FreeBSD as the only operating system for you

[shkhln]

(job wasn't exactly related to development). Then I got a full-time employment related to development in another OS (illumos)

That's quite a jump. Were there any intermediate steps?

 

[yuripv79]

That's quite a jump. Were there any intermediate steps?

Well, I didn't do any development at work, so I had a lot of free time to do it as a hobby

 

[shkhln]

Is FreeBSD the only operating system you use?

FreeBSD on a personal desktop/laptop, but other than that not really.

 

[shkhln]

Well, I didn't do any development at work, so I had a lot of free time to do it as a hobby

I'd be interested to learn a bit more about that. Would you mind if we take the conversation to PMs? (Or some other communication platform.)

 

[Sevendogsbsd]

Not my only OS. I have a bare metal Windows 11 gaming box that is strictly for gaming. I gave up on wine and most of what I play won't run on wine anyway, or it's easier to run native; that's the real reason because I got tired of having to make things work and wanted them to "just work". Also have a house full of Macs that do everything. My workhorse Mac is running VirtualBox and Debian VM and FreeBSD VMs in my "hack lab". Reminds me I need to set up my old firewall to create an isolated environment but who has the time...

 

[dnb]

Not really "forced", I choose to do the job. But yes. I'm going to say, it's 99% of the professional work I do nowadays.

No. As much as I would like to, it would honestly kill my income. No income, no nice place to live. No money to buy cool stuff to run FreeBSD on.

Very interesting, thanks for the honest answer! But what exactly is the reason for using a different operating system? I'll just point out a few cases, and you can write "this" if any case is yours:

1) You develop complex programs that run on a specific OS (for example, a specific Linux distribution with a specific version and software environment). And therefore, it is much easier to develop on this distribution right from the start in order to avoid errors, confusion and inconvenience when porting code from FreeBSD to this target Linux distribution.

2) What's more, you're tied to certain hardware, which, even if it can run under FreeBSD, isn't needed by the consumer.

So, for example, some user can connect remotely from FreeBSD to a GPU server running Ubuntu. But he could just put Ubuntu on his workstation and turn it into a GPU server. This way he would have avoided duplication and having to use two machines instead of one.

But I don't think jumping between systems is the right thing to do, because I'm sure the day will come very quickly on Ubuntu when I'll catch gross bugs. To tell you the truth, I was catching some bugs in the first 7 minutes of using Ubuntu livecd without even putting the system on disk, and one of the problems was a problem when importing zpool.

 

[SirDice]

But what exactly is the reason for using a different operating system?

I'm a contractor. I work for a company that specializes in "UNIX" engineers. I get send to different companies, to do projects or temporarily fill an employment gap. I get to go to all sorts of different companies, small, large and everything in between. I've done quite a bit of Sun Solaris but most companies nowadays have all mostly switched to Linux. Besides the typical Microsoft Windows office type environment (workstations, file/print servers, active directory, outlook/exchange, etc) of course. It's rarely a 100% Linux environment, it's often a 4 to 1 ratio (for every 4 MS Windows servers, there's 1 Linux server). I'm currently contracted to run and maintain around 800+ Linux servers. I've set up and wrote about 90% of the puppet code that keeps everything in check.

1) You develop complex programs that run on a specific OS (for example, a specific Linux distribution with a specific version and software environment). And therefore, it is much easier to develop on this distribution right from the start in order to avoid errors, confusion and inconvenience when porting code from FreeBSD to this target Linux distribution.

It's difficult to describe what I do, but systems engineer probably covers it best. I build systems or entire farms of servers to do whatever the client wants it to do. Back in the early days I spend a lot of time in a datacenter installing stuff. Things moved progressively towards "devops", or infrastructure-as-code, so I rarely actually physically touch a server now.

2) What's more, you're tied to certain hardware, which, even if it can run under FreeBSD, isn't needed by the consumer.

I use whatever that client provides. Most of it is virtual nowadays anyway.

 

[Sevendogsbsd]

I'm a contractor. I work for a company that specializes in "UNIX" engineers. I get send to different companies, to do projects or temporarily fill an employment gap. I get to go to all sorts of different companies, small, large and everything in between. I've done quite a bit of Sun Solaris but most companies nowadays have all mostly switched to Linux. Besides the typical Microsoft Windows office type environment (workstations, file/print servers, active directory, outlook/exchange, etc) of course. It's rarely a 100% Linux environment, it's often a 4 to 1 ratio (for every 4 MS Windows servers, there's 1 Linux server).

