[HN Gopher] Let's Help NetBSD Cross the Finish Line Before 2025 ...
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Let's Help NetBSD Cross the Finish Line Before 2025 Ends
Author : jaypatelani
Score : 373 points
Date : 2025-10-26 12:34 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (mail-index.netbsd.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (mail-index.netbsd.org)
| fallen_comrade wrote:
| https://netbsd.org/donations/
| kosolam wrote:
| It's so annoying that none of the corps using it aren't putting a
| cent in and they ask individual developers to donate. Meh
| sgt wrote:
| I'd hope at least some of the NetBSD developers are paid to
| work on the OS as part of their day jobs.
| pjmlp wrote:
| That is the wonder of BSD like licenses for big corps.
|
| If Linux never happened, we would still be using big iron
| UNIXes, each taking whatever they felt like from BSD variants.
|
| Notice how all the new FOSS operating systems for IoT devices
| none of them use GPL, NutXX, FreeRTOS, Zephyr, Arduino libs,
| IDF,...
| layer8 wrote:
| OTOH, if Linux never happened, much more work would be put
| into *BSD.
| ghaff wrote:
| Absent something like OpenSolaris really taking off, the
| popular opinion in my circles is that *BSD would have
| (which is at least related to the same thing). Unless you
| believe Windows would have "won" which is certainly the
| side-bet a lot of companies were making at the time.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Not really, as anyone that was already using UNIX at the
| time is aware of, and the whole UNIX V6 vs BSD integrations
| as baseline for Aix, Solaris, Irix, HP-UX,....
| spauldo wrote:
| No, we wouldn't. Linux climbed its way up to overtake
| proprietary UNIX despite being less capable, which it very
| much was at the time.
|
| Linux came around at the right time when the Internet was
| going public and regular people had access to hardware that
| could run a decent UNIX. People latched onto it because it
| was free and an interesting project. The free BSDs were just
| late enough to the party that they missed out on the
| momentum.
|
| All the proprietary UNIX vendors (other than SCO) relied on
| expensive proprietary hardware sales. Intel ate their lunch
| while they were too busy stabbing each other in the back to
| notice. Linux killed SCO because SCO was, quite frankly,
| overpriced crap.
|
| None of this had anything to do with the license, other that
| the fact you could use it for free. It was all about hardware
| availability, the rise of the Internet, the wave of new IT
| people who had experienced Linux at home, and the fact that
| Linux on Intel was good enough to replace those pricy
| proprietary machines.
|
| Now, you wanna talk Apple, there's where your code "theft"
| kicks in. But that's a whole different thing.
| pjmlp wrote:
| I was there, hence why it it easy to get quotes like these,
|
| > 1998: Many major companies such as IBM, Compaq and Oracle
| announce their support for Linux.
|
| From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Linux
|
| Without big money from UNIX vendors like those, cutting
| down their R&D costs, Linux would not have climbed
| anything.
|
| GPL was the reason why they collaborated instead of being
| able to assimilate the code as they were doing with BSD,
| like anything sockets related.
|
| Ironically IBM has recouped its investment, now as Red-Hat
| owners.
|
| That is where everything on GNU/Linux that is mainly done
| by Red-Hat like GNOME, Gtk, GCC, Java is being paid for.
| unleaded wrote:
| I wonder if there'll be some big cultural shift in open source
| as people get more annoyed at cases of big companies taking
| their code and giving nothing back/demanding them to work for
| free. Might already be happening just slowly
| aleph_minus_one wrote:
| The people at the big companies who share the cause are not
| the ones who have anything important to decide there.
| forgetfulness wrote:
| AGPL and non-compete licenses like SSPL and FSL have been
| steadily adopted --Redis, ElasticSearch and Liquibase notably
| switched to them--, pretty much motivated by not wanting to
| be screwed over by Big Tech one way or another.
|
| More than fine if you ask me, giving away your work for
| megacorps and oligarchs to steamroll your business or
| otherwise society at large isn't much of a public service in
| the end
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| Yeah I have been thinking more and more about source
| available. I am not sure about AGPL as I feel like, some
| companies might still use it. honestly, it depends but all
| the companies which use non compete license somehow diverts
| back to AGPL if they were open source before
|
| So if some company/product was open source and then used
| source available license, the backlash would be so much
| that they go to something like AGPl most of the time
|
| but that happens because people feel betrayed because some
| might have contributed thinking its foss forever so its a
| rug pull
|
| I think a good idea could be to have a source available
| license from the start so that everybody who ever
| contributes knows this as a fact.
|
| What are your thoughts? What should I or anyone else pick?
| As a "foss" advocate, I would prefer AGPL but I don't want
| to get screwed by Big Tech ever with all the loopholes that
| they can have (like AWS), Honestly I don't know which is
| why I am asking really.
| aleph_minus_one wrote:
| > What should I or anyone else pick?
|
| My personal (non-mainstream) thought on this topic is:
| work on open source projects that serve a purpose that is
| very antithetical to the interests of bigtech companies.
| This way, such companies will be a lot less interested in
| "using" your project (without contributing back).
| ghaff wrote:
| If you don't work for that big company, you're more than
| welcome to ignore any "demands" to work for free. And a lot
| of people in open source are indeed paid to work on it.
| robinsonb5 wrote:
| Maybe, but it seems to me that there's been a cultural shift
| _away_ from GPL in recent years.
| aleph_minus_one wrote:
| Which shows that the propaganda by bigtech companies over
| many, many years _did_ work. :-(
| rpcope1 wrote:
| Honestly I feel like I've been seeing a lot more AGPLv3 for
| that very reason, and I'm 100% in support of it.
| fidotron wrote:
| Are there any major corporations using NetBSD today?
|
| I know in the past things like the network stack had been
| repurposed to other mainstream products.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Well NASA currently using pkgsrc of NetBSD for their NAS
|
| https://www.nas.nasa.gov/hecc/support/kb/using-software-
| pack...
| alecco wrote:
| From Big Tech to startups, most corporations waste billions in
| ridiculous and frivolous projects and yet insignificant money
| is sent back to the projects they owe their very existence.
|
| But don't you dare switch to a proprietary license or _you_
| will be dragged across social media as an evil selfish person.
| Even if it 's only postponing source releases for a couple of
| years.
| spauldo wrote:
| I doubt NetBSD gets much use by "big corps." It's used by
| hobbyists, researchers, and universities.
| jmclnx wrote:
| Such an underfunded project. Even with such low resources they
| can get a lot done.
| motorest wrote:
| It surprised me that a project such as NetBSD only managed to
| raise ~$10k throughout the year. What's going on with the
| project?
| jmclnx wrote:
| The last few years or so, its activity seemed to have
| increased quite a bit, or maybe they are getting more press
| then they have had in many years :)
|
| FWIW, this is the first time I have ever seen any mention of
| donations on any major tech WEB site.
