FreeBSD Foundation Flounders on 15 with Rust, pkgbase, and KDE

Barney said:
It’s really not. You can use OSX as a server. and you can use FreeBSD as a desktop. That doesn’t change what they really are.
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Says who? The difference between a server and a desktop? Come on, software-wise, it's completely negligible. In fact, in Microsoft, the difference is just a few registry edits to properly take advantage of available hardware. And an empire was built around that, with all the different editions and different prices for those editions. Apart from those registry edits, the decision to run specific software (or implement certain prohibitions) was completely arbitrary.

Just because FreeBSD is capable of running the AMP stack without that silliness, that says absolutely nothing about its ability to run Blender or KDE. Its equally capable of running both the server software and the software aimed at 'desktop users' like Blender and KDE. FreeBSD just doesn't give a rat's ass about what it's running. It can be tuned to run anything. Install it, and it will run. Install Apache, and it will run. Install KDE, and it will run. The real limiter is hardware, not some silly labels like 'server OS', 'desktop OS', etc. And yes, you can compile and run Apache on a Celeron, FreeBSD will not complain 😏
 
astyle said:
Says who? The difference between a server and a desktop? Come on, software-wise, it's completely negligible. In fact, in Microsoft, the difference is just a few registry edits
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You’re missing the point and I suspect you don’t have the capacity to debate it.
 
astyle said:
Yeah, the point that Microsoft's Marketing department already made like, 20 years ago.
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I probably don't have the capacity to debate the 'is it a server or a workstation argument' in this century as I missed the point that Barney was making. My own views on the subject changed when I started to use UnixWare 1.0 .

Back in the late 1980's I was very aware of the difference between what I thought was a server and what was a workstation when I spent many weekends compiling NetWare 286 kernels. This had to be done when replacing 8-bit NE1000 cards with new 16-bit NE2000 network adapters, or when switching from Thinnet to Token Ring. Many frustrating hours were spent trying to get kernel code from unpatched original floppies running with new drivers that were not sufficiently well behaved to run in ring zero. Patches were postal until CompuServe became a thing.

Back then the IBM/MS/3Com LAN Manager argument for preemptive multitasking was the divider between what made a high performance FILE SERVER and a PC that shared files. It didn't matter which side of the argument you were on, both believed they were the server group and the other was the PC.

I was firmly in the NetWare camp. That marketing decision referred to earlier was made by IBM about OS/2 38 or more years ago, Microsoft just inherited it. NetWare NFS, TLS, SNA, and SAA introduced me to interoperability with a variety of application servers and I came to realise that my belief system about servers was flawed. It was based on Novell's marketing legacy of making file server hardware with Motorola 68000 CPUs (NetWare68) and then expanding that marketing into becoming a 'Network Operating System' after porting it to X86.

Since UnixWare 1.0, my own viewpoint is that practically everything that uses preemptive multitasking is a server, right down to a SD card. If it has services it's just the vertical or horizontal scale to fit the service demand that counts. A server can be any size from a nano device or when distributed, perhaps the entire planet. I have built many single user account FreeBSD servers for my own use, including the one I am using now to write this using Firefox. Labelling it a server, a workstation or a PC is irrellevant, does it matter if it has one user or many? Is FreeBSD still a server operating system if it only has one user ?

My personal opinion is that the physical hardware differences between server class hardware, workstation hardware and PC hardware are recognisable in business computing, but less so in other arenas. Since dynamic kernel modules and ZFS became available, there is little to distinguish between a server and a workstation in operating systems that use them now. I don't often install a GUI on a FreeBSD 'server', but I do when it makes sense to do so.
 
Windows and MacOS X are black boxes where you don't care about what happens inside. You don't care about the mess because you can't see it. And forget about "it just works" because it doesn't.

But FreeBSD and Linux are open source and we can see the mess and make a fuss about it. But at least we can make them work to fit our needs.

In the end most of it is just a matter of optics and technical competence.
 
Yeah, the Z440 actually has the specs to function as a web server, database server, factory equipment controller, or for processing GIS data. When it was new, the specs were considered to be appropriate for those kinds of tasks. And I have actually seen physical Z440 boxes being used in all those capacities, and they all performed very well, on par with rackmount blade servers and VMs. It's just a matter of the software taking advantage of available hardware, and the technical competence in setting it up correctly. 😤

There's absolutely no reason for the Z440 to NOT be up to the task of being a dedicated Digital Audio Workstation.

Desktop / Server / Controller / DAW are completely arbitrary designations meant to make money off people who lack the necessary technical expertise.
 
tuaris said:
Oh, I just took a look at https://pkg.freebsd.org/FreeBSD:15:amd64/base_latest/ and I am instantly disappointed. I was a fan of the idea, but seeing how they decided to make one package for each item is a massive bummer. Why would you split it up this way?
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To have a minimal install for what you need and - more importantly - automatically install more of base exactly if and when it is needed (as dependency of other packages).

Personally I don't really need it. I am fine with a "minimal" base that includes all the commandline utilities, cron and a C compiler. It is useful for diagnostic, workarounds and the like. Compare to Common Lisp, where you always drag around a full Common Lisp compiler in the on-disk image. Wasteful? Maybe. But I want it. It is useful for diagnostic, workarounds and the like.

I don't want to run dumb images (OS or languages) that cut me off from diagnostic tools.
 
cracauer@ said:
To have a minimal install for what you need and - more importantly - automatically install more of base exactly if and when it is needed (as dependency of other packages).