This roughly how my last contract job was: the support infrastructure was 100% Windows servers and workstations (AD, print, developers, admins, etc) and the product/solution that ran the customer's application was initially 100% HP-UX then moved to RedHat Linux 100%. We had around 300 servers our admins managed. Cost was far better with RedHat and I "think" performance was also but can't remember. I also remember we used to have an HP superdome (?).

 

[SirDice]

the product/solution that ran the customer's application was initially 100% HP-UX then moved to RedHat Linux 100%.

Yeah, that's pretty much what you see everywhere, HP-UX, AIX, Solaris, etc. all getting replaced by Linux. And they usually pick RedHat, or at the very least settle on one specific distribution. Having to maintain dozens of different distributions is a nightmare.

 

[Sevendogsbsd]

Yeah, that's pretty much what you see everywhere, HP-UX, AIX, Solaris, etc. all getting replaced by Linux. And they usually pick RedHat, or at the very least settle on one specific distribution. Having to maintain dozens of different distributions is a nightmare.

In that customer's case, it was a government agency and they were more comfortable having paid support. Of course we could have had a free solution but at that time, open source was only just starting to make inroads to the government and some agencies still thought it was "evil", wrongly so of course.

 

[Jose]

In that customer's case, it was a government agency and they were more comfortable having paid support. Of course we could have had a free solution but at that time, open source was only just starting to make inroads to the government and some agencies still thought it was "evil", wrongly so of course.

This was still happening as late as 2019 in government. I can't tell you how infuriating it is to not be able to install free software on a free operating system because it would violate your license. I guess they do it to enforce supported configurations, but it's still obnoxious.

 

[Sevendogsbsd]

The "rationale" at that time of some agencies was that "if you could see the code, it's not secure", which is of course a ridiculous assumption. Also, the concept of "free" was confused with the distribution model of "freeware", which is also obviously not the case with open source applications. Government agencies are slow to change though, and are also filled with non-technical people making technical policy...

 

[astyle]

Is FreeBSD the only operating system you use? Tell me, what system do you use in dual boot with FreeBSD and why? Are you forced to use Linux distributions to make money? Could you be uncompromising and abandon systems other than FreeBSD?

Have you thought about refusing to use some feature if it's not supported by FreeBSD? For me, for example, such a [Feature] is CUDA/ROCM computing. I am faced with a choice: use Ubuntu, or refuse to compute using these libraries. But this is just an example in my case). I can easily set up Ubuntu (or Gentoo, for example) in an advanced style with a ZFS pull and other goodies, but these distributions don't seem quite as perfect as FreeBSD to me.

FreeBSD is not the only system I use...

I don't dual-boot, it's too much work to wait for the computer to reboot into the system I wanna use. It's easier to have a couple boxes side by side, or to virtualize (if your box has enough metal for that).

At work, I use whatever the employer provides. If it's Windows, that's what I use. If it's Linux, that's what I use. I get good at it, and figure it out, and become the go-to guy who can actually troubleshoot the issue. The important part is to know employer's priorities, and use your skills in a way that aligns with those priorities, that's why your skills were purchased in the first place.

If a feature is not supported by FreeBSD, the thing to do is to figure out if there are alternatives, like: Using Linux/Mac/Windoze, developing a FreeBSD-based solution yourself, give up on the feature altogether, or see if overall goals of the feature can be accomplished by different means. Just pick the right tool for the job, get paid, go home, and then play with your personal FreeBSD-based computer to your heart's content.

On my personal systems, I prefer FreeBSD, and I do follow ROCm computing. It's a bit of a back burner project for me, to get ROCm computing going on FreeBSD, but that's my personal systems, and my personal time. At work, I do what I'm paid to do. There's kind of a reason they pay me for my skill...

 

[Moxgod]

Hi dnb!
A fun topic but as SirDice said and hopefully all professionals would agree it's always going to come down to the task, a common trend among work and hobbies.
But as far as extracting secrets from obsessive testers like my self here is my current task to OS list.

