tl;dr: In my opinion, these anti Linux rants do harm to OpenBSD by condemning everything Linux does instead of allowing us to pick out just the good parts.
On Wed, Jun 22, 2011 at 11:22:02AM +0200, Benny Lofgren wrote: > On 2011-06-22 09.24, Tobias Ulmer wrote: > > On Wed, Jun 22, 2011 at 03:48:59AM +0200, Benny Lofgren wrote: > >> On 2011-06-22 03.03, vadi...@gmail.com wrote: > >>>> Please continue to use Linux. > >>>> That's ugly, useless and dangerous. > >>> > >>> Oops, looks like that was a "holy war" type of question. Sorry I did > >>> not want to start that. > >>> > >>>> If you want Linux, use Linux. > >>> > >>> It's not that I want specifically Linux. I've just decided to look for > >>> a system that cat satisfy me from the usability point of view. I do > >>> not care if that will be Linux or *BSD or Solaris or whatever else. > >>> The main idea was that the work with the system should be a pleasure, > >>> not a pain :) > >> > >> What you should do is relearn the proper way. :-) > >> > > [the rest of my rant deleted] > > > Oh please, Linus wrote the kernel, not Ubuntu. If you hate coreutils or > > getopt, blame the respective groups that developed them and not someone > > writing a kernel, a long time ago. > > No, I don't hate coreutils or getopt, getopt is good shit. What I hate > is the inconsistensies, the fact that Linux isn't a homogenous piece of > work but so obviously a product of a thousand chefs, few with similar > taste. > > And my criticism extends to the kernel too, or rather begins with it, so > it definitley applies to Linus himself and the kernel guys. > > > This rose tinted "OpenBSD is the greatest" shit really gets on my > > nerves. It's all fun to bash others, but from time to time you have to > > look at their stuff and figure out which parts they did right and you > > could improve. > > Granted, my rant was, on purpose, negatively Linux-biased, but not in > one single place - also on purpose - would you have found the word > OpenBSD or any slant towards it, which makes me suspect you couldn't > stand what I wrote long enough to actually read all of it. :-) Right. And I felt in the mood to take the opposite position for the fun of it. > > So I think you might have missed my point. There is a "true unix" > heritage that needs to be cared for, THAT MAKES LIFE SIMPLER if you > understand and take advantage of it. OpenBSD specifically and old BSD in general is not true to Unix. From ksh to billions of options to find and other tools to the entire networking framework (bolted on with additional syscalls, pseudo devices etc), nothing of that is Unix (or even -like). Here is something to read: http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/ BSD went through a similar phase as GNU: adding every feature known to man to the original Unix commands. Have a look at lpr(1) for GNUism in action. After some time we got a little wiser and stopped adding flags for everything that was convenient. Linux, especially with the constant influx of new developers and commercial interests, hasn't yet cooled down enough to stop messing around with their "base" system. However if I got my history right, the improvements of BSD are why people bought a Unix license and then installed BSD. It was better, it had more features, networking, usable error messages, better language support etc. etc. > Linus missed or chose to ignore that part entirely. That's fine, as > Linux is not said to be a unix operating system, but a "unix like" one. > > The problem is, this "likeness" is not "like enough", so it really > doesn't help the community overall but rather hinders it. This is > something the Linux and GNU folks could have addressed in the early > days but either chose to ignore or were ignorant about. For that > they absolutely deserve some blame. Are you ready to test my patch where I'm going to remove -exec from find(1) so you can have your real Unix back? And -r from grep? And... Bullshit, you use BSD because just like Linux, it added lots of handy features while keeping it simple. Linux may overdo it from your and my point of view, but so does OpenBSD from the POV of some old unix guys. > > Now, the OP:s questions are certainly addressable by choosing a shell > he is used to, and perhaps by a set of aliases and/or scripts to tune > the "user experience" into something familiar for him. The getopt(3) function is inconsistent amongst operating systems and could use some polish in my opinion. Maybe there are technical reasons why this feature can't be implemented, but this discussion has certainly extinguished my curiosity about it. Backwards threads like this one prevent people from trying to improve things, which is the real damage done. Once they get "discussed" in this manner on misc@, it's difficult to get even very sensible patches committed. Some developers may have formed a strong "anti" stance and it takes years to convince them. > > My problem with that, and the reason for the recommendation I made > before digressing into rant mode, is that that practice will get him > into trouble in the long run, as he encounters other flavors of unix, > linux, Solaris, *BSD and whatever else might lie in his path in the > future. So my suggestion, while tongue in cheek, was made in all > seriousness and is in my opinion still a very valid one. I'm not specifically interested in the thread starters problem, it's reasonable to suggest more portable approaches. What got me was the (imo) baseless anti Linux (and Linus) sentiment. I love good rants, but every now and then... Anyway, here's my novel, now I have work to do. > > (Ok, this will be my last novel in this thread, I promise... I just > seem genetically unable to say things in just a few words.) > > > Regards, > /Benny > > -- > internetlabbet.se / work: +46 8 551 124 80 / "Words must > Benny Lvfgren / mobile: +46 70 718 11 90 / be weighed, > / fax: +46 8 551 124 89 / not counted." > / email: benny -at- internetlabbet.se
