Help me understand. reddit / freebsd ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2022-04-27 23:17 Hello everyone. I recently installed freeBSD and wanted to know why is that for some wireless hardware there is not support. For example on openBSD there is support fro Broadcom wifi cards (43602) and Intel AX200.But freeBSD doesnt have support or it is barely getting implemented. Why does freeBSD not use iwx(4) and instead uses iwlwifi (not really working that great)? It is just curiosity as to why \*BSDs distros don't share drivers. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- djbelly219 · 2022-04-27 23:27 Check out 13.1. I don’t know the deal exactly, but OpenBSD just dropped an update, but FreeBSD 13.1 is in the oven with driver updates. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2022-04-27 23:54 I am aware of that. I was just wondering as to why they don't share the same working drivers. Instead they implement their own. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- onymousbosch · 2022-04-28 01:18 Don't they all have different kernels? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- meatmechdriver · 2022-04-28 01:38 The BSDs are not like linux distributions that share the same kernel, they are their own forks of some lineage of 386BSD. There is some cross pollination but they are distinctly different systems. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- OtherJohnGray · 2022-04-28 02:04 Also licensing, AFAIK we can’t have GPL code in the kernel because it would taint the whole OS. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- LowerSeaworthiness · 2022-04-28 05:16 Hardly an expert, but I’ve looked at the code. There’s quite a bit of divergence in driver infrastructure. People generally work on areas that matter to them, and that drives different evolutionary paths as different needs are supported. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -kilix- · 2022-04-28 07:05 They don't share drivers because they are not distros. Each of the major BSDs is a distinct operating system. It is not possible to just take a driver from OpenBSD and plug it into FreeBSD, porting a driver requires a significant amount of work. For example, OpenBSD and FreeBSD use different syscalls (yes, there is a partial overlap) and their kernels are only vaguely similar. There is not an equal support of different types of hardware amongst BSD variants, because each of the BSDs has their own goals and the developers targets are different. You can help though, if you want. Edit: not sure why you are being downvoted, cmon guys. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- GreenMan802 · 2022-04-30 03:51 Also remember that wifi cards in laptops are some of the easiest things to swap out with one that has better support for your OS of choice. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- grahamperrin · 2022-05-02 10:16 > … Intel AX200 … FreeBSD bug [244261 – Add support for Intel AX200 (iwx) wireless devices](https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=244261#c48) Cross-reference: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2022-05-02 23:51 I am aware of that. That is what I am using. But is quite buggy. Can't authenticate to some Open Networks. That is why I said. But I like freeBSD because of their WiKi. I like when a distribution has good written support. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- lazy-xo · 2022-05-25 09:17 You should research more than their wiki when it’s time to buy - and honestly - if it’s not supported why not work on it yourself? Can always use new developers on our OS Edit - can’t lie I like their wiki and the freebsdwiki.net or whatever it is too. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2022-05-25 23:22 If I had the knowledge to do it. Do you think I will be here posting this?