-Oracle Linux 9.1 Best google search results I have ever had... Also it seems to compile source code faster than anything I have seen. Another special note is how it lets you turn off all securtity policies before it installs.

-Windows 11 hard to break and has a large market so likely has a few tools you just wont get to work anywhere else.

-Clear Linux unsuprisingly support NVIDIA card well... arguably the best video and native linux gaming experience I have had so far. Infact ubuntu just had a release and it still isnt quite as good. Pop os make big claims but I feel that the only thing it has going for it is good out of the box gnome desktop settings.

-FreeBSD's audio lords over all period. It was worth the fight getting gnome to work on 12.4 because it's as if god repayed my hard work with audio quality that has polarized me from all other operating systems.

 

[ralphbsz]

Is FreeBSD the only operating system you use?

At home: The two servers (home and cloud-based) are FreeBSD. My laptop/desktops are all Macs. Other family members have a mix of Mac and Windows, depending on their requirements and use cases. For Raspberry Pis that are doing data acquisition and control, I use Linux (Raspbian -> Debian).

At work: All servers are Linux. My laptop is a Mac.

 

[IThoughtTooLongForThis]

I'm only using FreeBSD and Windows 10.
I have Windows 10 on my gaming computer while my laptop and amateur radio computer are both running FreeBSD 13.2.
My VPS is also running FreeBSD 13.2.

I suppose you could include DOS as well as I'm running FreeDOS 1.2 on my old IBM 486 machine for retro games and dial up BBS fun.

 

[meine]

Is FreeBSD the only operating system you use?

For my private box and netbook, FreeBSD is the only OS I use. I skipped dual boot with Windows something and Fedora 10 back in 2009. 'Do or Do Not, there is no Try'

I don't earn my money with FreeBSD. For that I have to use my company's W10 laptop. Although FreeBSD has the Citrix remote access and stuff, server side my FBSD box isn't recognized as a computer device [see attachment].

The good side: when i shut down the wadnows boss box, my work is done

 

[yuripv79]

I'd be interested to learn a bit more about that. Would you mind if we take the conversation to PMs? (Or some other communication platform.)

There really isn't much to it other than what I already said.

 

[drewlander]

I dual boot FreeBSD and Fedora. Until I can easily passthrough usb wifi devices with Bhyve, AND FreeBSD supports my dGPU setup so I can use all of my monitors (intel video plus dedicated AMD), I will keep dual booting. I have not spend much time getting either item to work, and time is something I have very little of

 

[BaronBS]

For now I only have a T430 with FreeBSD as the main OS and a OpenBSD in another ssd for dw stuffs. Back in my native country I use to collect Thinkpads ( I had 5 back then). T430 and X230 with FreeBSD, X201 and T40 with OpenBSD and a X220 with Slackware. I miss them so much T.T

 

[hruodr]

FreeBSD on desktop, OpenBSD on nettop, Debian on VMware VirtualServer (Provider do not configure it for BSD).

 

[graemeg]

FreeBSD at home for the past 15 years - using it for programming/contracting work, gaming and making YouTube content. At worked I'm forced to use MacOS.

 

[meine]

I'm glad to be only responsible for my FreeBSD box. Yesterday's upgrade to 13.2 just worked and was only triggered by me. No prior unanticipated drop in performance 'because an update was waiting' [/rant]
This morning however, the redmondisized boss box barfed again -- 'hard error'

Very Hard

 

[astyle]

I'm glad to be only responsible for my FreeBSD box. Yesterday's upgrade to 13.2 just worked and was only triggered by me. No prior unanticipated drop in performance 'because an update was waiting' [/rant]
This morning however, the redmondisized boss box barfed again -- 'hard error'

Very Hard

View attachment 16223

My response would be to re-launch Outlook, reboot the machine, or use a different machine. Not like the boss cannot provide a different, brand-new machine at the drop of a hat.

 

[free-and-bsd]

FreeBSD as my main desktop OS (home, previously at work as well) ever since release 9.
Then also Win 10 (bhyved) -- for some Windows-only stuff (must reconsider one of these days!!).
OpenBSD: bhyved, acting as a router -- because of PF and other stuff they offer. No passthru on that machine, but I've still managed to pass the main traffic through that VM. Just installing it was much fun... learned a number of things along the way )). I guess it's my equivalent of gaming LOL.

No dual boot for these ~5 years now.