Is there a real interest in pushing FreeBSD on the desktop space?

[hardworkingnewbie]

MacOS puts all the App in a folder with a specific extension that is not interpreted as a folder.
It also does this with bundles, etc.
That's why removing an Application in MacOS is as simple as dragging the icon to Trash, deletes the "folder".

Not always, which is why apps like AppCleaner are a thing under MacOS. https://freemacsoft.net/appcleaner/

 

[rmomota]

Not always, which is why apps like AppCleaner are a thing under MacOS. https://freemacsoft.net/appcleaner/

Just like Windows leaves registry left overs and other stuff,and just like Linux leaves conf files.
Every system leaves orphan files and confs after software gets uninstalled.

 

[Cath O'Deray]

More recent news about boot times was probably a niche use case, not desktop.

Confirmed, not desktop. Found in the most obvious place:

FreeBSD can now boot in 25 milliseconds

On AWS Firecracker – but there are other new micro-VM engines around, too …

 

[Cath O'Deray]

One thing this project can do … is to make it clear (and enforce) that its purpose is first and foremost to be a free and open source UNIX implementation for those who are actually desire/are interested in/or need a UNIX system. …

A question for anyone.

What is the goal of the FreeBSD Project?

 

[richardtoohey2]

Does it have to have a single goal? I think there are different parties with different goals.

And sometimes those goals are conflicting or some goals have priority over others.

 

[daridro]

A question for anyone.

What is the goal of the FreeBSD Project?

I see the FreeBSD project as a way of proposing a rich and coherent potential.
The user entry point for this potential must be minimal, so that each individual can then realize it as he or she sees fit within a coherent ecosystem.

 

[Cath O'Deray]

I see the FreeBSD project as a way of proposing a rich and coherent potential.
The user entry point for this potential must be minimal, so that each individual can then realize it as he or she sees fit within a coherent ecosystem.

Thanks.

The actual goal is quite different (awareness is low) …

 

[menelkir]

I see the FreeBSD project as a way of proposing a rich and coherent potential.
The user entry point for this potential must be minimal, so that each individual can then realize it as he or she sees fit within a coherent ecosystem.

Which is fine, but people see as a defect because they want something to be in the way they want to be, and not in a way it can serve any purpose.
Like "why I don't have a desktop ready for me?" because their interest is around a desktop ready to use with all shinny icons why you don't actually need even ports for a functional system to begin with (e.g you can install base and just run a proprietary software for a simple purpose).
Having options is good, having choices is good, and some people call it "fragmentation" because someone is offering choices they don't want, go figure.

 

[daridro]

Having options is good, having choices is good, and some people call it "fragmentation" because someone is offering choices they don't want, go figure.

Then the overall philosophy of the project is not understood… Maybe those people want an absolute standardization across the global offer (same icons, same applications, same desktop etc.) then the question is: Why, if they found their happiness elsewhere, do they want to decline it here? Maybe they are looking for a turnkey product, not a coherent potential that they can shape as they wish.

 

[menelkir]

Then the overall philosophy of the project is not understood… Maybe those people want an absolute standardization across the global offer (same icons, same applications, same desktop etc.) then the question is: Why, if they found their happiness elsewhere, do they want to decline it here? Maybe they are looking for a turnkey product, not a coherent potential that they can shape as they wish.

Because people wants the world to turn around them. it's the same way people wants flatpak on freebsd not understanding that flatpak doesn't fix absolutely anything for freebsd (they learned how to use flatpak, they want to use the same knowledge everywhere). They want freebsd turn into something they don't have to learn anything new and not having to move a single finger to understand how it works and change to their workflow.

 

[hruodr]

Like "why I don't have a desktop ready for me?"

I absolutely do not like censorship, but I think this eternal topic "Desktop Environment" should be forbidden
as the "why it is not (more) like", giving a hint to the many desktop environments in ports and packages,
and telling that questions about their installation are as welcome as any other question.

Characteristic on all this threads about desktop environment is that it is not clear what people are asking
for, of what the thread is about, but in spite of it they generate a big discussion about: nothing, nonsense,
or in the best case about: anything.

 

[menelkir]

I absolutely do not like censorship, but I think this eternal topic "Desktop Environment" should be forbidden
as the "why it is not (more) like", giving a hint to the many desktop environments in ports and packages,
and telling that questions about their installation are as welcome as any other question.

