If it had 5% market share, they wouldn't have dropped ARM and i386. Man pages and the handbook would be more recent. More forum questions would be solved sooner...
I wouldn't bet on this.
You see those 7.something% for Linux are shared by
all Linux distris.
If FreeBSD gets to 5% it would be one OS/'distri', only, having those 5%.
That means it would be very interesting to become some form of business.
And that means:
Goodbye foundation, hello management, CEOs etc.
Goodbye to almost any free spirit, creative, experimenting,... just focus on where the (most) money is.
If this would be servers, goodbye desktop, and embedded.
If this would be desktop, goodbye ... - you get the picture.
Will a business improve forums?
I think not.
The live source, and the power of this forum comes from its vital community of experts, and enthusiasts, pros, and hobbyists (an amateur means 'loves it'), greybeards, and newbs, young, and old.
Many know each other through this forum for many years, some even in real life e.g. from Cons.
People connecting people because they care, want to share their interest, their knowledge, their passion.
Spend (lots of) time to help, invite people, open the gates to FreeBSD, and discuss topics with others.
Imagine this will get into the hands of some business.
See what Wikipedia became.
The foundation hoards
billions of dollars, starting every year again in december their opera of the whining beggar, while the authors of the articles, the producers of what Wikipedia actually is, work for free.
It's a core flaw in human thinking:
More money does not makes you feel more secure.
In the contrary it makes you more insecure, because you may lose it. All you receive by lots of money is greed for get even more money.
A forum like that then will become some support outpost, only, mostly done by 'trained support drones', people do it as long as an underpaid job until they get something better. Who know exactly three answers:
"Read the FAQ!"
"Did you updated?"
"Please contact support." (the real one costs, of course)
Or some enthusiasts may stay, continue support for free.
While 'the company' advertices with their good support, and the CEO and CFO congratulate each other for having support without paying a penny for it.
Otherwise the forums is nothing more as for
statistically evaluate count customers fancy ideas. Tell the managment the most named three ones as top customer wishes.
And the management will tell the developers to leave the rest, focus on customer demands - in tight schedules, of course:
'we will see to eleminate flaws, and fix bugs later, when we will have some spare time.' (yeah, yeah, naturally. There is no such thing as 'spare time' in business. That's called 'too much staff')
Not listen to them, what they think is needed most, or does best.
...so get completely out of developer's hands.
What seems to be a neat idea has a crucial flaw:
Most customers are idiots.
They do not know what's best for them.
They don't think.
They dream. They wish. They hope. They believe. They want. They demand.
But they don't think.
For selling that is best.
Until you also need to sell your company; in time as long as you can find some moron you mock on paying money for a company drained below zero.
But to get the best:
Don't listen to the majority of customers.
Don't listen to salesguys.
Listen to experts.
And listen to yourself.
Stay loyal to your founding ideals!
Besides the fact the HB ain't that bad
a business will not improve that either.
Do show me a HB on an operating system
that is at least as good as the official FreeBSD one.
However I agree the HB could use some improvement.
A HB
always could need some improvemt - except it's for some steam engine development stopped on seventy years ago.
My idea on how to improve the HB would be
to make it as Wikipedia does it - open it up for more authors.
(A lot of potential ones can be found within this forums [not me, of course - too few expertise, too long articles
])
The core idea of Wikipedia is that anybody can write, and edit articles.
The question to be solved would be:
Who gets writing access?
Besides developers maybe automatically anyway e.g. established members of this forum was my idea.
And one need some moderators - of course also in Wikipedia every change needs to be verified first.
I know there already is a
FreeBSD Wiki
But besides I have the feeling it could use a bit more help, to get more articles, and some updated,
I like the idea for an open the Handbook with more authors to be considered for a moment.
Because I believe - I don't know, I believe - doing the HB right is like all documentation in software:
Underestimated,
as in the needed effort,
such as in its meaning, importance, and value for the project.
When I recall right
Cath O'Deray already is or was participated in that.
Maybe he can tell us if I'm wrong,
or this could be an idea to be considered more closely.
Click About this Wiki.
) without any needing to ping Apples Servers. Your MacFu is lacking.
