Now, before I continue let's start by stating the obvious: I'm biased
Even so I do try to come up with a fair response.
Having that out of the way I think the most important question here is if you're willing to get your hands "dirty". Being familiar on the commandline is a good sign because although there are plenty of "front end" programs available you'll get the most result by using the several available tools.
Another very important aspect (in my opinion) is that the available documentation for FreeBSD is in many ways superior to that of other Unix-like environments. That's not an opinion, it's a fact. Of course now I'm obliged to back up this claim with some proof. Let's say you're going to copy some files on your system, you know you need the
cp command but require a little more information on the details.
If you then issue the
man cp command on a CentOS system or FreeBSD system you'll quickly notice some differences. Some of those are in the details, but even so. Look at this:
cp manualpage on CentOS said:
COPYRIGHT
Copyright © 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software. You may redistribute copies of it under the
terms of the GNU General Public License
<http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>. There is NO WARRANTY, to the
extent permitted by law.
SEE ALSO
The full documentation for cp is maintained as a Texinfo manual. If
the info and cp programs are properly installed at your site, the com-
mand
info cp
should give you access to the complete manual.
versus
cp manualpage on FreeBSD said:
COMPATIBILITY
Historic versions of the cp utility had a -r option. This implementation
supports that option, however, its behavior is different from historical
FreeBSD behavior. Use of this option is strongly discouraged as the
behavior is implementation-dependent. In FreeBSD, -r is a synonym for
-RL and works the same unless modified by other flags. Historical imple-
mentations of -r differ as they copy special files as normal files while
recreating a hierarchy.
The -v and -n options are non-standard and their use in scripts is not
recommended.
SEE ALSO
mv(1), rcp(1), umask(2), fts(3), symlink(7)
STANDARDS
The cp command is expected to be IEEE Std 1003.2 (``POSIX.2'') compati-
ble.
HISTORY
A cp command appeared in Version 1 AT&T UNIX.
Now, although I consider the latter example to be superior do keep in mind that superior doesn't imply perfection. It's not, you'll most likely also come across examples which aren't as great. Of course the main difference is that you can then share your issues (for example by filing a so called Problem Report) and chances are high that it will be looked at and dealt with.
Even so; in my opinion FreeBSD provides much more information to find your way around the commandline than some of the other systems do. As such; if you're capable to get your hands "dirty" and are also familiar with commands such as
apropos and/or
man -k then you should be well prepared, and FreeBSD could most certainly be something for you.
Although others already mentioned this one I think it can't be said enough: do take some time to go over the
FreeBSD handbook. It's an invaluable source of information and will most certainly be able to help you out with any problems you might face. Best of all it might also help you to get a good impression of this "FreeBSD thing".
And finally, another item I'd like to point your attention to is this article on a
comparison between FreeBSD and Linux. I strongly advise you to read it; this isn't about which of the two is "better" or the "best" (those are just nonsense comparisons best left for
passionate fans (
) or worse
) but instead it tries to give a good balanced impression of the differences between the two systems.
Hope this can help as well.
PS: Although that small rant of this passionate fan is indeed a bit of a rant it might also give you some ideas on how others approach this whole "FreeBSD vs. Linux" thing.