| bfkwlfkjf wrote:
| OT what's with the email addresses with percent signs in them?
| layer8 wrote:
| See
| http://www.faqs.org/docs/linux_network/x-087-2-mail.address....
| (next to last paragraph)
| berikv wrote:
| "Then there is the % address operator: user %domainB@domainA
| is first sent to domainA, which expands the rightmost (in
| this case, the only) percent sign to an @ sign. The address
| is now user@domainB, and the mailer happily forwards your
| message to domainB, which delivers it to user. This type of
| address is sometimes referred to as "Ye Olde ARPAnet Kludge,"
| and its use is discouraged"
| MontyCarloHall wrote:
| >Ye Olde ARPAnet Kludge
|
| Seems fitting that NetBSD's internal mailing lists still
| use ossified address syntax from a time before DNS.
| andai wrote:
| I would guess it's an anti-spam measure. Although if I'm
| reading sibling comment right, it is actually a valid email
| address? (Assuming you have a mail server running on
| localhost.)
| layer8 wrote:
| It's rather the opposite: Spammers used to exploit that
| mechanism back when it was more widely enabled.
| wcchandler wrote:
| Do they offer a swag store like OpenBSD or FreeBSD? I realize
| they only get pennies from those sales but that's typically my
| approach, buy a shirt for $30 and make an extra $20 donation.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Yes they do. Here is link https://www.freewear.org/NetBSD
| mythz wrote:
| It's really in the best interest of everyone using it to chip in
| and keep the project relevant. Unfortunately the amount of
| donations is going to be contingent on the size of its user base
| which will need to grow to ensure its longevity.
| dijit wrote:
| eh, I don't use it, I chucked $150 their way.
|
| Having NetBSD around is a net win, and the cost of doing
| business for them is extremely low for the product they
| provide.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot:)
| irusensei wrote:
| This year I've seen some retro tech YouTube videos about people
| putting modern NetBSD in their expensive PDPs and Vax machines.
| Dave Plumber comes to mind.
| sammy2255 wrote:
| What is NetBSD?
| munchlax wrote:
| It's the amount of BSD you have from gross BSD after paying all
| the technical debts.
| bombcar wrote:
| EBITDABSD.
| rkomorn wrote:
| But then what does that make FreeBSD?
| torstenvl wrote:
| It's a BSD variant dedicated to running on a wide variety of
| hardware.
|
| One of the running jokes is that you can "run it on a toaster"
| -- see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45712368
| bombcar wrote:
| If it can run DooM it can run NetBSD.
| justin66 wrote:
| Not really. Doom just requires a 32 bit CPU (maybe someone
| even kluged it together on a 16 bit platform?) but NetBSD
| requires a CPU with an MMU.
| spauldo wrote:
| NetBSD is the slim, small, traditional BSD that has an emphasis
| on clean code and portability. It's great for small jobs and
| it'll run on that old SPARC that's collecting dust in the
| closet. It's simpler than FreeBSD (the industrial strength BSD)
| and doesn't have the hyper focus on security that OpenBSD does.
| jorgemendes wrote:
| Donated. I hope NetBSD becomes a stronger option for my old PCs.
| So many good old machines that could benefit from it.
| jmclnx wrote:
| Same here. But one other thing to add for new responses about
| "Why NetBSD", the rump kernel.
|
| Years ago I had to get a very old document off of a DOS
| diskette. So I tried:
|
| * On Linux: accessing the diskette would cause a panic or a
| reboot or massive read failures.
|
| * FreeBSD: panics all the time
|
| * NetBSD: panics. But then I remembered it had rump. So I said,
| why not try that. Started up rump, got a few code dumps, but
| after a some tries I got a bit over 90% of the document off of
| the diskette. The main system had no issues with the rump
| kernel crashing.
|
| So that alone is worth the "price of admission" :)
| atomic_princess wrote:
| FYI rump is essentially unmaintained since its author left
| NetBSD years ago
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Wow this is cool. I always get fascinated by how people have
| used NetBSD.
| nolist_policy wrote:
| Linux can do that with User Mode Linux.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot for donations:)
| mlyle wrote:
| Thank -you- for all you do! Donated.
|
| NetBSD has been a labor of love for a long, long time.
|
| In the mid-90's I was a teenager with a 486-25 on a desk in a
| closet running NetBSD 0.9-1.0, connected to 10base2 going to
| my dad's office where there was a computer that dual booted
| to Linux. I learned so much from those systems; systems
| programming, how to _really_ use the C programming language,
| sysadmin skills, reading network traces. A whole part of who
| I am today derives from those early experiences trying to
| figure out what the _$#_ # was going on while tracking
| -CURRENT.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot :)
|
| Here something you might like : CS631 -- Advanced
| Programming in the UNIX Environment - NetBSD
| https://stevens.netmeister.org/631/netbsd.html
| mlyle wrote:
| :D I've actually seen it.
|
| I'm retired from tech and a high school teacher these
| days and allowed to teach wack/out of level things.
|
| I would _love_ to teach operating systems with NetBSD,
| but between the space hardware stuff I do and the Verilog
| /digital logic/microprocessor architecture class I teach,
| I soak up all the interested students' elective slots.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Nice.. :)
| nobodyandproud wrote:
| For as long as I can remember, there was NetBSD and FreeBSD
| (OpenBSD and DragonFly came later).
|
| I suppose after 30+ years, any chance of consolidation is
| hopeless and undesirable?
| E39M5S62 wrote:
| Code aside, the goals for each project are vastly different.
| There's nothing to be gained by consolidation.
| nobodyandproud wrote:
| Every Linux distro has different goals. But a unified kernel
| (more or less).
|
| For hardware, can a single device driver be made for all
| variants of BSD? If so, then I agree.
| cperciva wrote:
| There's a lot of shared code.
| spauldo wrote:
| You aren't going to see OpenBSD share a kernel with anyone
| - it's too different and makes trade-offs the others won't
| accept. And NetBSD doesn't need the heavyweight kernel
| FreeBSD uses.
|
| From what I've seen, the BSD community swaps code around on
| a regular basis. But they pick and choose what code to use
| based on their own goals. It seems to work pretty well.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| What are the goals/specialization/actual use of each?
|
| FreeBSD: I always got the impression this was trying to be
| full modern UNIX but non-linux
|
| NetBSD: I guess this is for older/less powerful computers
| based on comments here?
|
| OpenBSD: ???Security???
|
| Dragonfly: a schism over threading, but FreeBSD?
| tonyhart7 wrote:
| what is different than OpenBSD or just BSD???
| dijit wrote:
| "BSD" doesn't really exist as far as I'm aware. It _was_ a
| proprietary operating system made at Berkeley for studying OS
| design.
