Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Jay Patel]

A Journey Into BSD and Standards: BSD and POSIX 
https://indico.bsdcan.org/event/1/contributions/26/

Yahoo Mail: Search, organise, conquer 
 
  On Fri, 10 May 2024 at 12:28 am, Liam Proven wrote:   On 
Thu, 2 May 2024 at 14:51, Hauke Fath (SPG)  wrote:
>
> And there's the rub, right there.
>
> You want to tell other people ("developers") what they should spend
> their time on. And if you were ten times right, it wouldn't work that way

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Liam Proven]

On Thu, 2 May 2024 at 14:51, Hauke Fath (SPG)  wrote:
>
> And there's the rub, right there.
>
> You want to tell other people ("developers") what they should spend
> their time on. And if you were ten times right, it wouldn't work that way.

Ahh yes. Excellent point.

> Do the leg work yourself, and things *might* come to happen. Or not.

If I were capable, which I am not, then there are other things I would
focus my efforts on which I find much more interesting than 1970s
monolithic Unix-type OSes.

In that family of designs, I personally find Plan 9 and Inferno _far_
more interesting, for instance. I did a talk on that theme at FOSDEM
in Brussels in February:

https://fosdem.org/2024/schedule/event/fosdem-2024-3095-one-way-forward-finding-a-path-to-what-comes-after-unix/

I turned it into some articles:

https://www.theregister.com/Tag/One%20Way%20Forward/

But I am more intrigued by the idea of getting away completely from
the concepts of "filesystems" and "drives", which I regard as legacy
technology -- 20th century stuff. That was the theme of my previous
talk, which became the "starting over" article above.

https://archive.fosdem.org/2021/schedule/event/new_type_of_computer/

-- 
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Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Hauke Fath (SPG)]

On 2024-05-02 11:44, Liam Proven wrote:

This is not so much about the binaries about about the ABI for libc and
other core libs.   But I suspec this works better than you think, if one
arranges for the other libs and deals with elf tags.

You are missing my point.

I am not asking "are they close?" or "are they compatible?" I am
saying: let's


And there's the rub, right there.

You want to tell other people ("developers") what they should spend 
their time on. And if you were ten times right, it wouldn't work that way.


Do the leg work yourself, and things *might* come to happen. Or not.


work out the differences, make a detailed specific list,
and see if it would be possible to work out a specific standard API so
that*the same binaries*  could run on them all.


Ob-xkcd: 

Cheerio,
Hauke

--
 The ASCII Ribbon CampaignHauke Fath
() No HTML/RTF in email Institut für Nachrichtentechnik
/\ No Word docs in email TU Darmstadt
 Respect for open standards  Ruf +49-6151-16-21344

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Jay Patel]

https://archive.fosdem.org/2023/schedule/event/bsd_driver_harmony/attachments/slides/5976/export/events/attachments/bsd_driver_harmony/slides/5976/BSD_Driver_Harmony_FOSDEM.pdf
Talk from Last year 
Yahoo Mail: Search, organise, conquer 
 
  On Thu, 2 May 2024 at 3:14 pm, Liam Proven wrote:   On 
Wed, 1 May 2024 at 12:31, Greg Troxel  wrote:
>
> Liam Proven  writes:
>
> > Step 1: a binary interoperability standard, so apps from any BSD can
> > execute on any other BSD (on the same CPU architecture, obviously.)
>
> This is not so much about the binaries about about the ABI for libc and
> other core libs.  But I suspec this works better than you think, if one
> arranges for the other libs and deals with elf tags.

You are missing my point.

I am not asking "are they close?" or "are they compatible?" I am
saying: let's work out the differences, make a detailed specific list,
and see if it would be possible to work out a specific standard API so
that *the same binaries* could run on them all.

A modern BSD equivalent of the iBCS 2:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Binary_Compatibility_Standard

> All BSDs come from 386BSD and Net/2, said in a very broad brush way.

I know that. I have been working in the Unix industry and thus
watching this sector closely since half a decade before 386BSD was
released.

> It's not accurate to say that the kernels are unique. [...]

Again, you misunderstand and do not see my point.

I am saying: let us try to isolate and work out which parts of the 3
or 4 main BSD projects are specific to each OS and which are shared.

Each BSD's kernel is its own. Yes they are all related. We know that.
The clue is in the BSD name. But they are not the same any more and
merging the kernels would be both an epic job, as well as one that
nobody would want to do or to happen.


> > * Coreutils?
>
> coreutils is a term for a GNU package, and many/most of those
> utilities in BSDs aren't from that.  Really, coreutils is the linux
> reimplementation of traditional utilities.

I dispute that. It's just a name. Don't fixate on the name. Thing
about the thing that the name refers to.

