I found nothing but pain trying to run the BSDs on recent computers/setups.

There is 'different' as in 'alternative/edgy', and then there is 'different' as in 'won't implement/yagni' which becomes highly subjective.

cerved3• 8 months ago

Never had any issues but I've only ever tried to run it on supermicro boards

movedx16• 8 months ago

I’ve been using it in VMs just fine. Used it on my desktop just fine for a year. Used it on laptops just fine.

You might have just hit a bad hardware setup that’s outside the scope of support. It happens.

stackghost4• 8 months ago

Used it on laptops just fine.

Which laptop?

Did you use the battery, touchpad, and the wifi?

I find most BSD users who say they use it on a laptop are just using a laptop-form-factor machine like a thinkpad that is plugged in, with a mouse not the touchpad, and connected via ethernet 99.9% of the time. There's nothing wrong with this, but it bears little resemblance to what I consider "using a laptop".

My experience with distros including Open- and FreeBSD on laptops has been universally negative. OpenBSD in particular is very slow compared to Linux on the same hardware, to say nothing of awful touchpad drivers and battery management.

asveikau2• 8 months ago

I've been running it on most of my personal laptops since around version 10. It's a lot like how Linux felt in the late 90s. Depends on your hardware and what you want to do. But it's solid.

If you could handle Linux in the late 90s you can handle it.

assimpleaspossi6• 8 months ago

So you're saying KDE and Gnome and xfce and enlightenment and openBox, etc, are all desktops that run like the 90s? These current versions, and many more, run on FreeBSD.

grahamjperrin4• 7 months ago

yagni

TIL

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_aren%27t_gonna_need_it

mistyvales• 8 months ago

I run freeBSD for a NAS and a couple linux vm's under bhyve. Could I have just installed Ubuntu and been done with it? Probably. I did make some mistakes like setting a very low swap partition, forgetting to switch my RAID controller to IT mode which made me have to rebuild my raidz1 pool, changing my bhyves to UEFI so the internet works better. I made sure the jail I built for plex worked fine. It's been fun. At this point I should probably rebuild the whole damn thing, but I know it will run just fine as is.

movedx16• 8 months ago

For years and years to come. You’ll never need to update that box, frankly.

knowknow• 8 months ago

It seems FreeBSD is becoming more talked about in enthusiast communities simply because Linux is a lot more mainstream now and there’s a joy in contrarianism rather than any real changes with either of the two operating systems.

BrouteMinou4• 8 months ago

The desire to be different is strong with some people.

shevy-java3• 8 months ago

That's fine. The thing is: I am different with Linux too. So I don't quite understand that FreeBSD focus.

From the BSDs, I think only OpenBSD has a really unique selling point with its focus on security. People ask "why pick FreeBSD rather than Linux" and most will not find compelling arguments in favour of FreeBSD there.

rixed• 8 months ago

A well needed counterbalance when so much in tech is just a popularity contest.

movedx16• 8 months ago

I feel like you may never have used it. Would that be true?

IgorPartola2• 8 months ago

I can’t speak for whole communities but my interest in FreeBSD has been renewed over the past couple of years. It has been a very solid OS for a long time and the tight integration between the kernel and core userland has meant that it is sometimes more performant than some popular Linux distros. But its UX has not always been amazing. Seems like lately they have really improved that. Plus ZFS and root on ZFS in particular is very nice.

I would actually be interested in running it in some production environments but it seems like that is pitted against the common deploy scenarios that involve Docker and while there is work on bringing runc to FreeBSD it is alpha stage at best currently.

Still, if you just want an ssh server, a file server, a mail server, it is a great OS with sane defaults and a predictable upgrade schedule.

arthurfirst23• 8 months ago

Docker did work. AFAIK the APIs are there. Someone needs to grab the bull by the horns.

Jails and BHYVE vms are excellent -- but I use Docker every day and if I could use BSD as my docker host I would.

Good thing my docker servers are all built with terraform so I do not have to touch.

xmcp123• 8 months ago

Linux is not fucking mainstream

If anything is mainstream, it’s BSD, because OS X is BSD.

bigyabai2• 8 months ago

OS X is XNU. BSD code is in the kernel and BSD tooling is in the userland, but the kernel isn't BSD in license or architecture.

lern_too_spel• 8 months ago

Linux is the most-user kernel on consumer devices (Android) and servers by a very wide margin.

groundzeros2015• 8 months ago

I think it’s a joy of having a system built by a small community for fun and not debates between large corporate interests.

travisgriggs• 8 months ago

My interest has been piqued of late. I've been a Linux enthusiast since the late 90's. I don't think it's a sense of contrarianism that motivates my interest anew.

As I've aged, what I've come to value most in software stacks is composability. I do not know if [Free]BSD restores that, but Linux feels like it has grown more complicated and less composable. I'm using this term loosely, but I'm mostly thinking of how one reasons and cognates about the way the system work in this instance. I want to work in a world where each tool on the OS's bench has a single straightforward man page, not swiss army knives where the authors/maintainers just kept throwing more "it can do this too" in to attract community.

lmm5• 8 months ago

Disagree. Linux has been gradually changing with the push towards systemd, snap, flatpak etc.. Today's FreeBSD resembles the Linux of 10 or 20 years ago a lot more than today's Linux does.

tombert9• 8 months ago

Today's FreeBSD resembles the Linux of 10 or 20 years ago a lot more than today's Linux does.