|
| OpenBSD/FreeBSD/NetBSD are open source continuations of the
| source-available 4.4-BSDlite code (removing AT&T proprietary
| extensions iirc).
|
| OpenBSD follows BSD principles but focuses on code clarity and
| security.
|
| FreeBSD tries to be very flexible, putting user-experience over
| security. (it has to be noted that OpenBSD is very usable, but
| lacks a lot of nice features like ZFS and DTrace that FreeBSD
| supports).
|
| NetBSD is all about being incredibly lean and portable. NetBSD
| will run on _basically_ anything, even things that Linux and
| other *BSD 's have no hope of running on.
| mistercheph wrote:
| What about DragonFlyBSD?
| dijit wrote:
| DragonflyBSD is trying to be extremely progressive in their
| OS design by leaning in to how we're architecting new
| computers.
|
| So, leaning in to how SSD's behave instead of how HDD's
| behave- ensuring that the kernel can make effective use of
| multiple cores etc;
| chuckadams wrote:
| There absolutely was a real-world non-research operating
| system called just "BSD", and it ran primarily on DEC VAX
| hardware to start. Other Unixes like SunOS eventually started
| basing themselves on it. The last official Berkeley Software
| Distribution was 4.4BSD-Lite in 1994, which by then had been
| ported to many other platforms, including i386. The Computer
| Systems Research Group which maintained BSD disbanded the
| next year.
| dainiusse wrote:
| Donated. I an thankful to NetBSD - I built some routers back in
| 2000. Long live NetBSD!
| munchlax wrote:
| And let me guess... You haven't had to replace them since?
| jpgvm wrote:
| Migrated them onto a toaster to reduce hardware footprint.
| dainiusse wrote:
| They don't exist anymore. No need to be sarcastic. But they
| gave me plenty of experience
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot :)
| xyproto wrote:
| Does NetBSD really help reduce e-waste any more than Linux
| already does?
| xhkkffbf wrote:
| Some of the Linux distros are getting pretty fat and don't work
| so well on older hardware. Of course some are lean too. But
| NetBSD has a goal.
| unleaded wrote:
| Maybe not yet but I can see Linux's place as the shitbox
| saviour start slipping a bit in the next few years. Debian
| dropping x86, distros getting fatter in general.. I can't
| really see those trends reversing. Meanwhile NetBSD goes
| against them.
|
| However it goes, the main issue is one no operating system can
| solve which is modern life relying on the Web and beefier
| browsers. Unless you want to rebel against that you're probably
| better off getting a laptop from the past 10 years for < PS100
| on eBay.
| dijit wrote:
| How is TLS negotiation and transport on older hardware (with
| no AES-NI hardware acceleration)?
|
| I remember it used to be expensive as heck to do TLS back in
| 2014~, so much so that we bought accelerator cards and
| segmented "secure" servers so that load wouldn't hit the
| ordinary browsing of our sites...
| 1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote:
| "How is TLS negotiation and transport on older hardware
| (with no AES-NI hardware acceleration)?"
|
| I use a TLS forward proxy. With today's overpowered
| hardware, I can even run the proxy on an old "phone" (but I
| cant run NetBSD^1)
|
| This allows the older computers I own to use plaintext HTTP
| like the good old days
|
| 1. Despite https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-Mobile_Sidekick
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| Although I agree with beefier browsers, I also want to say
| that there are browsers like dillo etc. which can be good
| enough for simple websites and also not everything needs a
| web browser to be usable
|
| Imagine this, a system which can watch movies, edit texts,
| create disks, have curl/wget, send and recieve files using
| piping server (which is a curl thing) , view pdfs, mpv and
| what not, a desktop manager, file manager etc.
|
| As someone hacking around with the legendary tiny core linux,
| I am more and more mind blown each day with just how much can
| happen in 14-21 MB, you can definitely build a mini self
| hosting rack with just some remastering as tinycore can
| actually run podman as well (combine this with alpine
| containers to create a super duper minimalist self hosting
| things too)
|
| the possibilities are endless. When I ran tiny core linux on
| my pc and ran nothing else, It took 21 mb in ram for a whole
| gui with editors and file managers etc. all running in ram so
| super fast filesystem with a package manager
|
| I personally wanted to build my own operating system to limit
| myself to the most minimal system so taht I just study and do
| nothing else, I thought tiny core was it but then I tried to
| hack around it and there are sooooo many things in 21 mb,
| makes me appreciate minimalism
| dijit wrote:
| > which can watch movies
|
| I have to say, the sheer _fucking irony_ of this statement
| made me do a double-take.
|
| I might be showing my age a bit, but I'm still remembering
| when web-browsing was considered a "light" activity
| (without extensions like Web Java), and watching a video
| was "very computationally expensive".
|
| I guess some shift happened in the early 2010's where video
| playback was hardware accelerated more frequently; and
| complicated javascript started taking off as Google
| unveiled v8.
| malfist wrote:
| As much as the tech bro billionare class salivate over
| the idea of bringing an "everything app" to the market,
| we already have those. They're called browsers.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| This might be one of the reasons why things like chatgpt
| (OpenAI) etc. are releasing atlas etc.
|
| This is their attempt of everything app, where the whole
| internet would be behind the UI of their chatbot and it
| would go through an LLM before being changed by it and
| then it would pass to us.
|
| Your single comment explains a lot really and this is
| something that I agree. Everything App is the
| browser/internet, combining it with things like wasm, you
| can even run whole iso files in browser wasm itself (Its
| fresh on my mind because I shared it to somebody on HN
| right now but try out copy.sh/v86 [1])
|
| [1]: https://copy.sh/v86/
| p_ing wrote:
| The argument for NetBSD is that it runs on almost anything that
| was ever produced. That isn't the case for Linux, even older
| x86 is no longer supported in the mainline.
| jmmv wrote:
| That may be technically true but...
|
| Linux (the kernel) may have been ported to more machines and
| architectures than NetBSD's kernel, yes. But is all the code
| present in the same source tree or do you have to go find
| patch sets or unofficial branches?
|
| More importantly: is there a modern distribution that builds
| an installable system for that platform?
|
| The special thing about NetBSD is that you get the
| portability out of a single and modern tree for many more
| platforms than any single Linux distribution offers.
| p_ing wrote:
| You said the same thing I did with extra steps.
| jmmv wrote:
| That's because... I misread your comment.
|
| In any case, NetBSD is not well known and "why bother
| because Linux also runs everywhere too" so I thought it
| was worth explaining.
| kakwa_ wrote:
| https://technically.kakwalab.ovh/posts/silly-sun-server-intr...
|
| Some architectures are no longer practical with Linux. The
| kernel might still support it, but distribution support is
| sketchy.
|
| For a SPARC64 server refurb project, the choices were pretty
| much OpenBSD or NetBSD in my case.