Here is one set of BSD coreutils, ported to Linux:

https://github.com/DiegoMagdaleno/BSDCoreUtils

Here is another:

https://github.com/dcantrell/bsdutils

Here's a modernised port of that:

https://github.com/chimera-linux/chimerautils

It is an identifiable, discrete thing.

FWIW I have written about this subject as part of this article:

https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/13/chimera_non_gnu_linux/


> Lots of things are the same because they are from the same upstream,
> eg. OpenSSH.  But others are differnet.  Again you can't really slice it
> that way so easily.

I submit that there is a very important difference between "you can't
slice it" and "nobody has tried to slice it".

> Mostly these are the same upstreams, perhaps packaged differently.

I know. That is my point.

> emacs runs on all of them.  I'm not sure what your point is here.

My point is to try to reduce the maintenance load of the 4 separate
BSD projects by identifying where they overlap and moving those
duplicated sections into a shared codebase, which can be
collaboratively maintained by all the teams, reducing the maintenance
burden on those parts by, conservatively, 75%.


-- 
Liam Proven ~ Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk ~ gMail/gTalk/FB: lpro...@gmail.com
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Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Liam Proven]

On Wed, 1 May 2024 at 12:31, Greg Troxel  wrote:
>
> Liam Proven  writes:
>
> > Step 1: a binary interoperability standard, so apps from any BSD can
> > execute on any other BSD (on the same CPU architecture, obviously.)
>
> This is not so much about the binaries about about the ABI for libc and
> other core libs.   But I suspec this works better than you think, if one
> arranges for the other libs and deals with elf tags.

You are missing my point.

I am not asking "are they close?" or "are they compatible?" I am
saying: let's work out the differences, make a detailed specific list,
and see if it would be possible to work out a specific standard API so
that *the same binaries* could run on them all.

A modern BSD equivalent of the iBCS 2:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Binary_Compatibility_Standard

> All BSDs come from 386BSD and Net/2, said in a very broad brush way.

I know that. I have been working in the Unix industry and thus
watching this sector closely since half a decade before 386BSD was
released.

> It's not accurate to say that the kernels are unique. [...]

Again, you misunderstand and do not see my point.

I am saying: let us try to isolate and work out which parts of the 3
or 4 main BSD projects are specific to each OS and which are shared.

Each BSD's kernel is its own. Yes they are all related. We know that.
The clue is in the BSD name. But they are not the same any more and
merging the kernels would be both an epic job, as well as one that
nobody would want to do or to happen.


> > * Coreutils?
>
> coreutils is a term for a GNU package, and many/most of those
> utilities in BSDs aren't from that.   Really, coreutils is the linux
> reimplementation of traditional utilities.

I dispute that. It's just a name. Don't fixate on the name. Thing
about the thing that the name refers to.

Here is one set of BSD coreutils, ported to Linux:

https://github.com/DiegoMagdaleno/BSDCoreUtils

Here is another:

https://github.com/dcantrell/bsdutils

Here's a modernised port of that:

https://github.com/chimera-linux/chimerautils

It is an identifiable, discrete thing.

FWIW I have written about this subject as part of this article:

https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/13/chimera_non_gnu_linux/


> Lots of things are the same because they are from the same upstream,
> eg. OpenSSH.  But others are differnet.  Again you can't really slice it
> that way so easily.

I submit that there is a very important difference between "you can't
slice it" and "nobody has tried to slice it".

> Mostly these are the same upstreams, perhaps packaged differently.

I know. That is my point.

> emacs runs on all of them.  I'm not sure what your point is here.

My point is to try to reduce the maintenance load of the 4 separate
BSD projects by identifying where they overlap and moving those
duplicated sections into a shared codebase, which can be
collaboratively maintained by all the teams, reducing the maintenance
burden on those parts by, conservatively, 75%.


-- 
Liam Proven ~ Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk ~ gMail/gTalk/FB: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/LinkedIn: lproven ~ Skype: liamproven
IoM: (+44) 7624 277612: UK: (+44) 7939-087884
Czech [+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal]: (+420) 702-829-053

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Greg Troxel]

Liam Proven  writes:

> Step 1: a binary interoperability standard, so apps from any BSD can
> execute on any other BSD (on the same CPU architecture, obviously.)

This is not so much about the binaries about about the ABI for libc and
other core libs.   But I suspec this works better than you think, if one
arranges for the other libs and deals with elf tags.

> Step 2: identify the core OS elements that are widely different, and
> those that are largely shared because they are upstream FOSS code.

All BSDs come from 386BSD and Net/2, said in a very broad brush way.

> Unique and different:
> * Kernels
> * LibC
> * Init daemon, maybe?
> * Packaging tools

It's not accurate to say that the kernels are unique.  There is a lot of
common code.  You can't really slice it that way, because what's common
and what isn't is not organized along the kinds of lines you are
listing.

