For all the people using FreeBSD as their primary desktop.

There are a few ports for using, including mounting, SMB/CIFS. If the one needed for mounting a specific version or that uses a specific feature isn't there, the one needed can be patched and ported.
 
How do you guys solve this problem? Am I missing some secret sauce or BSD-fu?

I solved those problems by not using any of those platforms or services, just using basic protocols for web (browser), email (mutt) and sometimes IRC. Socializing can be done through the websites of mastodon or twitter. I don't watch many TV and when I miss something, I missed it. Don't bother.

Over the years I migrated all my files to defaultly known file systems on a basic FreeBSD box, so it mounts my photo camera. The rest is irrelevant to me.

I do not bother to do remote work on my own computer, just use the provided W10 boss box for that.

The 'secret BSD-fu sauce' is to use BSD and skip the rest. So STOP the 'app thinking' as if there is an app for any use on any platform. START using software as intended -- as broad and narrow as designed.

The world around seems cramped in 'app thinking', stimulating FOMO. But that is different from how software and *BSD is used, how personal computing is intended.
 
FreeBSD didn't always have all the features. For a desktop, for a long time, it was usable. Recently, it had nearly all the desktop features.

Common and complete features are good. Hopefully, it not being done the Linux way.

This should have been focused on SMB or alternatives, from the begining, not Linux. Who cares. If there's a program that works there, and it's not reliant on Linuxism dependencies, port it here.
 
This is true. Apple really would like you to use AFS more than anything else.
Yeah, but they've embraced SMB/CIFS for remote mounts. It seems to me that most of the people working on Netatalk are now working on Samba. They haven' zapped Netatalk support for Timemachine yet. I'm hoping me and my family will be through using Apple devices by the time they inevitably do.

I looked at setting up Samba on my network, and it's a hard pass for me. Samba, following the Microsoft way, has to take control of a DNS domain in order to work properly. Their built-in DNS server is ass, and they have serious issues working properly with BIND. Yeah. No thanks.
 
When I have to use SMB, I just turn the tables. I run a Samba server on the UNIX host and get the Windows machine to act as the clients. FreeBSD has a perfectly good Samba server. Linux shares the same version.

It is kind of the opposite problem for Microsoft Windows. The NFS client is "ok" but I have yet to find a decent NFS server.

As for actual desktop / workstation usage; then SSH, Git suffice 99.9% of the time.

(Signal, Slack, Bitwarden, Discord, Chrome (for Netflix, and Spotify), etc.)
Slack and Discord are web pages. Just use them from any old crusty browser.
Chromium works fine as a substitute. You don't have the DRM plugins but the pirate bay can generally solve that (think of it simply as a peer hosted Netflix mirror).

As for drivers; I tend to just buy a suitable machine. It may seem disappointing as a piece of advice but FreeBSD supports many, many more hardware than macOS and yet people don't seem to encounter driver issues there because they are running it on a suitable machine.
 
The only two pieces of software I use from that list are Signal and in the past Discord. I always just used Discord on my browser (Firefox) because the Desktop Client is literally just a glorified (not really) Chrome anyway, and Signal on my Phone since I mean.. never had a reason to need it on desktop otherwise.
 
As for Bitwarden, I don't really like to tie the browser with the storage cause I also use it on my phone. Also, I share it with my wife, so switching it up isn't really feasible cause she's already used to it.
BTW, I just have a password manager app on my phone, and that's it. I don't sync with desktop, I tell the browser to NEVER REMEMBER the passwords I enter. And I don't share my passwords with anyone, even if I have a great relationship otherwise. You never know when someone gets careless - and your accounts become a mess as a result. Even if you can manage to keep your relationship in spite of that, the leaked information has the potential to bite in surprising ways.

Netflix/Spotify/Youtube support is spotty on FreeBSD, at least in part because the pkg version of multimedia/ffmpeg is compiled with conservative options that don't include everything plus the kitchen sink. Fortunately, they are not something I use. Well, maybe Youtube.

I do like compiling stuff with my own options - that's what ports are for.
 
For all the people using FreeBSD as their primary desktop.

Cross-reference:

For all the people using FreeBSD as their primary desktop.


From the opening poster:

… the biggest issue is more the lack of some Linux apps and drivers.

Whattteva any driver in particular?

For the DRM stack (graphics), from <https://gitter.im/FreeBSDDesktop/Lobby/archives/2022/02/18?at=620fda5f4164105ab0a48254>:

[irc] <manu> brief plan is 5.10, move most things to base (i.e. no linuxkpi_gplv2.ko)
[irc] <manu> then have a dma-buf implem in base and if it's good enough perf-wise import everything

The NVIDIA situation is remarkable. Whilst FreeBSD-specific drivers can be downloaded from NVIDIA's site, it's preferable to install ports of the drivers (not the originals).

iwlwifi(4) is work in progress. The manual page for 13.1 <https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=iwlwifi&sektion=4&manpath=FreeBSD+13.1-RELEASE> is not yet available. Instead: <https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=iwlwifi&sektion=4&manpath=FreeBSD+14.0-current> and <https://wiki.freebsd.org/WiFi/Iwlwifi>.