I'm not sure that that's the win that you think it is. Linux 10 to 20 years ago was pretty terrible, at least on desktops.

Everyone hates on systemd, but honestly I really think that the complaints are extremely overblown. I've been using systemd based distros since around ~2012, and while I've had many issues with Linux in that time, I can't really say that any of them were caused by systemd. systemd is easy to use, journalctl is nice for looking at logs, and honestly most of the complaints I see about it boil down to "well what if...", what-if's that simply hasn't happened yet.

FreeBSD is cool, but when I run it I do sometimes kind of miss systemd, simply because systemd is easy. I know there was some interest in launchd in the FreeBSD world but I don't know how far that actually got or if it got any traction, but I really wish it would.

anticristi• 8 months ago

Well said! I used to administer both FreeBSD and Linux (Debian) servers at the same time. I found them different, but couldn't say either was better or worse.

wkat424210• 8 months ago

For me it's all the changes in Linux. Every time I upgrade they change stuff that worked fine for me. Another issue is many distros pushing their "invented here" stuff like canonical and redhat. And the huge amount of corporate influence over Linux.

FreeBSD is largely free of those. And it leaves all the agency to the operator, rather than the distro forcing stuff down (except arch, but I don't like the community there)

MangoToupe2• 8 months ago

There was always some truth to that, and there are worse reasons to find joy in actual competition. How do you discover the truth about differences in quality without fuel for curiosity?

irusensei4• 8 months ago

If you work with computers the whole day it would make sense the computers you keep as a hobby have some degree of difference.

kalleboo• 8 months ago

FreeBSD users definitely seem to have taken over the mantle of OS evangelicals from Linux users.

I tried using FreeBSD for two different projects (NAS and router) and it turned out to be unsuitable for both, for each one switching to Linux solved the problem. Despite having solved my problems, the FreeBSD faithful seemed to think that using FreeBSD in itself was supposed to be the goal, not to solve the task at hand.

jajuuka• 8 months ago

That is the vibe I get from this post. Very "I am different" energy.

ginkoleaf• 8 months ago

Dismissing the FreeBSD community as contrarians feels uncharitable. I can think of at least a few other contributing factors for the increase in popularity of late:

1) Linux's popularity has enlarged the pool of users interested in Unix-like operating systems. Some proportion of users familiar with Unix genuinely like FreeBSD and the unique features it offers.

2) The rise of docker and the implosion of VMWare has driven an increase of interest in FreeBSD Jails and the Bhyve hypervisor.

3) Running a homelab is a popular hobby. ZFS is popular for RAID, and pf is popular for networking.

4) Podman being brought to FreeBSD: (https://freebsdfoundation.org/blog/oci-containers-on-freebsd...).

5) Dell, AMD, Framework, and the FreeBSD foundation committing $750,000 to making FreeBSD easier to use last year: (https://freebsdfoundation.org/blog/why-laptop-support-why-no...).

6) Apple announcing that they're bringing the Swift language to FreeBSD this year.

int_19h3• 8 months ago

FreeBSD is also extremely conservative by comparison to Linux. It's not just systemd; things change less in general, and it's closer to old school Unix. Some people like it for nostalgia reasons, some just got tired of having rug constantly being pulled from under them (seems to be a common thing when people get older).

arthurfirst23• 8 months ago

I felt the same way in 1999.

mbreese• 8 months ago

And do you feel the same way now?

arthurfirst23• 8 months ago

Yes, but we have separated for a while on a few different occasions. FreeBSD chased me away for few years around version 7. I always came back though.

shevy-java3• 8 months ago

Culture matters too. One reason I stepped away from Linux was the noise, the debates that drowned out the joy of building.

No clue what he is babbling about. LFS/BLFS is active. FreeBSD doesn't have that. I am sorry but Linux is the better tinker-toy. I understand this upsets the BSD folks, but it is simply how it is. Granted, systemd and the corporatification took a huge toll into the Linux ecosystem but even now as it is in some ruins (KDE devs recently decreed that xorg will die and they will aid in the process of killing off xorg, by forcing everyone into wayland), it is still much more active as a tinker-toy. That's simply how it is.

I recall many years ago NetBSD on the mailing list pointed out that Linux now runs on more toasters than NetBSD. This is simply the power of tinkerification.

Please keep FreeBSD the kind of place where thoughtful engineering is welcome without ego battles

K - for the three or four users worldwide.

There’s also the practical side: keep the doors open with hardware vendors like Dell and HPE, so FreeBSD remains a first-class citizen.

Except that Linux supports more hardware. I am sorry FreeBSD people - there is reality. We can't offset and ignore it.

My hope is simple: that you stay different. Not in the way that shouts for attention, but in the way that earns trust.