| iberator wrote:
| yes. It supports like 60 different cpu architecture all back to
| 1979 VAX 790 INCLUDED.
|
| Its also one of few OSes where 32-bit 386 is still tier 1
| release.
|
| All from single code source code tree.
| xyproto wrote:
| Does running NetBSD on VAX from 1979 help to reduce e-waste,
| though?
| iberator wrote:
| Yes if you still run it. 0 metal wasted.
| ptrwis wrote:
| What do you think, there are milions of people or companies
| running NetBSD on 486 to protect the planet from e-waste? How
| many times have you replaced your phone with a newer model in
| the last 10 years?
| timeon wrote:
| > How many times have you replaced your phone with a newer
| model in the last 10 years
|
| Once, after accident.
| jrmg wrote:
| _NetBSD is a powerful force for sustainability. Foundation 's
| commitment to running on a vast array of hardware--new and old--
| helps reduce e-waste. Old laptops and single-board computers that
| would otherwise be in a landfill are given new life as robust
| firewalls, file servers, or even retro-gaming machines, all
| thanks to NetBSD._
|
| Emotionally I like this - but thinking more dispassionately,
| these systems use, by modern standards, a huge amount of power. I
| wonder if, for many (most?) of them, it whould not be more
| environmentally responsible to replace them with modern, less
| power-hungry devices.
| dijit wrote:
| You know, I wonder about that.
|
| The cost of creating new computers has got to be pretty high to
| the environment (I've heard 85% of lifetime carbon emissions
| from computers are from the manufacturing process), and I
| strongly suspect that we don't take that into consideration
| since we greenwash ourselves by forcing China to do our dirty
| work, chastising them for it, and then patting ourselves on the
| back for buying "more energy efficient chips".
| bombcar wrote:
| Money dollars are a pretty good "stand-in" but in general
| it's better to reuse and reduce than to recycle.
|
| But if the cost of a new machine is the same as a year or two
| of the old operating the new is probably the way to go.
| dijit wrote:
| I'm saying that I think "cost" in terms of money is _not_ a
| good proxy for environmental impact.
| mmooss wrote:
| > Money dollars are a pretty good "stand-in"
|
| They aren't; among other things, most environmental harm is
| externalized. When you buy things that produce climate
| change or microplastics, the cost of the impact is paid by
| society generally.
| CaptainOfCoit wrote:
| > The cost of creating new computers has got to be pretty
| high to the environment
|
| But aren't those made regardless if the people with old
| computers upgrade to them or not? I guess over time, they'll
| make less if people buy less, but the ones we'd purchase
| today has already been made, and might as well replace less
| energy efficient devices than just being added to the global
| count.
| dijit wrote:
| I think you answered your own question here.
| mmooss wrote:
| We need an index of lifecycle costs for products and
| services, broken down by phase (material production,
| manufacturing, logistics, operations, disposal, etc.). It's
| especially needed because those costs are often externalized
| for buyers (i.e., they aren't built into the price - you
| don't pay the true cost of gas, for example; many costs are
| externalized to everyone else). How else can consumers,
| manufacturers, policymakers, etc. make anything like an
| informed decision?
|
| I'm surprised someone like the Sierra Club, Consumer Reports,
| a scientific group, a government group, etc. doesn't
| undertake it. Yes, it's a bunch of work, there would be
| uncertainty, but it's essential and better than nothing.
|
| There are such things for food:
|
| * Klimato: https://klimato.com/
|
| * The Big Climate Database: http://thebigclimatedatabase.com/
| davidw wrote:
| This is why people keep bringing up a carbon tax. It does a
| lot of the work to internalize all those externalities so
| individuals or groups don't have to try and figure all this
| stuff out.
| mrlongroots wrote:
| Yes, unfortunately even the best intentioned individuals
| have very limited ability to make meaningful carbon-
| minimizing decisions. Carbon tax is such a sensible
| solution!
| nolist_policy wrote:
| Also I bet >50% of personal computer e waste is bog standard
| x86-64 by now. No need to support _a vast array of hardware_.
| Gud wrote:
| Have you considered any advantages with ensuring code is
| portable?
| hnlmorg wrote:
| Isn't that an advantage by itself?
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| > No need to support a vast array of hardware
|
| I hope you understand how unique netbsd is, it is one of the
| only systems which can be compiled so easily with just a
| single script even from linux or other systems and its rump
| kernel etc. drivers from what I know are (modular?) so they
| could be used with other kernels as well if any kernel wants
| ie.
|
| You never know where the innovation can be, I feel like that
| each kernel/operating system can bring a new idea, as an
| example, templeOS uses Holy C which basically is Just in time
| C (iirc) and that means that you can just edit files of
| templeOS and restart and those changes would occur
|
| I know TempleOS is niche and a meme OS but I feel like that
| there are a lot of ideas and unique operating systems and I
| have heard that netbsd can be good in giving driver support
| to.
|
| This is just one of many things, and I feel like the main
| point of NetBSD and the likes are fundamental hackability,
| they can run on things like routers as well although most run
| openbsd/freebsd but still. I don't see a reason not to unless
| you are speaking monetary (ie. it may take some extra funds
| developing/hosting but that is chump change) but I feel like
| NETBSD is a novel project with respectable goals and they
| aren't going to change just for this.
|
| More Options are a good thing. if I can have a project run on
| Netbsd, then its very easy to port it over to any other vast
| array of hardware as well, and that hardware includes
| extremely embedded hardware as well I guess
| ghostly_s wrote:
| > I hope you understand how unique netbsd is, it is one of
| the only systems which can be compiled so easily with just
| a single script even from linux or other systems and its
| rump kernel etc. drivers from what I know are (modular?) so
| they could be used with other kernels as well if any kernel
| wants
|
| Aren't competing kernels already shipping support for this
| hardware? Surely the project has to have more selling
| points than "can be compiled with a single script."
