Best FreeBSD "distro"?

pasteldepepino

pasteldepepino

I was searching for about other FreeBSD "distros" (and by distros I mean other versions like: NomadBSD, HelloSystem, MidnightBSD, GhostBSD, HardenedBSD, NextBSD and etc.), and i wanted to know which one is considered the "best" from these i descripted.
 
You have to learn a bit more and I'm not sure where to direct you. Most of those are desktop adaptations of FreeBSD. For someone expecting something like Windows or Mac GhostBSD would probably be the least troublesome. Is NextBSD still active?

If you grab FreeBSD, and follow the handbook install instructions, you'll have a working system very quickly. Then you'd have to add X. Out of the ones you've mentioned I think GhostBSD is the most active, but FreeBSD itself isn't that hard under normal circumstances. It's more or less like install ArchLinux then installing X and much of the other stuff afterwards. I'm not sure if this helps you. But the short answer is that if you absolutely don't want to to try with FreeBSD itself, GhostBSD is probably the best supported and most active.

I should add this is my opinion only, and based on a purely subjective impression, as I've tried VMs with Ghost and Nomad but never worked seriously with either.
 
I don't want to down any of your mentioned branches(?)/"distris" - I don't know any of those, so cannot even judge,
but I think the main reason why newcomers want to 'avoid' FreeBSD and try some "distro" (first) is FreeBSD does not come by default with a desktop environment.
Once you figured out, this is no big deal but an advantage, really, FreeBSD is worth a shot.
Because instead of having one preconfigured DE installed by default, which you may first deinstall again, before you can install your choice anyway, or even none at all, installing X.org (or Wayland) is simply done by three simple commands you can copy from the Handbook:
- install X.org
- make drm-kmod (the module ("driver") for the graphic card) in ports
- and (optional) install the DE/WM of your preference, when you're not satisfied with twm
It's pretty easy in deed. Need no computerskills at all (but I guess you have some. Otherwise it's unlikely you were here 😁.)
Reading the handbook is all it needs to accomplish that task. Maybe dig this forums a bit, if your graphics adapter is kind of exotic.
 
- GhostBSD is cool to copy configuration from, but disregard for security was a deal-breaker for me. https://github.com/ghostbsd/issues/issues/150
- HardenedBSD is a cool testing ground of security features but it's so extreme that it may break apps. Not a distro.
- MidnightBSD uses FreeBSD 13 as base. I think it can be called a distro.
- NextBSD is dead.
- NomadBSD is not a distro. It's a cool way to have a customized FreeBSD on a pendrive.
 
I use NomadBSD in my computer instead of FreeBSD it self because I just can't configure Xwindows on it. i tried following every tutorial I could find on the internet but it just wouldn't work on my computer (a 2014 mac mini), so I decided to use NomadBSD, and I wanted to know if there's any better option. but thanks for the help!
 
FreeBSD is a general purpose OS, many derivatives like GhostBSD are a "one man vision" project, if you feel comfortable with their vision you're fine, if you want to use any OS the way you want I recommend to use the base, in this case regularFreeBSD.

Now the FreeBSD hardware compatibility is not as huge as on Linux, however if NomadBSD runs on your MacMini it must run FreeBSD as well, please have you already checked this out?

 
pasteldepepino said:
I was searching for about other FreeBSD "distros" (and by distros I mean other versions like: NomadBSD, HelloSystem, MidnightBSD, GhostBSD, HardenedBSD, NextBSD and etc.), and i wanted to know which one is considered the "best" from these i descripted.
Click to expand...
The best advice I can give you is not to treat (Free)BSD as if it were Linux. There are no "distros". Sure, there are variants but ... it's still very different.

At the risk of being somewhat of a puritan right now my take on this is that there are basically only 3 "main" BSD editions:
  • FreeBSD (this is where we're at right now).
  • OpenBSD => a BSD "variant" if you will which is fully geared towards high-end security. I quote: "Only two remote holes in the default install, in a heck of a long time!". Here's the thing... OpenBSD doesn't necessarily rely on FreeBSD, there's even an OpenBSD foundation.
  • NetBSD => Another BSD "variant", but this time I can't really comment on it because my experience with NetBSD is very limited. My take is that it thrives to provide a lot more and wider spread hardware support ("Of course it runs NetBSD!"). Nevertheless this is yet another BSD 'variant' which doesn't necessarily rely on others, and once again there's also a backing NetBSD foundation.
But anything beyond this... isn't necessarily a BSD 'variant' but rather a spin-off project that utilizes an existing one to build upon. They don't provide a whole new OS but an existing one with their own customizatons applied to it.

Each to their own (and I'm not necessarily criticizing!) but that doesn't even come close to the idea of Linux distro's.

Keep in mind: Linux is essentially a kernel where the userland had to be build around it. BSD is and has always been a full blown operating system right from the getgo.

As for being best... your mileage may vary. If you want security then ... OpenBSD might be a good choice, but so will FreeBSD. OpenBSD will gladly sacrifice user friendlyness ("usability"?) in favor of hardening. Obviously there can be situations where this simply won't do.

Just my 2 cents on this of course.
 
ShelLuser said:
The best advice I can give you is not to treat (Free)BSD as if it were Linux. There are no "distros". Sure, there are variants but ... it's still very different.