TempleOS also exists.

I think it is much more different than any of the BSDs.

If someone wants hype or the latest shiny thing every month, they have Linux.

Right - and you don't have to go that route either. Imagine there is choice on Linux. I can run Linux without systemd - there is no problem with that. I don't need GNOME or KDE asking-for-donation begging devs killing xorg either. (Admittedly GTK and QT seem to be the only really surviving oldschool desktop GUIs and GTK is really unusuable nowadays.)

the way the best of Unix always did, they should know they can find it here.

Yeah ok ... 500 out of 500 supercomputers running Linux ...

And maybe, one day, someone will walk past a rack of servers, hear the steady, unhurried rhythm of a FreeBSD system still running

I used FreeBSD for a while until a certain event made me go back to Linux - my computer was shut off when I returned home. When I left, it was still turned on. It ran FreeBSD. This is of course episodical, but I never had that problem with Linux.

I think FreeBSD folks need to realise that Linux did some things better.

movedx16• 8 months ago

Yeah ok ... 500 out of 500 supercomputers running Linux ...

So what? Big whoop.

Gud4• 8 months ago

I use FreeBSD and Linux. I am not married to any operating system.

For some reason, every time FreeBSD is put in a positive light there is always a lot of Linux(-only) users who has to put FreeBSD down.

I don’t understand why. Would be interesting to understand this psychological phenomena.

BrouteMinou4• 8 months ago

I believe it's an effort to promote Linux, to get more market share.

Linux users aren't interested to see potential adopters go for BSD instead of joining their ranks.

On every forum, every discussion, there is at least one guy saying he runs that game on Linux, or that other OS is somehow inferior to Linux, or this problem would never happen on Linux...

It's all about marketing, if you will...

adrian_b• 8 months ago

The same for me.

For 30 years I have been using permanently both FreeBSD and Linux, because they both have strengths and weaknesses.

I am using Linux on laptops and desktops, where I may need support for some hardware devices not supported by FreeBSD or I need software compatibility with certain applications that are not easily ported to FreeBSD.

I also use Linux on some computational servers where I need compatibility with software not available on FreeBSD, e.g. NVIDIA CUDA. (While CUDA is not available for FreeBSD, NVIDIA GPUs are still the right choice for FreeBSD computers when needing a graphic display, because NVIDIA provides drivers for FreeBSD, while AMD does not.)

I use FreeBSD on various servers with networking or storage functions, where I value most to have the highest reliability and the simplest administration.

arthurfirst23• 8 months ago

26 years of FreeBSD and counting...

IIRC in about 99 I got sick of Mandrake and RH RPM deps hell and found FreeBSD 3 CD in a Walnut creek book. Ports and BSD packages were a revelation, to say nothing of the documentation which still sets it apart from the haphazard Linux.

The comment about using a good SERVER mobo like supermicro is on point --- I managed many supermicro fbsd colo ack servers for almost 15 years and those boards worked well with it.

Currently I run FreeBSD on several home machines including old mac minis repurposed as media machines throughout the house.

They run kodi + linux brave and with that I can stream anything like live sports.

Also OpenBSD for one firewall and PFSense (FreeBSD) for another.

movedx16• 8 months ago

Lovely stuff. The industry would be so much better off if the family of BSDs had more attention and use.

I run some EVE Online services for friends. They have manual install steps for those of use not using containers. Took me half a day to get the stack going on FBSD and that was mostly me making typos and mistakes. So pleased I was able to dodge the “docker compose up” trap.

BrouteMinou4• 8 months ago

Can you explain why "Docker compose" is a trap?

recursivetree• 8 months ago

As one of the guys who develops a EVE Online service: While you were able to get by with manual install steps that perhaps change with the OS, for a decent number of people it is the first time they do anything on the CLI on a unixoid system. Docker reduces the support workload in our help channels drastically because it is easier to get going.

windward• 8 months ago

You've put that command in quotation marks in three comments on this topic. I don't think it's as prevalent as you're making out.

fridder3• 8 months ago

I wonder how it would work with the new-ish podman/oci container support?

naikrovek• 8 months ago

It really is amazing how much success Linux has achieved given its relatively haphazard nature.

FreeBSD always has been, and always will be, my favorite OS.

It is so much more coherent and considered, as the post author points out. It is cohesive; whole.

quesera3• 8 months ago

Linux has turned haphazardry into a strength. This is impressive.

I prefer FreeBSD.

cesarb3• 8 months ago

It really is amazing how much success Linux has achieved given its relatively haphazard nature.

That haphazard nature is probably part of the reason for its success, since it allowed for many alternative ways of doing things being experimented in parallel.

jrmcvngtn• 8 months ago

That was my impression from diving into The Design & Implementation of the FreeBSD Operating System. I really need to devote time to running it long term.

jimbokun• 8 months ago

Just another instance of Worse is Better?

throw7• 8 months ago

Linux is haphazard because it's really only the kernel. The analog of "FreeBSD" would be a linux distro like Redhat or Debian etc. In fact, systemd's real goal was to get rid of linux' haphazard nature... but it's ahhh really divisive as everyone knows.