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| Support for x86_64?
|
| I meant in the sense that since NetBSD supports soooo
| many devices, it can also help innovation in other
| kernels if need be as well by being able to take driver
| support via its rumpkernel as well if need be
|
| And to be honest, I feel like there is this sense of
| freedom knowing that you can have a system which is
| portable, if some script can run on my pc on netbsd,
| chances are if its not too specific, it could run on your
| pc or even your toaster lol!
|
| https://laughingsquid.com/netbsd-toaster/
|
| Netbsd can run on any device possible and I really
| appreciate it.
|
| >Surely the project has to have more selling points than
| "can be compiled with a single script."
|
| Personally I have only heard good things about netbsd but
| I don't have much expertise in it (sorry), I can
| recommend you to take a look at smolbsd which looks
| really cool for uni-kernel purposes as well
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45582758
|
| I feel like that there is a lot more things that can be
| done with netbsd as well or other open source projects in
| general as well
| tredre3 wrote:
| > Netbsd can run on any device possible and I really
| appreciate it.
|
| That's more of a meme than reality and I wish people
| would actually look into it before mindlessly repeating
| the trope. I did, when I wanted to run a new OS on a
| niche device, and the reality is very different. Nowadays
| Linux works on a lot more hardware than NetBSD does. Yes,
| NetBSD nominally supports a few more architectures than
| Linux (very few, especially that mClinux is now
| upstreamed), but the driver situation for the rest of the
| system means that it can't run on most devices from those
| architecture anyway.
| Fnoord wrote:
| This and 'runs' is a very relative term. What exactly
| works, what doesn't? What do you need? How power
| efficient or buggy is it? How is the performance? I
| remember running Linux on an SGI Indy. Not everything
| worked, as not every Indy was equal (I had six) but also
| compared to IRIX (especially 5.x series) the performance
| was dog slow. The Indy had some good hardware (like the
| soundcard or Indycam) but that wouldn't work (well) on
| Linux. My Octane 2 didn't have 3D accelerated graphics on
| Linux. The state of every port isn't equal. Same on
| OpenBSD. Furthermore, if you run Linux your distribution
| of choice may not be available or work well.
| ndiddy wrote:
| Note that for most of the more esoteric platforms NetBSD
| supports, "support" simply means they continue to cross-
| compile to target that platform. There's been lots of
| cases where there's some major regression that makes a
| port unusable (can't boot, can't interact with the
| system, etc) and nobody notices for years because there's
| both nobody testing these ports and nobody actually using
| them. At that point, the value of the support is
| questionable.
| nolist_policy wrote:
| > I hope you understand how unique netbsd is, it is one of
| the only systems which can be compiled so easily with just
| a single script even from linux or other systems and its
| rump kernel etc. drivers from what I know are (modular?) so
| they could be used with other kernels as well if any kernel
| wants ie.
|
| Linus hast this with User Mode Linux (upstream) and Linux
| Kernel Library (out of tree).
|
| > You never know where the innovation can be, I feel like
| that each kernel/operating system can bring a new idea, as
| an example, templeOS uses Holy C which basically is Just in
| time C (iirc) and that means that you can just edit files
| of templeOS and restart and those changes would occur
|
| That's a while ago, but Fabrice Bellard did a demo with his
| tiny c compiler where it would would compile the Linux
| Kernel at boot time and then boot the compiled Kernel.
|
| > This is just one of many things, and I feel like the main
| point of NetBSD and the likes are fundamental hackability,
| they can run on things like routers as well although most
| run openbsd/freebsd but still.
|
| Most consumer grade routers run Linux out of the box.
|
| > More Options are a good thing. if I can have a project
| run on Netbsd, then its very easy to port it over to any
| other vast array of hardware as well, and that hardware
| includes extremely embedded hardware as well I guess
|
| uCLinux (upstream) doesn't even need a MMU. It can run on a
| Cortex-M4 with 8mb ram.
| hnlmorg wrote:
| > That's a while ago, but Fabrice Bellard did a demo with
| his tiny c compiler where it would would compile the
| Linux Kernel at boot time and then boot the compiled
| Kernel.
|
| That's interesting. Do you have a link you can share? Or
| remember any more details?
|
| I'm curious how long it took to fully start
| johnisgood wrote:
| I agree.
|
| So in my other comment I mentioned some specific(s) to (or
| rather, originated from) NetBSD, just as much as for
| example _pledge()_ (fine-grained system call restriction),
| _unveil()_ (filesystem visibility restriction), _arc4random
| family_ [1] (ChaCha20-based CSPRNG), _reallocarray()_
| (integer overflow-safe realloc), _OpenBGPD_ (BGP daemon),
| _OpenOSPFD_ (OSPF daemon), _httpd_ (web server), _acme-
| client_ (Let 's Encrypt client), _signify_ (cryptographic
| signing tool), etc. are specific to OpenBSD.
|
| DragonflyBSD has some goodies too while we are at it! For
| example _varsym_ (Variable Symbol System - per-process
| environment-like variable substitution), _nlookup_
| (namecache-based path lookup replacing the vnode-based
| namei()), _objcache_ (per-CPU object caching allocator),
| _LWKT_ (Light Weight Kernel Threads - message-passing based
| threading), _HAMMER2_ (clustered COW filesystem with multi-
| master replication, successor to HAMMER), and so forth.
|
| All popular BSDs have their own rich history. I know more
| about DragonflyBSD than NetBSD, so as an example:
| DragonflyBSD's core design philosophy centers on SMP
| scalability (cache-coherent token-based synchronization and
| LWKT message passing, avoiding fine-grained locking),
| OpenBSD's gist is security, and so forth.
|
| [1] The ChaCha20-based CSPRNG (originally arc4random was
| RC4-based), which has been ported to other BSDs and some
| Linux systems.
|
| (Sorry, I was really tempted to elaborate on these unique
| features and I felt like your comment was the perfect place
| for it!).
| p_ing wrote:
| It would be awesome to see a cost breakdown/environmental
| impact of continuing to run a P4 or G5 today vs. the
| metals/materials/recycling process/disposal process cost and
| environmental impact.
|
| I always had the same question about cleaning recycling as it
| went through a recycling plant -- is the water usage
| environmentally "friendly" versus what is ultimately recycled
| (which is often not much, sadly).
| steve1977 wrote:
| That brings up an interesting point. While recycled materials
| like gold are obviously revenue for the recycler, the cost of
| polluting water might get externalized in some cases maybe.
| zenlot wrote:
| Always funny to read from environmentalists discussing how much
| power draws a lenovo laptop from 2014 running NetBSD.
|
| Come on, look at all the businesses and what's really happening
| in the space you're commenting on. That laptop literally means
| nothing.
| NathanielK wrote:
| Even the Pentium M systems from a decade prior have <10W
| idle. Honestly embarrassing to mention when AI chips are
| dumping kilowatts.
| cluckindan wrote:
| Wonder how long you could run an old laptop on the energy
| used by a single ChatGPT conversation?
| rootnod3 wrote:
| Months at the minimum probably.
| Fnoord wrote:
| Wonder how useful the ChatGPT conversation is compared to
| a Google search from begin '00s (when Google was new and
| something like Pentium 4 was new).
| jrmg wrote:
| I think it's a fair question when I'm literally commenting on
| a statement about sustainability and reuse of old computers.
|
| And on a larger scale, you could use your dismissal against
| almost everything. Every part of society (and businesses are
| part of society) can think 'that thing I do means literally
| nothing when so much else is going on!' about almost
| anything.
| mrweasel wrote:
| That old computer running NetBSD probably also isn't running
| 24/7, making the environmental impact that much lower.
