FreeBSD 1, Linux 0
I don't know how many of you are familiar with <a href="http://www.keenspot.com/"; target="_blank">Keenspot</a>, but they're a webcomics publisher run on a shoestring that had settled on a Google-esque model of running Linux on cheap hardware to keep operating costs down.
Well, after years of headaches and a crash of their <a href="http://chesterforums.keenspot.com/"; target="_blank">immense forums</a> that cost them a month's worth of posts (about 15,000), one of the owners/tech guys formally announced that <a href="http://chesterforums.keenspot.com/viewtopic.php?t=50202"; target="_blank">they're ditching Linux for FreeBSD</a>. There's some really interesting reading in here, from someone who's been in the trenches, pushing Linux to the limit.
From the above-linked thread:
[quote]As for why we use ReiserFS and Linux 4.5.x, I can't really answer that. Nate's the one involved with installing such things. I do know that the motivation behind Linux versions has always been exactly what I've detailed above: NO VERSIONS OF LINUX WORK. This is a fundamental flaw of Linux. Every version of Linux has some fatal bug somewhere. Most average desktop users never see these bugs, but when you have as much traffic and varied applications running as we do, you run into them all.
When they do happen, usually the result is something horrific. Even if it's just a system crash--the average user is used to their computer just suddenly freezing for no obvious reason whatsoever, but when it happens to us, heads start to roll. Pagers go off at four in the morning.
So we spend days doing a websearch to find the problems and what we find is always the same. On some Linux message board somewhere, someone will have described the exact same problem and the accompanying advice is always, "Oh, that's a bug in Linux x.x.x. It was fixed in Linux x.x.x+y. You need to upgrade."
The problem, as I've pounded into the ground by now, is that for every x.x.x, there's a new set of bugs for which the only advice is to add another "y" on. I would say it's safe to say that we have gone through every "stable" version of Linux from the 2.2's to 2.4.20.
If they would just leave it alone for a few years until all the bugs were fixed and then released one stable version (like FreeBSD), it would be a decent operating system.
No Linux version is "stable."
<hr></blockquote>
He notes elsewhere that the caretakers of FreeBSD wait until a codebase is two years old before pronouncing it stable.
This is something worth remembering: The idea that software moves at some insane speed, and you have to have to have to be right up to the minute, is a fiction sold by Microsoft and others to keep the market churning. In reality, if you want good service out of something as fundamental as an operating system, you are far better served with patience, diligence, and as much well-written, battle-tested code as possible. People want features, but implicit in the clamoring for features is the assumption that the product will continue to work, and work well.
So if anyone is thinking that Apple should move with all possible speed to the latest Mach, or FreeBSD, or gcc, or Java, or whatever, think about this. Think about the people who went back to iMovie 2 because, while iMovie 3 is much nicer when it works, it doesn't work all that often. It's worth waiting as long as necessary for Apple or whoever else to bulletproof their work, and the farther down into the guts of the system you go the truer this is.
Well, after years of headaches and a crash of their <a href="http://chesterforums.keenspot.com/"; target="_blank">immense forums</a> that cost them a month's worth of posts (about 15,000), one of the owners/tech guys formally announced that <a href="http://chesterforums.keenspot.com/viewtopic.php?t=50202"; target="_blank">they're ditching Linux for FreeBSD</a>. There's some really interesting reading in here, from someone who's been in the trenches, pushing Linux to the limit.
From the above-linked thread:
[quote]As for why we use ReiserFS and Linux 4.5.x, I can't really answer that. Nate's the one involved with installing such things. I do know that the motivation behind Linux versions has always been exactly what I've detailed above: NO VERSIONS OF LINUX WORK. This is a fundamental flaw of Linux. Every version of Linux has some fatal bug somewhere. Most average desktop users never see these bugs, but when you have as much traffic and varied applications running as we do, you run into them all.
When they do happen, usually the result is something horrific. Even if it's just a system crash--the average user is used to their computer just suddenly freezing for no obvious reason whatsoever, but when it happens to us, heads start to roll. Pagers go off at four in the morning.
So we spend days doing a websearch to find the problems and what we find is always the same. On some Linux message board somewhere, someone will have described the exact same problem and the accompanying advice is always, "Oh, that's a bug in Linux x.x.x. It was fixed in Linux x.x.x+y. You need to upgrade."
The problem, as I've pounded into the ground by now, is that for every x.x.x, there's a new set of bugs for which the only advice is to add another "y" on. I would say it's safe to say that we have gone through every "stable" version of Linux from the 2.2's to 2.4.20.
If they would just leave it alone for a few years until all the bugs were fixed and then released one stable version (like FreeBSD), it would be a decent operating system.
No Linux version is "stable."
<hr></blockquote>
He notes elsewhere that the caretakers of FreeBSD wait until a codebase is two years old before pronouncing it stable.
This is something worth remembering: The idea that software moves at some insane speed, and you have to have to have to be right up to the minute, is a fiction sold by Microsoft and others to keep the market churning. In reality, if you want good service out of something as fundamental as an operating system, you are far better served with patience, diligence, and as much well-written, battle-tested code as possible. People want features, but implicit in the clamoring for features is the assumption that the product will continue to work, and work well.
So if anyone is thinking that Apple should move with all possible speed to the latest Mach, or FreeBSD, or gcc, or Java, or whatever, think about this. Think about the people who went back to iMovie 2 because, while iMovie 3 is much nicer when it works, it doesn't work all that often. It's worth waiting as long as necessary for Apple or whoever else to bulletproof their work, and the farther down into the guts of the system you go the truer this is.
Comments
I like this phrase from the text:
[quote] "BSD is for people who like Unix. Linux is for people who hate Windows." <hr></blockquote>
I read several of the webcomics they publish, so I've seen the problems they've had.
On another note, they used to run their forums on UBB. Guess what happened?
Then again, FreeBSD is pretty good too. I just can't figure out IPFILTER....
<strong>On another note, they used to run their forums on UBB. Guess what happened?
BRAD !?!????? :eek: :eek: :eek: Move Move Move !!!