I go back to early Linux' initial success because of the license. It's the first real decision you have to make once you start putting your code out there.

AdieuToLogic5• 8 months ago

The comment about using a good SERVER mobo like supermicro is on point --- I managed many supermicro fbsd colo ack servers for almost 15 years and those boards worked well with it.

I completely agree.

Supermicro mobo's with server-grade components combined with aggressive cooling fans/heat sinks running FreeBSD in a AAA data center resulted in two prod servers having uptimes of over 3000+ days. This included dozens of app/jails/ports updates (pretty much everything other than the kernel).

wowczarek2• 8 months ago

Back when I was a sysadmin (sort of 2007-2010), the preference of a colleague (RIP AJG...) who ran a lot of things before my time at the org, was FreeBSD, and I quickly understood why. We ran Postgres on 6.x as a db for a large Jira instance, while Jira itself ran on Linux iirc because I went with jrockit that ran circles around any JVM at the time. Those Postgres boxes had many years of uptime, locked away in a small colo facility, never failed and outlived the org that got merged and chopped up. FreeBSD was just so snappy, and just kept going. At the same time I ran ZFS on FreeBSD as our main file store for NFS and whatnot, snapshots, send/recv replication and all.

And it was all indeed on Supermicro server hardware.

And in parallel, while our routing kit was mostly Cisco, I put a transparent bridging firewall in front of the network running pfSense 1.2 or 1.3. It was one of those embedded boxes running a Via C3/Nehemiah, that had the Via Padlock crypto engine that pfSense supported. Its AES256 performance blew away our Xeons and crypto accelerator cards in our midrange Cisco ISRs - cards costing more than that C3 box. It had a failsafe Ethernet passthrough for when power went down and it ran FreeBSD. I've been using pfSense ever since, commercialisation / Netgate aside, force of habit.

And although for some things I lean towards OpenBSD today, FreeBSD delivers, and it has for nearly 20 years for me. And, as they say, it should for you, too.

RantyDave• 8 months ago

"a thousand-day uptime shouldn’t be folklore"

I reboot a lot. Mostly I want to know that should the system need to reboot for whatever reason, that it will all come back up again. I run a very lightly loaded site and I highly doubt anybody notices the minute (or so) loss of service caused by rebooting.

Pretty sure I don't feel bad about this.

arthurfirst23• 8 months ago

Regularly (every 3 years or so) had 1000+ days of uptime with FreeBSD rack servers on Supermicro mobos.

I built the servers myself and then shipped to colo half way around the world.

I got over 1400 once and then I needed to add a new disk. They ran for almost 13 years with some disk replacements, CPU upgrades, and memory additions

kiwijamo• 8 months ago

Genuine questions:

Do you ever apply kernel patches? I also run FreeBSD and reboot for any kernel patches and never can get my uptimes to 1,000 days before that.

Do you just run versions that don't get security patches? Security support EOL dates generally means I need to upgrade before 1,000 days too. For example the current stable release gets security patches only from June 10, 2025 to June 30, 2026 giving just over 360 days of active support.

I get FreeBSD is stable and get days of uptime, and I could easily do the same if I didn't bother upgrading etc, it's just that I can't see how that's done without putting your machine at risk. Perhaps only for airgapped machines?

klempner• 8 months ago

There's a weird fetishization of long uptimes. I suspect some of this dates from the bad old days when Windows would outright crash after 50 days of uptime.

In the modern era, a lightly (or at least stably) loaded system lasting for hundreds or even thousands of days without crashing or needing a reboot should be a baseline unremarkable expectation -- but that implies that you don't need security updates, which means the system needs to not be exposed to the internet.

On the other hand, every time you do a software update you put the system in a weird spot that is potentially subtly different from where it would be on a fresh reboot, unless you restart all of userspace (at which point you might as well just reboot).

And of course FreeBSD hasn't implemented kernel live patching -- but then, that isn't a "long uptime" solution anyway, the point of live patching is to keep the system running safely until your next maintenance window.

cesarb3• 8 months ago

There's a weird fetishization of long uptimes. I suspect some of this dates from the bad old days when Windows would outright crash after 50 days of uptime.

My recollection is that, usually, it crashed more often than that. The 50 days thing was IIRC only the time for it to be guaranteed to crash (due to some counter overflowing).

In the modern era, a lightly (or at least stably) loaded system lasting for hundreds or even thousands of days without crashing or needing a reboot should be a baseline unremarkable expectation -- but that implies that you don't need security updates, which means the system needs to not be exposed to the internet.

Or that the part of the system which needs the security updates not be exposed to the Internet. Other than the TCP/IP stack, most of the kernel is not directly accessible from outside the system.

On the other hand, every time you do a software update you put the system in a weird spot that is potentially subtly different from where it would be on a fresh reboot, unless you restart all of userspace (at which point you might as well just reboot).