|
| The comparison probably needs to be: Running that old NetBSD
| machine for a few hours a day, worst case about 40 while I
| work vs. producing an running a brand new laptop.
|
| If we're talking desktops, then many older machines have
| 2-300W PSUs, not even enough to power a modern graphics card
| (I know, an Nvidia card isn't running 600W all the time).
| noAnswer wrote:
| Be passive, do nothing. Not even asking. Just consume. Your
| actions mean nothing because whatabout.
| zenlot wrote:
| Lol. You're not using your laptop making huge impact. Wake
| up, be real. Sheep mentality, exactly what they want you to
| believe in.
| jrmg wrote:
| There's a lot of irony in asserting that the ones who
| _are_ considering and acting upon the consequences of
| their small choices are the ones exhibiting 'sheep
| mentlity'.
| NathanielK wrote:
| Outside of keeping a SPARC blade system running 24/7, most old
| systems use similar power to a light fixture.
|
| This argument misses the forest for the trees for non-
| commercial users.
| rpcope1 wrote:
| Given that there are a lot of cases that old systems are used
| for that don't run the system full out and that they probably
| idle a lot when on, just like your new stuff, given that a lot
| of older hardware barring known stupid designs like Pentium 4
| that draw ludicrous power for the perf, and given how much of
| an absolute shit show electronics recycling is (I've seen a
| good amount of how it actually gets "broken down"), I honestly
| think we upgrade way too often for most use cases. If you can
| still get by doing something important with a P3 or a Core 2,
| honestly I would be really surprised if it was actually vastly
| more cost efficient and environmentally friendly to refresh to
| new hardware.
| jrmg wrote:
| Computers of that vintage drew way more power at idle than
| modern systems.
| agumonkey wrote:
| This was the reason I moved from my sturdy ~2008 laptop, power
| efficiency. That said I don't buy new anyway, i just jumped to
| the 2010-2015 range.
| agalush wrote:
| I have a raspberry Pi 2 running NetBSD at home providing a lot
| of useful services.
|
| It uses just 1.5W.
|
| Any more recent alternative would consume much more power.
| jrmg wrote:
| That's sort of why this is on my mind.
|
| I've just replaced an old Cubieboard (RPi1 alternative -
| about 2W) running Pi-hole _and_ an old temperamental gigabit
| router (~10W) with a 2014 Mac mini (plus second Gigabit
| adapter) - which uses about 11W (a really efficient computer
| for its age!)
|
| It's less than the old combo drew - but I wonder if I could
| be accomplishing the same with an (or even a couple of) SBCs
| - and if that would 'pay for itself' (environmentally well as
| financially) after a couple of years.
| toast0 wrote:
| > and if that would 'pay for itself' (environmentally well
| as financially) after a couple of years.
|
| At 11W, the financial costs of running are quite low. I
| think it's about 90 kWh per year. Depends on your rates,
| but I've seen $0.60 quoted in comments lately as a high
| rate for PG&E customers in California, which is about $55.
| You might well be able to invest in something that can run
| your load for fewer watts, but I don't know if it's worth
| the effort.
|
| You're likely to get a lot more savings by looking at
| things that use more energy.
| wltr wrote:
| Why is it NetBSD and which services do you have? I'd love to
| read about that, and I think I might utilise mine that way
| too.
| agalush wrote:
| NetBSD because I love simplicity and because it draws less
| power than running Raspbian.
|
| It is running Gitea, Prometheus and a bunch of small tools
| I wrote (weather monitoring, home automation, family data
| sharing and tools for my Kids)
| wltr wrote:
| But how is it draw less power comparing to Raspbian? I'm
| not arguing, just curious how you measured that, and why
| NetBSD _that_ much more efficient. I have a RPi2 with
| Raspbian, and another one with DietPi, I expect them to
| sip power similarly, considering they're mostly idle
| anyway. Would love to read some blog on this though, if
| you happen to have one.
| agalush wrote:
| I just measured it by myself with a domestic power usage
| tool.
| galangalalgol wrote:
| That is fascinating, one of the reasons I hadn't done
| that is a concern about power management features. I'd
| read openbsd at least had them running flat out most of
| the time.
| raddan wrote:
| I too would like to see a side-by-side comparison but if
| we assume that the claim is true, one reason might be
| that NetBSD runs very few daemons after a default
| install. I run NetBSD on a handful of Raspberry Pi Zero
| machines, and it is really quite a surprise that they run
| as well as they do for a $5 computer. Your typical
| Raspbian install has a lot more going on after the
| default install.
| cosmic_cheese wrote:
| > Your typical Raspbian install has a lot more going on
| after the default install.
|
| I believe that this is true for just about all widely
| popular distributions. It's probably possible to set up
| Arch to have power draw similar to NetBSD, but you're
| going to have to know what you're doing and it's probably
| going to require more administration/attention to keep
| running smoothly than NetBSD does.
| 1313ed01 wrote:
| Do you use the built-in WiFi on any of the Raspberry Pis?
|
| By coincidence I installed NetBSD last weekend on a
| Raspberry Pi. Never used it before, but it seemed very
| nice. I had some issues with sshd (most likely just me
| doing something stupid) and never got as far as
| experimenting with WiFi, but supposedly there is some
| support (unlike FreeBSD and OpenBSD that do not support
| WiFi on any Raspberry Pis?).
| rootnod3 wrote:
| Manufacturing probably way outshines the usage. And, the side-
| benefit of using old machines with say NetBSD or OpenBSD etc is
| that it makes people realize that they don't NEED new modern
| shiny hardware. I am still daily-driving a x220 on the road (it
| gets 99% of my stuff done) and at home I am using mostly a
| slightly upgraded T480. So a 15 year old and a 8 year old
| laptop. And power consumption wise, my T480 lasts about 17
| hours on a charge. That is about same time I'd get out of a
| modern M3 MacBook Air.
|
| With a bit less performance? Sure. But for my use-case it
| works. And more people realizing that might actually be a good
| thing.
| wltr wrote:
| 17 hours?! I can't believe it! How did you optimise the
| machine to be _that_ energy efficient?
| rootnod3 wrote:
| T480 can hold 2 batteries. A swappable and an internal one.
| At least under FreeBSD the swappable alone gives about
| 10-11 hours on low brightness. The internal one carries the
| rest of the way.
|
| I did replace the screen with a low power screen, which
| easily had the biggest impact on battery life.
|
| I haven't tested the T480 under OpenBSD in a while, but my
| guess is that if I ran it with "apm -L", it would get close
| to the same numbers.
| wltr wrote:
| Oh wow, thanks! And a low power screen is what? I thought
| they're mostly the same, with probably exception of the
| most recent oled ones.
| spauldo wrote:
| Yeah I don't buy that argument either. The amount of e-waste
| being saved by NetBSD is so tiny as to be insignificant.