At the risk of being somewhat of a puritan right now my take on this is that there are basically only 3 "main" BSD editions:
  • FreeBSD (this is where we're at right now).
  • OpenBSD => a BSD "variant" if you will which is fully geared towards high-end security. I quote: "Only two remote holes in the default install, in a heck of a long time!". Here's the thing... OpenBSD doesn't necessarily rely on FreeBSD, there's even an OpenBSD foundation.
  • NetBSD => Another BSD "variant", but this time I can't really comment on it because my experience with NetBSD is very limited. My take is that it thrives to provide a lot more and wider spread hardware support ("Of course it runs NetBSD!"). Nevertheless this is yet another BSD 'variant' which doesn't necessarily rely on others, and once again there's also a backing NetBSD foundation.
But anything beyond this... isn't necessarily a BSD 'variant' but rather a spin-off project that utilizes an existing one to build upon. They don't provide a whole new OS but an existing one with their own customizatons applied to it.

Each to their own (and I'm not necessarily criticizing!) but that doesn't even come close to the idea of Linux distro's.

Keep in mind: Linux is essentially a kernel where the userland had to be build around it. BSD is and has always been a full blown operating system right from the getgo.

As for being best... your mileage may vary. If you want security then ... OpenBSD might be a good choice, but so will FreeBSD. OpenBSD will gladly sacrifice user friendlyness ("usability"?) in favor of hardening. Obviously there can be situations where this simply won't do.

Just my 2 cents on this of course.
Click to expand...
Yes, I understand the differences beetwen linux distros and these "FreeBSD spinoffs". But on my view they are just FreeBSD variants that make things easier if you want a pre-installed and configured GUI, or more security features (like on hardenedBSD). But anyways, thanks for the help!

P.S.
And also i'm not wrong in calling the freeBSD "spin-offs" distros, Beacause as you can see on the bottom of this page: freebsd.org/where
, it says:

"FreeBSD-derived Operating System Distributions​

FreeBSD is widely used as a building block for other commercial and open-source operating systems. The projects below are of particular interest.

  • TrueNAS is network attached storage (NAS) software that shares and protects data from modern-day threats like ransomware and malware. TrueNAS makes it easy for users and client devices to access shared data through virtually any sharing protocol.
  • GhostBSD is derived from FreeBSD, and uses the GTK environment to provide a beautiful look and a comfortable experience on a modern BSD platform offering a natural and native UNIX®-like work environment.
  • MidnightBSD was forked from FreeBSD 6.1 beta, and continues to use parts of more recent FreeBSD code bases. Developed with desktop users in mind, MidnightBSD includes everything that you would expect for your daily tasks: mail, web browsing, word processing, gaming, and much more.
  • NomadBSD is a persistent live system for USB flash drives, based on FreeBSD. Together with automatic hardware detection and setup, it is configured to be used as a desktop system that works out of the box, but can also be used for data recovery, for educational purposes, or to test FreeBSD hardware compatibility.
  • pfSense is a FreeBSD-based customized distribution tailored for use as a firewall and router."
"Distributions".
 
I'd say, just try a couple of those derivatives (if they're not 'dead' projects), see which one you like. You're going to find some pros and cons for each, but it'll give you a good idea of what's possible. Then you're going to find out how insanely customizable FreeBSD and the ports system really is. You'll be experimenting a lot, learn a lot in the mean time, and figure out how to mold everything to your liking.
 
forums.freebsd.org

share bsd experience

forums.freebsd.org forums.freebsd.org

There's a few described compared to FreeBSD such as HardenedBSD, GhostBSD and DragonflyBSD. Other BSD's are described and compared to FreeBSD, but those aren't FreeBSD derivatives, such as NetBSD and OpenBSD.
 
pasteldepepino said:
And also i'm not wrong in calling the freeBSD "spin-offs" distros
Click to expand...
Possibly not wrong with these ones but remember that the D in BSD stands for Distribution. And "distro" is shorthand for Distribution so ultimately you have the awkward phrase Berkely Software Distribution Distribution which feels wholly redundant ;)
 
I was curious about DragonflyBSD having support for AMD RDNA2 or something early-on, but didn't get around to installing it.

OpenBSD sounded more server-oriented. GhostBSD says their FreeBSD (and implied a desktop set-up of FreeBSD was possible), so I figured I'd go with FreeBSD :p
 
25 years ago, I was laughing about installing NetBSD on a toaster. Right now, there are smart toasters available on Amazon, on which it's not impossible to replace Android with NetBSD.

I actually tried DesktopBSD a few years ago, but the documentation kept referring to the FreeBSD docs anyway. So I figured, why bother with a spinoff when I can install the source, and have options actually open to me?
 
pasteldepepino said:
I use NomadBSD in my computer instead of FreeBSD it self because I just can't configure Xwindows on it. i tried following every tutorial I could find on the internet but it just wouldn't work on my computer (a 2014 mac mini), so I decided to use NomadBSD, and I wanted to know if there's any better option. but thanks for the help!
Click to expand...

Check out the FreeBSD Wiki page I maintain for Intel Mac minis: https://wiki.freebsd.org/IntelMacMini

Unfortunately the only Mac mini I don't actually own is the 2014 model, but you may find the note on the Mid-2011 (5,2 model) to use the scfb video driver helpful.
 
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