You don't need a software update for that. Normal use of the system is enough to make it gradually diverge from its "clean" after-boot state. For instance, if you empty /tmp on boot, any temporary file is already a subtle difference from how it would be on a fresh reboot.

Personally, I consider having to reboot due to a security fix, or even a stability fix, to be a failure. It means that, while the system didn't fail (crash or be compromised), it was vulnerable to failure (crashing or being compromised). We should aim to do better than that.

fragmede• 8 months ago

It's from a bygone era. An era when you'd lose hours of work if you didn't go file -> save, (or ctrl-s, if you were obsessive). If you reboot, you lose all of your work, your configuration, that you haven't saved to disk. Computers were scarce, back in those days. There was one in the house, in the den, for the family. These days, I've got a dozen of them and everything autosaves. But so that's where that comes from.

sixdonuts3• 8 months ago

There are a lot of OT, safety and security infrastructure that must be run on premise in large orgs and require four to five nines of availability. Much of the underlying network, storage, and compute infra for these OT and SS solutions run proprietary OSs based on a BSD OS. BSD OSs are chosen specifically for their performance, security and stability. These solutions will often run for years without a reboot. If a patch is required to resolve a defect or vulnerability it generally does not require a reboot of the kernel and even so these solutions usually have HA/clustering capabilities to allow for NDU (non disruptive upgrades) and zero downtime of the IT infra solution.

wahern• 8 months ago

unless you restart all of userspace (at which point you might as well just reboot).

I can't speak for FreeBSD, but on my OpenBSD system hosting ssh, smtp, http, dns, and chat (prosody) services, restarting userspace is nothing to sweat. Not because restarting a particular service is easier than on a Linux server (`rcctl restart foo` vs `systemctl restart foo`), but because there are far fewer background processes and you know what each of them does; the system is simpler and more transparent, inducing less fear about breaking or missing a service. Moreover, init(1) itself is rarely implicated by a patch, and everything else (rc) is non-resident shell scripts, whereas who knows whether you can avoid restarting any of the constellation of systemd's own services, especially given their many library dependencies.

If you're running pet servers rather than cattle, you may want to avoid a reboot if you can. Maybe a capacitor is about to die and you'd rather deal with it at some future inopportune moment rather than extending the present inopportune moment.

bobanrocky• 8 months ago

Love the Sun E10k reference !!

- ex Sun

rhinoceraptor2• 8 months ago

The E10k reminds me of Bryan Cantrill's story about the motivation for dtrace. Sun engineers were working day and night, trying to debug what seemed to be a Solaris kernel networking bug, on a benchmarking cluster of E10k machines. I won't spoil the end, but it's great:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTVfAMRj-7E&t=2640s

wkat424210• 8 months ago

Yeah if Sun had continued to exist, what wonderful things would we have now!

But Oracle destroys everything it touches.

andrehacker4• 8 months ago

As much as I love FreeBSD, the release schedule is a real challenge in production: each point release is only supported for about three months. Since every release includes all ports and packages, you end up having to recertify your main application constantly.

Compare this to RedHat: yes, a paid subscription is expensive, but RedHat backports security fixes into the original code, so open source package updates don’t break your application, and critical CVEs are still addressed.

Microsoft, for all its faults, provides remarkable stability by supporting backward compatibility to a sometimes ridiculous extent.

Is FreeBSD amazing, stable, and an I/O workhorse? Absolutely: just ask Netflix. But is it a good choice for general-purpose, application-focused (as opposed to infrastructure-focused) large deployments? Hm, no ?

crest2• 8 months ago

What you measured is just the overlap between minor releases of the same major release. It helps to think of them as service packs if you want a MicroSoft analogy. So each minor release is supported until it has be surplanted for 3 months by a new one on the same major release line or the whole major release line goes end of life.

andrehacker4• 8 months ago

Sure, but the point is that each minor release contains changes in all third party open source packages/ports by taking them to the head version.

Open source packages often include breaking changes, all but guaranteeing your application to fail. With (a paid version of) RedHat Linux, RedHat modifies the open source packages to remediate CVEs by modifying the original version.

toast04• 8 months ago

As much as I love FreeBSD, the release schedule is a real challenge in production: each point release is only supported for about three months. Since every release includes all ports and packages, you end up having to recertify your main application constantly.

How much support do you plan on getting? The old releases don't really turn into pumpkins. Yes, every two or three major releases, they end up with a minor release that adds something to libc where binary packages from X.2 won't run on X.1 or X.0. But this isn't usually a huge deal for servers if you follow this plan:

Use FreeBSD as your stable base, but build your own binaries for your main service / language runtimes. If you build once and distribute binaries, keep your build machine / build root on the oldest minor revision you have in your fleet. When you install a new system, use an OS version that's in support and install any FreeBSD built binary packages then.

You do have to be prepared to review updates to confirm if they need you to take action (many to most won't if you are careful about what is enabled), backport fixes, build packages yourself, or upgrade in a hurry when necessary, but you don't often actually need to.