|
| NetBSD is great for retrocomputing, since it's a modern OS that
| can run on very limited hardware. It's also a very nice
| traditional UNIX. It's well documented, has a nice codebase,
| and is a pleasure to use. But for saving e-waste, Linux has it
| beat.
| wltr wrote:
| Well, look, here is my use case. I have some really old
| hardware that I used to play with earlier in life, it's located
| at the parents' place. I still use that hardware, but not too
| often, since I live on my own. I could replace all that, as it
| consumes a lot of power indeed (comparing to SBCs). But in
| absolute numbers, they're just regular computers, so power draw
| is somewhere at 60-90 Watt/hr, I suppose. Which is not that
| much, especially given I run the machines half a day once a
| month. What I learned over the years, you can utilise some
| servers by not running them 24/7. One server there, I wake it
| over LAN nightly, copy some backups there, and turn it off
| again. Very useful. So, I think I'd keep them running for as
| long as they're alive.
| muyuu wrote:
| most older systems are surprisingly frugal on idle and are
| typically used sporadically
| kev009 wrote:
| It probably works as an economic argument. Readers of this site
| and many in first world countries have limited barriers to buy
| new equipment and there are low cost options. Elsewhere that
| may not be true, either the low cost equipment is still beyond
| reach, or it is simply difficult to import or completely
| unavailable.
|
| It's interesting to observe that a 1990 (386) vs 2000 (Pentium
| III) computer is a heck of a lot different than a 2015 vs 2025
| computer. We're talking about Skylake (2015) which would have
| no issue as a daily driver for quite a lot of people.
| Fnoord wrote:
| It is a logistics issue. People replace perfectly working
| computers all the time. Sure, if you use Skylake you list
| performance from Spectre and Meltdown. You may not even be
| able to run Windows 11 on perfectly working x86-64 machines.
| But for poor people, power usage may even be more important
| than for you or me (businesses generally don't care). That
| Skylake's successors were so terrible is due to Intel and
| thankfully it allowed AMD and ARM-based SoCs to thrive.
| fujigawa wrote:
| You're right, the world is better off having some Asian kid
| taking apart your junk and breathing in solder fumes with no
| protection, rather than you running a legacy box in your
| basement that uses some extra kWh per year.
|
| After all, he probably won't live long enough to tell his
| grandkids stories about power-hungry hardware.
|
| That reminds me, my homelab could use a SPARC box just because.
| Panino wrote:
| In some cases yes, replacing an old machine with a new one can
| be an evironmentally responsible choice. But in general that's
| not the case and one should thoughtfully consider the variables
| including but not limited to software choice, grid carbon cost
| (see Electricity Maps below), embodied carbon cost of
| materials, environmental issues of mining and production not
| strictly related to climate emissions, and more.
|
| Low Tech Magazine wrote an article about this here:
|
| https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2020/12/how-and-why-i-stop...
|
| https://app.electricitymaps.com
| dlcarrier wrote:
| I get my power off grid through solar generation and battery
| storage, so I monitor usage pretty closely.
|
| In my experience, newer computers have slightly higher idle
| power consumption, but much less total consumption for a given
| compute task. On top of that, new computers are more likely to
| have dedicated hardware to accelerate the latest codecs.
|
| If you're using an old computer for ray tracing or neural
| networks or video transcoding, it's probably using enough power
| that it's worth upgrading.
|
| If you're browsing the Web or watching YouTube videos or
| running a file server, power consumption is probably similar on
| old and new computers, but regardless of the age, much higher
| on desktop computers than laptops.
|
| Look at power supplies on vintage computers, and you'll see
| that they're much, much smaller than on modern computers.
| PunchyHamster wrote:
| Also, all of the devices that could run NetBSD can just run
| Linux
| Narishma wrote:
| Not true. For example most Linux distributions have dropped
| 32-bit x86 and/or ARM support and I think it's only a matter
| of time before the Linux kernel follows suit.
| allywilson wrote:
| "I'm Doing My Part"
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot :)
| cntlzw wrote:
| Donated.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot:)
| lukaslalinsky wrote:
| I'm curious what do people use NetBSD for?
| owl_vision wrote:
| i ran NetBSD as a desktop on BeagleBoneBlack from circa 2010
| until recently when I donated the hardware to a CompSci
| student.
|
| ...and as others mentioned it: the rump kernel.
| spauldo wrote:
| It's my nameserver/DHCP server. I used to have it set up as an
| iSCSI target for backups and as a boot server for my firewall,
| but I do something else these days.
|
| My main reason for using NetBSD for this is to have easy access
| to the man pages. Like the other BSDs, the man pages are
| exceptionally well-written and are a tremendous resource for
| doing POSIX programming. Plus I find myself digging through the
| code when I'm interested in how something is implemented.
| Having a local repository of good C code with a liberal license
| is worth having the extra OS to manage.
| brandonmenc wrote:
| It was my desktop daily driver circa year 2000.
|
| Not sure what people use it for now.
| Narishma wrote:
| I use it on a couple of old laptops that Linux no longer
| supports.
| owl_vision wrote:
| an offspring to build your own minimal BSD UNIX system:
| https://www.smolbsd.org/
| skullone wrote:
| Donated! Thank you very much, NetBSD was one of my first
| experiences, on a Pentium 60 with a 504MB hard drive. It made me
| who I am today, eternally grateful to have learned from such
| amazing and talented people.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot :)
| _0xdd wrote:
| Just donated. I run a NetBSD instance on a VPS and on an old
| Lenovo mini PC that I use as a gateway/file server between my
| regular network and network of vintage PCs. I have two XT clones,
| two ATs, some 486s, a Pentium MMX, and an iMac G3 and G4. Fun
| hobby! I need to get NetBSD running on one of these old machines
| one of these days.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot :)
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| Do any governments use NetBSD? If so, they should be the #1
| name and shame.
| greenavocado wrote:
| Yes, let's name and shame software users /s
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| _"Now, that, I got me some Seagram 's gin, Everybody got
| they cups, but they ain't chipped in"_--Snoop
| tossit444 wrote:
| I guess we're all complicit to <insert war crime> for using
| and developing software that anyone can use freely...
| rootnod3 wrote:
| Donated. I think what NetBSD is missing, but also hard to pull
| off, is something like https://openbsd.amsterdam. A service that
| people can use where parts of the fees go towards the foundation.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot :) agree with your idea.
| guerrilla wrote:
| That's so cheap compared to what they provide. Amazing.
| rfmoz wrote:
| An interesting thread about the upgrade exists on the same list
| that the link points to, just a few messages earlier. Hopefully,
| with the donations, the project can improve the existing friction
| points - https://mail-index.netbsd.org/netbsd-
| users/2025/10/01/msg033...