Characteristic on all this threads about desktop environment is that it is not clear what people are asking
for, of what the thread is about, but in spite of it they generate a big discussion about: nothing, nonsense,
or in the best case about: anything.

I have to agree. I don't mind helping people fixing weird issues even with tiling WMs if it's possible to help. But usually people wants to pilot a mouse from the boot of the livecd otherwise "that's why no one uses freebsd". ?

 

[Cath O'Deray]

… forbidden …

Does the Unwatch button not work?

 

[Cath O'Deray]

… the overall philosophy of the project is not understood …

The goal is understandable, but it's not well-communicated.

…

1. official focus areas
2. an official set of goals that differs from the focus areas
3. an official goal that differs from the set of goals and from the focus areas
4. a draft official core philosophy and draft official core values and technologies that differ, as a set, from the sum of those three things
5. perceived goals, such as the set quoted above. …

 

[hruodr]

Does the Unwatch button not work?

There are on the platform many "forums" for different FreeBSD related themes.
For Hardware, for software, for programming, Networking, etc. My proposal is
about giving structure. Of course, one could have one and only one forum: "Small-talk".

All these desktop nonsense questions presuppose that FreeBSD is not really usable
as desktop. If someone feels so, he must first try to think what is his concrete problem,
why is he unhappy, then find the right forum, put an appropriate title and ask for help,
instead of writing something like "when will FreeBSD be usable as desktop".

Psychologically it is a projection. The person attributes a quality of him, his stupidity of
not been able to type "pkg install", to FreeBSD. His lack of reflection damages himself,
because this makes him unable to ask for help.

The first time I saw such a question was in the OpenBSD mailing list, where I was before
coming here. It was only once, not recurrent like here. The question was something like:
are there plans to make of OpenBSD a wonderful Desktop experience. At the very first
moment I found the question strange, I did not understand what he was asking.
He was projecting his unhappiness with his life to OpenBSD, he needed a wonderful experience
to feel good and was seeking it in OpenBSD.

 

[blackhole]

FreeBSD is very wise to hold back from heading down the desktop rabbit hole.

In that scenario, there are always choices to be made with regards to default desktop environments, etc. Ultimately that will settle on providing a Windows / macOS style imitation and the others, along with the plethora of Window managers get sidelined or don't top the list - those that don't top the list, require more work from you - ultimately you're giving an easy ride to some gnome / KDE users, for very little return, then they fill up the forum with worthless threads, because they failed to learn the basics in the first place.

Catering to lazy and incompetent people, is going to attract lazy and incompetent people. It's not hard to work out.

If I compare now, with FreeBSD 8.x, things are vastly easier to get up and running than they were back then, but FreeBSD is an OS which requires some technical proficiency and reading of the documentation of the user in order to progress. They will either reap the rewards from that, or FreeBSD is most likely not for them - and they will move to one of the plethora of OS or Linux distributions that already provide what they want.

 

[hruodr]

Catering to lazy and incompetent people, is going to attract lazy and incompetent people. It's not hard to work out.

Note that most of this desktop threads are more a question about installation.

I think the simple OpenBSD installer is by far much better the FreeBSD installer, all is done much faster without
any troubles in between, but it is an installer based on commands, not a graphic installer.

People that are not afraid of commands and manage to install OpenBSD, and that is very easy, and come to the
mailing list, will hence not tend to ask about Graphical Desktop Environment, as I noted in my previous posting.
Only once in many years I saw it.

Another think is, that FreeBSD with the hype "the power to serve", make the impression of being a
"Server OS", and hence cannot be a "Desktop OS". Here is also a question of prejudge.

But is Debian a "Desktop OS"? And are in Debian Forums these recurrent threads?

 

[blackhole]

But is Debian a "Desktop OS"? And are in Debian Forums these recurrent threads?

I'm not sure what "recurrent threads" you're referring to.

Historically, they had threads where some users would complain about the installer not being graphical. Nowadays they have a graphical installer and I don't know/care if there are still complaints about that. The forums used to be very conservative and no nonsense - that's no longer the case and there's been low signal to noise there for well over 10 years.

They offer a primary default desktop - gnome and a lot of things, desktop wise, revolve around that and thus systemd as well.

 

[Cath O'Deray]

… not been able to type "pkg install" …

Ahem.

 

[lgrant]

I wish it was as easy to setup a desktop on FreeBSD as it is on Linux, and it has not been for me.