I don't think this strategy works for a desktop deployment; there's too many moving pieces. But it works well for a server. Most of my FreeBSD servers for work got installed and never needed an OS upgrade until they were replaced by better hardware. I did have an upgrade process, and I did use it sometimes: there were a couple kernel bugs that needed fixes, and sometimes new kernels would have much better performance so it was foolish to leave things as-is. And a couple bugs in the packages we installed; usually those didn't need an OS upgrade too, but sometimes it was easier to upgrade the handful of old servers rather than fight everything; choosing battles is important.

Or you can go like Netflix and just run as close to -CURRENT as you can.

andrehacker4• 8 months ago

> Or you can go like Netflix and just run as close to -CURRENT as you can.

The point is that for any system that has a publicly facing (internet) part you will have to keep up to date with known vulnerabilities as published in CVEs. Not doing so makes you a prime target to security breaches.

The FreeBSD maintainers do modify FreeBSD to address the latest known vulnerabilities.... but you will have to accept the new release every 3 months.

Aditionally, those releases do not only contain FreeBSD changes but also changes to all third party open source packages that are part of the distribution. Every package is maintained by different individuals or groups and often they make changes that change the way their software works, often these are "breaking" changes, i.e. you will have to update your application code for it to be compatible with that.

chillfox• 8 months ago

As someone who was a Linux sysadmin for several years, looking after a large fleet of RedHat boxes, I can say that the "don’t break your application" promise is BS. Their patches broke applications several times resulting in having to hold them back for months for it to be fixed.

The only Linux distro that actually lives up to that promise in my experience is Alpine.

cperciva• 8 months ago

each point release is only supported for about three months

Where are you getting 3 months from? It's usually 9 months and occasionally 12 months.

Also, major versions are supported for 4 years and unless you're messing with kernel APIs nothing should break. (Testing is always good! But going from 14.3 to 14.4 is not a matter of needing lots of extra development work.)

andrehacker4• 8 months ago

I stand corrected, the official current release plan is "...while each individual point release is only supported FOR THREE MONTHS AFTER THE NEXT POINT RELEASE".

https://www.freebsd.org/security/#:~:text=on%20production%20...

Recent point releases:

14.3 (June 10, 2025)

14.2 (December 3, 2024)

14.1 (June 4, 2024)

14.0 (November 20, 2023)

13.4 (September 17, 2024)

> Also, major versions are supported for 4 years and unless you're messing with kernel APIs nothing should break.

Well, things may not break but your system may be open to published vulnerabilities like these:

https://bsdsec.net/articles/freebsd-security-advisory-freebs...

For keeping up to date with vulnerability fixes for packages/ports (which are far more frequent) the "easy" path is to use the last FreeBSD point release.

lmm5• 8 months ago

Comparing FreeBSD with paid RedHat is a bit of a tilted comparison. The vast majority of Linux deployments do not use paid RedHat and do not get that kind of extreme backporting of security fixes.

Gud4• 8 months ago

Still, that option exists, and doesn’t for FreeBSD.

FWIW I switched from Debian to FreeBSD 25 years ago as my main OS.

hulitu3• 8 months ago

Microsoft, for all its faults, provides remarkable stability by supporting backward compatibility to a sometimes ridiculous extent.

Citation needed. Some long time ago, yes. Not anymore.

tete3• 8 months ago

As much as I love FreeBSD, the release schedule is a real challenge in production: each point release is only supported for about three months.

I think point releases "don't count". Point releases means you run freebsd-update, restart and are done.

And major releases tend to be trivial too. You run freebsd-update, follow instructions it puts out, do `pkg update -u`.

Been doing that for production database clusters (Postgres) for hundreds of thousands of users for over a decade now and even longer in other settings.

Sure you do your planning and testing, but you better do that for your production DB. ;)

These are thousands of queries a second setup including a smaller portion of longer queries (GIS using PostGIS).

That said: Backwards compatibility is something that is frequently misunderstood in FreeBSD. Eg. the FreeBSD kernel has those COMPAT_$MAJORVERSION in there by default for compatibility. So you usually end up being fine where it matters.

But also keep in mind that you usually have a really really long time to move between major releases - the time between a new major release and the last minor release losing support.

And to come back to the Postgres Setup. I can do this without doing both the DB (+PostGIS) upgrade at once cause I have my build server building exactly the same version for both versions. No weird "I upgrade the kernel, the OS, the compiler and everything at once". I actually did moved a from FreeBSD 13 to 14 and PG from 14 to 18 - again with PostGIS which tends to make this really messy on many systems - without any issues whatsoever. Just using pg_upgrade and having the old versions packages in a temporary directory.

This is just one anecdote, but it's a real life production setup with many paying customers.

I also have experience with RedHat, but for RedHat the long term support always ends up being "I hope I don't work here anymore when we eventually do have to upgrade".

But keep in mind we talk about years for something that on FreeBSD tends to be really trivial compared to RedHat which while supporting old stuff for very long does mean a lot of moving parts, because the applications you run are a lot more tied to your release.

On FreeBSD on your old major release you totally can run eg the latest Postgres, or nginx, or python or node.js or...

rootnod38• 8 months ago

The just released FreeBSD 15 for example as a major release is supported until end of 2029, how much more LTS support do you want?