… Why is FreeBSD still stuck with the grossly outdated and insecure mount.smbfs …

Echoing <https://old.reddit.com/comments/ueas25/-/i6p5bqb/>; under <https://wiki.freebsd.org/2021FoundationCFI#Networking>:

smbfs in base: support SMBv2 and SMBv3 …
 
Bitwarden works nicely as a Firefox extension, so no application is needed really. I looked into creating a port for it some time ago, but the dependencies were insane, so I shelved that idea.
 
Maybe because something way more secure already exists?

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SSHFS>

No mention of lock in the change log, which began in 2004.

I wrote (in Wikipedia) about lock-related problems in 2009. (It was alarmingly easy for one person to overwrite another person's edition, with neither person being aware of the data loss until it was too late.)

2019, under Mounting SMB (v2/v3) shares / gvfs? : freebsd:

… are file lock situations, which may vary from one application to another, handled gracefully?

E.g. if you open an Excel workbook with write privileges, then will other users (properly) be limited to read-only for that file?

jardows did you ever have an opportunity test SSHFS in a multiple user situation, or (below) is testing an impossibility for you?

… I work at a large private university that uses only SMB for file sharing, …

… sometimes I don't have control over the actual server that's making the share …

… Apple really would like you to use AFS more than anything else.

Nit: APFS – with a P.

AFS is the Andrew File System. Rest in peace net/openafs.
 
Nit: APFS – with a P.

AFS is the Andrew File System. Rest in peace net/openafs.
Actually, I think we are both wrong here.
APFS is their new journaling file system, which was not what I was referring to. I was referring to their network file sharing protocol, which is actually AFP (apparently deprecated in favor of SMB in Big Sur), NOT AFS as I mentioned in earlier post. Too many similar acronyms.
 
I know that you could use the web browser for some of them (not Netflix/Spotify), but I was wondering if someone has it figured out. I prefer running it natively because I tend to have to reboot Firefox/Chromium every once in a while due to their memory usage becoming untenable after a while.

I use different user profiles for my browsers. One for work, one for fluff, a separate one for discord etc. That way I restart the fluff profile's browser instance often, and the others usually only when there is an update.

All those native apps on a regular Unix machine (as opposed to a mobile device) are very problematic security-wise. Discord has a hole and you use it natively - whole user account compromised.
 

Wi-Fi​


Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX200 160 MHz
Vendor ID: 8086
Device ID: 2723

FreeBSD bug 244261 – Add support for Intel AX200 (iwx) wireless devices – you can add yourself to the CC list.


– solved by ayyash07, however the solution there (wired instead of Wi-Fi) might be not what you want.

Can I get my AX200 working on -CURRENT ? : freebsd – there's an answer that does not require wired networking.

More discussion of AX200 under <https://old.reddit.com/r/freebsd/comments/udgrav/-/>.

Please watch this topic:


Also, FYI

 
I love FreeBSD, really I do. I love its rock solid stability (my Linux installations seem to always have weird quirks from time to time), performance, directory consistency, relatively simple setup, and of course The FreeBSD Handbook.

I've dabbled with it off and on for years, but have never really made the complete plunge for my daily driver machine mostly for two reasons, which are either drivers or lack of a certain software that I need (Signal, Slack, Bitwarden, Discord, Chrome (for Netflix, and Spotify), etc.). The Linux compatibility layer helps, but it's often a hit or miss, especially on packages that require systemd and that still doesn't solve the drivers issue.
Also, this one has really stumped me. Why is FreeBSD still stuck with the grossly outdated and insecure mount.smbfs instead of mount.cifs like what Linux has, which supports SMB version 2+?

How do you guys solve this problem? Am I missing some secret sauce or BSD-fu?

Desktop is an user specific environment where he performs his daily work. What is considered to be a common denominator of all desktops is that they allow users to configure the environment, access the network, the web, access files on the computer.

The specific end user application is not a common desktop denominator.

The access to proprietary services (Netflix, Spotify) is something that FreeBSD is not made for.

FreeBSD requires users to embrace mindset that you should not use 3rd party code to achieve something that's in the base (Bitwarden)

FreeBSD is a great choice for running mature open source tech atop of it. See it like that or you'll have troubles.

If you want to make a move and you see those services/applications as essential why even bothering? E.g. check if it's supported beforehand, if not, don't buy it. I refer to FreeBSD HCL or just google when I want to buy a piece of hardware, I don't just buy it blind and then get dissapointed because FreeBSD does not support it.
 
I guess the current consensus seems to be just use Linux for desktop unless you can you can forego non-BSD apps.
I found this post from back in 2017 that basically echoes my own sentiment. https://forums.FreeBSD.org/threads/do-freebsd-developers-eat-their-own-dogfood.62222/post-359614
I'd imagine this is still fairly relevant in 2022, particularly this part by fnoyanisi:

It matters because it would encourage developers to improve FreeBSD for desktop.
So, I totally agree with this! +1
The fanatic "FreeBSD is designed for servers, bugger off desktops" slogan we all hear does not make sense at all. The more users you have, the more contributions you will get, the more third party software will be ported to FreeBSD...This is a while(1) loop that will repeat itself, simple as that.
 
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