But there is a thing I l learn from this: it seems today folks just see there can be a desktop (or whatever) configured, and then they want to have that running on their machine rightaway, here and now - mostly disregarding all the many things that can be learned on the way - seeing these things (like text editor, network, etc.) rather as obstacles than as features.
That's a pretty normal attitude.
Actually it's unavoidable - if you wanted to know what you're doing about everything, you'd spend all of your life learning stuff instead of doing stuff. The question is more which of the things you want to learn and which of the things you merely want to use.
Particularly with the networking issues: I had the exact same problem as the OP, and I had to search for tips&tricks (and weed out the no-more-applicable ones) for several days just to find that /etc/rc.conf line that I had to change. It's a pretty steep entry barrier; I was able to deal with it because I learned the Internet with Trumpet Winsock, then Linux when dhcp was already in place, but as we have seen in this thread, it's still requiring things that a non-techie has no hope of overcoming without help.
I'd really like if the FreeBSD installer autodetected network cards and did the little zeroconf dances that all the other operating systems do for you.
I know that it's not really in line with the FreeBSD philosophy of "your system, your control", but then hardware autodetection already works, and networking is one of these all-important enablers these days.
Philosophically: If full control is impossible because you can't learn everything, give the user the choice what to learn and what to leave to the mechanisms. But do provide the mechanisms.
For me, this means no FreeBSD on the desktop for a while. At least not until I feel confident on the command line, which will take me a while. Because the desktop is something that I don't want to learn the details about, I want to just use it (as opposed to server operation where I want and need the control).
For my NAS, security is paramount because it's my last line of defense against ransomware and (at least some degree of) spear attacks. The data is going to be important enough to rule out Linux, so I'm willing to learn a new operating system (no matter which, it's always a major investment of time) and take control. But ordinarily, I wouldn't want to do that because my primary interests aren't in operating systems (not in existing ones anyway).
Well, enough rambling.
I was just trying to explain how my situation fits, and where I see the next hurdles for further FreeBSD adoption; feel free to ignore, as I'm not going to set the goals of the FreeBSD project, I'm just gratefully accepting what's there where it happens to fit my bill.
github.com