The minor point releases are close to a year in support. And that is only talking base system. Packages and ports you can also easily support yourself with poudriere and others.

As for backwards compatibility: FreeBSD has a stable backwards compatible ABI. That is why you can run a 11.0 jail on a 15.0 host. With zero problems.

Other way around is what doesn't work. You can't run a 15.0 jail on a 11.0 host for example. But backwards compatibility is definitely given.

[1] https://www.freebsd.org/releases/15.0R/schedule/

rhinoceraptor2• 8 months ago

I personally have been itching for a NixOS-style BSD or Illumos derivative. My main machine is currently NixOS with root on ZFS, but I would love to be running something where ZFS isn't an afterthought, I could use dtrace, the kernel has first class OS virtualization, and so on. I think that the declarative approach to package management is obviously the future, but I wish there were a non-Linux option.

SirHumphrey• 8 months ago

I would run something like that if it would exist - illumos zones sound quite appealing as does a more native support for ZFS.

irusensei4• 8 months ago

The way nixos handles zfs seems overengineered while on FreeBSD you don't even need an fstab.

sharts• 8 months ago

Other than a few niche areas like Netflix and Playstation or even MacOS as some like to often put fourth as examples of how great it is…

yeah.

artyom• 8 months ago

Or that niche app called Whatsapp

Gud4• 8 months ago

If I recall correctly, they’ve moved to Linux

f1shy• 8 months ago

Also Redit started as "some BSD boxes" The problem is, when a project scales up, at some moment you will need "commodity" sys admins, so it is easier to just go for linux.

Also as the project gets bigger, at some point somebody will come with the idea to move to linux.

sixdonuts3• 8 months ago

The BSD/Illumos OSs are used quite frequently as the base OS for high end commercial/enterprise network, SAN, NAS etc. solutions. They are chosen for it's performance, stability and HA features.

bitwize• 8 months ago

More of a Net/Open guy myself, but the Qotom network appliance I mentioned a few posts back runs FreeBSD. I use it as a wifi bridge to provide backhaul for my office's wired LAN over the house wifi. There are gadgets you can buy for this, but I like my solution running stock FreeBSD + some configuration.

mshroyer3• 8 months ago

These days I use it as a home file server because for my needs, FreeBSD the best tool for that job.

But back in the early 2000s I got access to a free Unix shell account that included Apache hosting and Perl, and if I'm not misremembering, it was running on FreeBSD and hosted by an ISP in the UK using the domain names portland.co.uk and port5.com.

That was formative for me: I learned all of Unix, Perl, and basic CGI web development on that server. I don't know who specifically was running that server, or whether they have any relation to the current owner of that domain. But if you're out there, thanks! Having access to FreeBSD was a huge help to a random high schooler in the U.S., who wouldn't have been able to afford a paid hosting account back then.

karlgkk2• 8 months ago

let administrators see longevity as a feature, not a gamble

I get what you’re going for. But…

Please god no. Immutable images, servers are cattle not pets.

irusensei4• 8 months ago

I prefer pets. I also give my server silly names. I think the cattle not pets crowd art partly to blame in ruining the fun of computing.

karlgkk2• 8 months ago

I don’t think in terms of servers, I think in terms of applications

Applications are my pets. Servers are the pens I keep them in. Pets are precious, pens are replaceable.

st3fan• 8 months ago

"If someone wants hype or the latest shiny thing every month, they have Linux."

This is just such a bizarre view ... what do they think Linux really is? Maybe if you are on bleeding edge Arch as a hobbyist who follows the latest shiny windows managers or something like that. But those of us who run Linux in production do that on stable releases with proven tech that hasn't changed significantly in more than a decade. Or longer for some things.

The FreeBSD folks need a reality check. They are so out of touch with what Linux really is. It is hard to take these kind of articles seriously.

lmm5• 8 months ago

But those of us who run Linux in production do that on stable releases with proven tech that hasn't changed significantly in more than a decade.

Pretty sure the firewall commands have changed at least once in that time, and the device layer and maybe the init system. I hear the preferred sound system is changing again in the last few years too.

Klonoar3• 8 months ago

If someone wants hype or the latest shiny thing every month, they have Linux.

Just. Run. Debian.

nrhrjrjrjtntbt• 8 months ago

And then install Postgres

BoredomIsFun3• 8 months ago

FreeBSD has very different from Debian package update policy, essentally delayed rolling release. The only one other system I can think of is OpenSUSE Slowroll.

bluGill5• 8 months ago

Last time I entountered a mainframe they religiously rebooted - full power cycle every six months. a few years before their power backup failed in an emergency and for months aftrewards they were trying to figure out what all was running on that thing and how to get it started. By rebooting people starting a process remember to get it in the startup sequence - or at least only a few moths have passed so odds are they remember how it works.

jeffjeffbear2• 8 months ago

I would still use it but NVIDIA abandoned it, so I can't. I wish they still had some support for modern CUDA.

tombert9• 8 months ago

Nothing "against" FreeBSD, but I've never been able to really use it as a desktop OS.