Personally I don't really need it. I am fine with a "minimal" base that includes all the commandline utilities, cron and a C compiler. It is useful for diagnostic, workarounds and the like. Compare to Common Lisp, where you always drag around a full Common Lisp compiler in the on-disk image. Wasteful? Maybe. But I want it. It is useful for diagnostic, workarounds and the like.

I don't want to run dumb images (OS or languages) that cut me off from diagnostic tools.
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I understand that need and I find that option important. However, that's when someone would proceed to building custom packages in the same way its done for ports. If need to customize my FreeBSD installation I can use Poudriere to build a custom base package that has only what I want.
 
Also, about those who say, that FreeBSD should only be a server. Some people want multiple monitors with a different terminal on each screen for configuring their server. Multihead monitors require X and a window manager, no matter how basic. Multiple monitors are useful for using a reference material on one monitor, and configuring on the other, or for working on related configurations in different directories.

Also, some want a basic GUI/WM on the computer that hooks up to their server through ssh.

I've pointed out earlier that XigmasNAS, OPNsense & PFSense also use GUIs. A FreeBSD computer with a light desktop might be wanted to interface with those also. Uncertain if the GUI's on NAS and router/firewall BSD distributions are a basic specialized window manager on X.
 
sidetone said:
Some people want multiple monitors with a different terminal on each screen for configuring their server. Multihead monitors require X and a window manager, no matter how basic. Multiple monitors are useful for using a reference material on one monitor, and configuring on the other, or for working on related configurations in different directories.
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You can say my name. You don't have to be shy.
 
drhowarddrfine said:
You can say my name. You don't have to be shy.
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It wasn't about you. Wasn't thinking of your name. It was a category of users, also how OpenBSD and NetBSD now come with a window manager by default. I've moved on to using a full screen window manager, which shows the same output on both monitors, both terminals and graphical applications. when I want a larger desktop of two monitors for expanded output or multihead, I switch to a different light WM.

Maybe this is your way of advertising your computer preferences. However, if I ever wrote, that guy who strongly dislikes Reddit, that would be a reference to drhowarddrfine.
 
As in politics, parsing words matters.

When I say a MAC is not a server, it doesnt mean you can’t make it into a server. You can run apache and ftpd and say it’s a server It’s not primarily designed as a server. Apple doesn’t care if it can handle 2 million RPS, because that’s not what it is.

Yes, you can use FreeBSD as a workstation, but you’re foolish to do so. Because there are better, cheaper options that require less effort.

rbranco said:
I dislike Rust but I dislike some anti-Rust trolls even more that they may be pushing me to try the language, but I'm not my 20's and Rust is not a psychedelic.
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RUST never sleeps, or so they say.
 
Barney said:
Yes, you can use FreeBSD as a workstation, but you’re foolish to do so. Because there are better, cheaper options that require less effort.
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Cheaper? Meaning, they will actually pay me to use their system? FreeBSD is free of charge, y'know... 🤣

Less effort? How about trying to research a solution, only to discover that what you thought was the answer is actually obsolete and doesn't apply to your version?

Foolish? Come on, why exactly? FreeBSD gets the job done, y'know... even on cheap hardware, because FreeBSD doesn't have the silly limitations that Microsoft and Apple and other commercial tech giants try to arbitrarily impose... Not to mention FreeBSD supports most of the modern data standards?

Oh, and Barney , exactly what does MAC acronym stand for? Parsing words is important not just in politics, but also in purely technical troubleshooting... For an example that even you can understand, MAC can stand for Media Access Control, and every Ethernet card has at least one. Wifi cards also have MAC addresses. That doesn't make them servers per se, but they are an important part of the TCP/IP stack, on which server software relies. One kind of needs to understand why exactly it's even called a stack, where each component sits, what IS the role of each component - as well as what is NOT the role of the said component. If you don't know that, you can't do effective troubleshooting and problem solving.

Sometimes, you gotta turn the problem on its head, and look at it from a different angle, before you know what the solution even is. If you're not familiar with the TCP/IP stack, troubleshooting MAC problems is meaningless. And it follows that any debate about whether MAC can be a 'server' or not is also pretty meaningless.

Or maybe I just have no idea what Barney meant when he wrote this:
Barney said:
When I say a MAC is not a server, it doesnt mean you can’t make it into a server.
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😂

In which case, I'm actually quite curious about the details of what Barney actually meant.
 
Barney said:
you can use FreeBSD as a workstation, but you’re foolish to do so. Because there are better, cheaper options that require less effort.
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Thanks for calling me foolish twice, as I have both my main and test workstations running FreeBSD. One is an i7 that I paid around 400€ new a couple of years ago and the other is a 15 year old laptop that barely runs with Linux and Windows and just flies with FreeBSD.

Yeah, I have definitely cheaper options indeed, you clearly know what you're talking about...
 
Barney said:
As in politics, parsing words matters.

When I say a MAC is not a server, it doesnt mean you can’t make it into a server. You can run apache and ftpd and say it’s a server It’s not primarily designed as a server. Apple doesn’t care if it can handle 2 million RPS, because that’s not what it is.

Yes, you can use FreeBSD as a workstation, but you’re foolish to do so. Because there are better, cheaper options that require less effort.


RUST never sleeps, or so they say.
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I use freebsd as workstation and "local server".
As workstation "firefox".
 
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