That said, I am not sure there is a need for open-source products to get market share. If everybody decided that FreeBSD was not what they needed, all the volunteers would go away, and it would fade into history. This would be sad, but OK.

Traditionally, FreeBSD has been a server OS, and I suspect that the people who want a desktop are people who already like FreeBSD. I don’t think people who are escaping from Windows are ever going to be the target audience, as it is for Ubuntu Linux. And though commercial support is nice, in some Linux distros, it has led to some propriety stuff that seems on the borderline of violating the GPL in order to increase market share. That seems to violate the spirit of open source.

As far as getting support from hardware vendors, you can help. For example, I was installing the drivers for the Blink(1) device. I am always irritated when I do this, because they supply Linux udev rules, and I always have to remember how to convert them to FreeBSD devd rules. So I wrote them and sent them my converted devd rules, and they are going to add them to the doc.

 

[Beastie7]

As far as getting support from hardware vendors, you can help.

No, the general community can only do so much. I'd wager the Debian/Ubuntu community (which has a lot of corporate sponsorship for that specific market) is responsible for most of the porting of applications/drivers/firmware to Linux due to their least barrier to entry for development (ie. providing a solid desktop release). More so than Redhat IMHO. To be fair, I'm not saying FreeBSD should, in any way, be like Linux; but we could learn a lot from their approach to attracting more users and developers. Given they have first party ports, like Firefox, VSCode, etc.

if not, use macOS (and enjoy all it's BSD glory). but a lot of us already know that.

 

[menelkir]

use macOS (and enjoy all it's BSD glory)

You mean pilot a mouse and say they're using something that is a BSD, because 0,0001% of the knowledge of BSDs aren't applicable on macos tho.

 

[blackhole]

Majority of Android users have no idea it's based on the Linux kernel.

macOS/iOS origins in NeXTSTEP / BSD and the Mach kernel, is also most likely unknown to 99% of Apple users also. If that OS was based on Linux, or were to be rebased on it in the future, that same 99% still would not know/care.

 

[beetreetime]

FreeBSD is very wise to hold back from heading down the desktop rabbit hole.

In that scenario, there are always choices to be made with regards to default desktop environments, etc. Ultimately that will settle on providing a Windows / macOS style imitation and the others, along with the plethora of Window managers get sidelined or don't top the list - those that don't top the list, require more work from you - ultimately you're giving an easy ride to some gnome / KDE users, for very little return, then they fill up the forum with worthless threads, because they failed to learn the basics in the first place.

Catering to lazy and incompetent people, is going to attract lazy and incompetent people. It's not hard to work out.

If I compare now, with FreeBSD 8.x, things are vastly easier to get up and running than they were back then, but FreeBSD is an OS which requires some technical proficiency and reading of the documentation of the user in order to progress. They will either reap the rewards from that, or FreeBSD is most likely not for them - and they will move to one of the plethora of OS or Linux distributions that already provide what they want.

I saw some of your posts over at the other place (DF) and I don't have an account over there, so I couldn't speak.

You do have to ask what the point of it all is. If someone can't handle installing without graphical installers and desktop in a can stuff then it stands to reason they aren't going to like the rest of it either, because in order to actually get the benefit, you really do have to spend the time learning the inner workings and that means command line. There's no way around it.

If they aren't willing to do that, then there's no point, because like you said, there's a thousand better options for them.

Besides, there already were things like PC-BSD (which was exactly what they claimed to want) and those same people weren't interested and or refuse to use them.

 

[blackhole]

I'm of the opinion that the ready to go, free, desktop OS utopian ideal is somewhat of a false dilemma and such side projects really only continue to exist because they get some minor corporate funding, not because anyone really believes they can rival windows or mac.

The false dilemma is that desktops somehow have to get easier to use, installers have to be graphical, a person with next to no skills has to be able to use it, etc - none of which is true. Those may be objectives for marketing and selling a product. Ultimately Windows comes preinstalled, so you will never reach 99% of these target users anyway.

You create an OS which is "easy" to use and install, if you have a clear business strategy. If there is no such agenda, then essentially the developers are somewhat akin to philanthropists, making things as easy as possible for users who are unwilling or unable to learn even the basics - but to what end? Perhaps in the vain hope of eventually getting hired away by "Big Tech" or that "desktop Linux" is more than just a pipe dream.

Presumably there is no profit to be made, but the most feature rich and complete software and / or Linux desktop distributions, will likely attract more developers/donations and those developers will have more opportunities.