Don't get me wrong: ports is pretty cool and jails are cool, but every time I've tried running FreeBSD on a laptop I end up spending a day chasing problems with drivers or getting things like brightness or volume controls working. Basically, FreeBSD on laptops (as of the last time I tried it about two years ago) feels like Linux on laptops about fifteen years ago. Linux on laptops nowadays generally works out of the box, at least with AMD stuff. I didn't have much issue getting NixOS working on my current laptop, but I am not sure that would be the case with FreeBSD, even still.

That said, FreeBSD on servers is pretty sweet. Very stable, and ports is pretty awesome. I ran FreeBSD on a server for about a year.

nesarkvechnep• 8 months ago

Well, take the corporate and user interest which Linux sees into account. FreeBSD is a niche desktop OS. We can’t expect everything to work. The easiest way is for me and you to start contributing and things might change for the better.

tombert9• 8 months ago

I don’t disagree with that, but I don’t see why this matters to the end user.

js-j• 8 months ago

I like freebsd a lot, too. In production we use debian (without systemd!), and here's the uptime of one of our servers:

$ uname -a

Linux deb2 3.16.0-4-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 3.16.7-ckt25-2 (2016-04-08) x86_64 GNU/Linux

$ uptime

08:50:41 up 2512 days, 17:15, 1 user, load average: 18.70, 20.46, 21.43

hybrid_study• 8 months ago

so last security patch was over 7 years ago?

nickdothutton• 8 months ago

FBSD user since the mid 90s. It (and BSDi) often outperformed "big UNIX" vendors, and was far ahead in terms of bang per buck... if only good server grade rack-mount x86 hardware had been available at the time we'd have made more use of it. Now I have returned to it for server workloads. Good documentation, consistent release schedule, reliability even under extreme load.

BoredomIsFun3• 8 months ago

To me biggest selling point of freebsd is delayed rolling release package policy - every 3 month you get a bulk of new packages, and security updates in between I wish Debian was like that.

rwaksmunski• 8 months ago

I got over 20 years of sane, reliable and consistent computing from the FreeBSD Project, thank you.

vogon_laureate2• 8 months ago

BSDs taught me how to Unix in a way that I just wasn't able to manage with Linux before. This was during the early RedHat 5.x days and I just found so many pain points with the RPMs and odd file hierarchy inconsistencies for different packages. I tried to setup a firewall for my office network and struggled with iptables (or was it ipchains back then?) and found the documentation confusing.

I tried OpenBSD to setup a firewall system and fell in love. Everything just made more sense and felt more cohesive. PF rules syntax was just so much easier to work with and flexible. I loved the ports system and the emphasis on code correctness and security. The Man pages were a revelation! I could find everything I needed in the command line.

I tried all the BSDs, and each have their own strengths and weaknesses. FreeBSD had the most ports and seemed to also have good hardware support, NetBSD had the most platform support, DragonflyBSD was focused on parallel computing, etc. They all borrow and learn from each other.

BSDs are great and I heartily recommend people give them a whirl. This article in The Register is also worth a read:

https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/08/switching_from_linux_...

MisterTea• 8 months ago

I've been running home servers in one form or another for some time. Win NT4 briefly, FreeBSD, Win2k server for a while, then to Linux for quite some time. I tried FreeNAS but learned to hate the webui churn and outdated/scattered docs but liked ZFS. Went back to Linux using Mint (yeah, weird choice...) and had issues with Mint and my hardware was crap. I wanted ZFS so I decided to go back to my roots and run FreeBSD again.

I realized the right way to start is with GOOD hardware. So I went on eBay (I know, I know...) and found a nice Supermicro uATX server board and a 65 watt quad core Xeon in the 1151(?) socket then bought a fresh set of Kingston 16 GB ECC DIMMs, and 4x 8TB enterprise CMR SATA disks.

I read the docs and read a few how-to's from blogs and personal sites. In a day I had a everything setup, accounts, Raid-Z5 data store, samba and nfs exporting the data store. It was so damn easy. It's been running solid ever since. It's so reliable it's boring. I have to remind myself its even there so I can run updates and check on the thing to make sure its not full of dust or snakes or whatever.

Ericson2314• 8 months ago

I hope that someday that https://github.com/nixos-bsd/nixbsd will be upstreamed into NixOS, and it will allow much easier switching between Linux and FreeBSD.

jandrusk• 8 months ago

What is love? Baby don't reboot me, baby don't reboot me :) Truly a rock solid OS and I use it for my personal DNS servers and never had any issue, it just run and runs and runs with minimal bloat. I think it's way more stable than Linux, but obviously has some work to be a comptetive desktop. I've recently developed the philosophy of using Omarchy as my desktop and servers are FreeBSD unless there's some reason it doesn't fit my use case.

fridder3• 8 months ago

I'm really enjoying the uptick in interest in FreeBSD I'm starting to see as well as the really exciting 15.0 release.

A Love Letter to FreeBSD

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