| jonahx wrote:
| Out of pure curiosity, is all the actual programming work for the
| foundation provided free of charge by volunteers? And the
| foundation expenses are mostly legal and administrative?
|
| It wasn't clear to me based on the financials:
| https://www.netbsd.org/foundation/reports/financial/2023.htm...
|
| Maybe the consulting section includes payments for programming
| work? Presumably at cheap rates, if so?
| fujigawa wrote:
| >Maybe the consulting section includes payments for programming
| work? Presumably at cheap rates, if so?
|
| Have we reached the point on the timeline where we believe low-
| level operating system code should be acquired at "cheap
| rates"? While simultaneously, I assume, believing webshit cloud
| bollocks still demands top dollar?
| jonahx wrote:
| I do not hold that belief, and nothing in my reply implies
| that I do.
|
| Per the link I included, the total spent on consulting was
| 17,939.51 USD. So, if they were paying people, the people
| were working cheaply. But the consulting may have been for
| non-programming work. Hence my question.
| adamthegoalie wrote:
| Things like NetBSD seem like an obvious use case for tokens and
| DAOs (funding and governing treasuries for non-crypto open source
| software projects). Why is this not more common already?
| olivia-banks wrote:
| Donated!! I run a small cluster of a few nodes I bought for
| cheap, and I'm experimenting with SSI on them. The kernel is
| really nice to read and modify.
| jaypatelani wrote:
| Thanks a lot:)
| johnisgood wrote:
| NetBSD has some goodies, too, by the way!
|
| _proplib_ (property list library for kernel-userspace
| communication), _RUMP_ (Rump Kernel - anykernel framework
| allowing kernel code to run in userspace), _Veriexec_ (verified
| exec integrity subsystem using cryptographic fingerprints), _LFS_
| (Log-structured File System - NetBSD maintains the only
| production LFS implementation), _WAPBL_ (Write Ahead Physical
| Block Logging - metadata journaling), _ATF_ (Automated Testing
| Framework - originated from NetBSD, now used across BSDs), etc.
| Feel free to check them out! Each one of them is interesting,
| IMO.
|
| Beyond these specific features, NetBSD's real strength is its
| extreme portability (runs on over 50 hardware platforms, from VAX
| to ARM to obscure embedded systems), exceptionally clean and
| readable codebase, and _pkgsrc_ (a portable package system that
| works across BSDs, Linux, and other Unix-like systems). I believe
| it makes NetBSD valuable not just as an OS, but as a reference
| implementation and research platform. The code quality and
| documentation are outstanding for anyone studying OS internals as
| well. :)
|
| I noticed someone asked what NetBSD is. I am happy to break down
| the different BSD flavors (NetBSD, OpenBSD, FreeBSD,
| DragonflyBSD) and their unique features if that would be helpful!
| colonelspace wrote:
| Please do break down the differences.
| johnisgood wrote:
| I could not hold myself back, so I already elaborated on
| OpenBSD and DragonflyBSD here (albeit it is non-exhaustive):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45714491 :D
|
| I left out FreeBSD from that comment, which has its own set
| of innovations: _Capsicum_ (capability-based security
| framework), _Jails_ (OS-level virtualization
| /containerization which predates Docker by over a decade),
| _MAC Framework_ (Mandatory Access Control for fine-grained
| security policies), _GEOM_ (modular disk I /O framework),
| _Linuxulator_ (Linux binary compatibility layer), _ZFS_
| (FreeBSD has arguably the best ZFS implementation outside of
| Solaris), _bhyve_ (type-2 hypervisor), and so forth.
|
| Userland tools include _iocage_ / _bastille_ (jail managers),
| _poudriere_ (package building), _jemalloc_ (default allocator
| which focuses on fragmentation avoidance and scalability)
| among many others.
|
| Each BSD really does have its own character. FreeBSD leans
| toward performance and production use, OpenBSD toward
| security and correctness, NetBSD toward portability and clean
| design, DragonflyBSD toward alternative SMP approaches!
|
| (illumos/OpenIndiana is quite interesting, too (see DTrace,
| Doors IPC, Zones, SMF, Contracts, Event Ports, RBAC)).
| cperciva wrote:
| I believe NetBSD also holds the record for the fastest kernel
| boot time for a general purpose operating system -- I held this
| record with FreeBSD with the system booting in about 23 ms but
| Emile got NetBSD down to 15 ms IIRC and I've been too busy to
| work on FreeBSD/Firecracker lately.
| johnisgood wrote:
| Interesting! Both 23ms and 15ms are lightning fast. Have you
| written about it anywhere in more detail?
| cperciva wrote:
| I gave a talk about FreeBSD on Firecracker at bsdcan a few
| years ago. Sorry I'm on my phone just before an orchestra
| concert so I can't give you a link but if you Google
| "BSDCan Colin Percival Firecracker" you should find it on
| YouTube.
| johnisgood wrote:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MT3cdeuRTzs - Porting
| FreeBSD to Firecracker by:Colin Percival?
| cperciva wrote:
| Yup that's the one.
| lateralux wrote:
| https://smolbsd.org/
| 1313ed01 wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45582758
| johnisgood wrote:
| Oooh, that got me curious! I will give this a try.
| bitwize wrote:
| NetBSD has the neat property that it's possible for a halfway
| decent C programmer to learn kernel programming from the man
| pages alone. The documentation is that good. FreeBSD and
| especially OpenBSD may also share this property, but NetBSD is
| my go-to OS to tinker with.
| johnisgood wrote:
| For sure! I agree.
|
| OpenBSD has great man pages as well. :)
| self_awareness wrote:
| Donated. While I don't use NetBSD, the existence of projects like
| this is essential for open source technology, operating system
| design, and the overall vitality of programming culture.
| phendrenad2 wrote:
| Big fan of NetBSD. From the perspective of a kernel hacker, I
| found the NetBSD codebase to be very readable and easy to work
| with. FreeBSD and OpenBSD, while being more fully-featured and
| security-minded respectively, had to make compromises in their
| codebase as a result.
| GeorgeTirebiter wrote:
| I just donated. It's important to keep projects like NetBSD
| vital, as a monoculture benefits nobody but the monoculturists. I
| think of it as a way to help ensure Survival of the Species - by
| diversity.
| jmmv wrote:
| Donated! I should have done this months ago when I started using
| NetBSD for an embedded project idea (that has gone nowhere).
|
| But I feel this link illustrates a big problem with NetBSD's "no
| hype" approach: I clicked the link you shared and found an email.
| The email has the donation link at the very end, and it's not
| clickable. When I go to the donation page, there is a ton of text
| before I even get to see an ugly PayPal tiny button or a tiny
| form to donate via Stripe.
|
| It's too hard to notice and too hard to do. The project's
| homepage does a better job though. But I think it should be made
| even more prominent if this is critical for the project's health!
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