> Largely common:
> * Shells
> * Coreutils?

coreutils is a term for a GNU package, and many/most of those
utilities in BSDs aren't from that.   Really, coreutils is the linux
reimplementation of traditional utilities.

> * Console-level userland?
> * X11 server?
> * Other core servers, such as HTTPD, SSH, etc.?
> * Compilers

Lots of things are the same because they are from the same upstream,
eg. OpenSSH.  But others are differnet.  Again you can't really slice it
that way so easily.

> Mostly separate:
> * Desktop environments and window managers
> * Upstream apps such as editors, web browsers, office suites, etc.

Mostly these are the same upstreams, perhaps packaged differently.
emacs runs on all of them.  I'm not sure what your point is here.


I see the biggest benefit to adding kernel support for other BSD's
interfaces, and things like stealing updated zfs code from FreeBSD.
But that's all work, and people do work when they feel like it.

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Liam Proven]

On Tue, 30 Apr 2024 at 21:38, Riccardo Mottola
 wrote:
>
> Ciao Liam!

*Waves* :-)
>
> There is actually, but it is never easy. I have seen good transfer
> between NetBSD and OpenBSD in the years, including drivers and such.

I wonder if there might be some way to formalise it, without stepping
on too many egos.

Step 1: a binary interoperability standard, so apps from any BSD can
execute on any other BSD (on the same CPU architecture, obviously.)

Step 2: identify the core OS elements that are widely different, and
those that are largely shared because they are upstream FOSS code.

Unique and different:
* Kernels
* LibC
* Init daemon, maybe?
* Packaging tools

Largely common:
* Shells
* Coreutils?
* Console-level userland?
* X11 server?
* Other core servers, such as HTTPD, SSH, etc.?
* Compilers

Mostly separate:
* Desktop environments and window managers
* Upstream apps such as editors, web browsers, office suites, etc.

Then work out if there could be cooperation on the bulk of the
userland code, so that it could be shared between all of them. One
common set of software repositories that Net/Open/Free/Dragonfly all
drew from.

This could, it seems to me, vastly reduce the maintenance of each
project and allow more effective sharing of developers' time and
effort.

But whether it's possible with all the conflicting egos, I have no idea.

> > Dragonfly has the best installer, IMHO, but of course it has many
> > fewer options to cover.
>
> I only use the "canonical" three.

It's worth trying Dragonfly and Ghost in VMs, at least, just to see
the contrast.

>  I must say as a user I like NetBSD and
> OpenBSD best.

There are good things, yes. I don't know enough to have a favourite.

> I think Debian has a good, but complicated, heavy installer. NetBSD
> could learn something from it, but not too much.
> Debian has a decent partitioning tool

I largely agree there.

> OpenBSD are complicated people..

:-D

> I'm not expert there, but they should have peraps more per

This sentence looks unfinished...?
>
> Terminal type does that for you... and NetBSD install works well even
> ona 9600 baud serial vt100, which is really legacy technology.

I am aware. But it is possible to gracefully scale _up_ as well as down.

> Yes, upgrading sometimes does not well test the bare install. However
> both are important applications.

I often hear from BSD users that they never see the installer so they
don't care.

This is foolish. If you only try to promote to, and include, existing
users then decline is inevitable, because people age and die. In
English it is called "preaching to the choir" and it is a proverb for
pointless, wasted activity.

Whereas your installer is *the first thing* newcomers see. Again, an
English proverb: "you never get  a 2nd chance to make a first
impression."

Lose them then, you lose them forever.

> I tend to too to upgrade... In the case of NetBSD however you still test
> a big part of the install - except partitioning. You do all steps!

That's the job. As the earlier flame in this thread shows, some people
cannot handle criticism of things they are accustomed to.

-- 
Liam Proven ~ Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk ~ gMail/gTalk/FB: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/LinkedIn: lproven ~ Skype: liamproven
IoM: (+44) 7624 277612: UK: (+44) 7939-087884
Czech [+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal]: (+420) 702-829-053

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Lucifer]

OpenBSD is NetBSD Lite

On Tue, Apr 30, 2024, 5:57 PM Riccardo Mottola 
wrote:

> Ciao Liam!
>
> Liam Proven wrote:
> > I really wish there were more technology sharing between the BSDs.
>
> There is actually, but it is never easy. I have seen good transfer
> between NetBSD and OpenBSD in the years, including drivers and such.
>
> >
> > Dragonfly has the best installer, IMHO, but of course it has many
> > fewer options to cover.
>
> I only use the "canonical" three. I must say as a user I like NetBSD and
> OpenBSD best.
> Of course the less platforms the easier it is. Things like partitioning,
> bootloader complicate things.
>
> I think NetBSD has a quite good installer in many aspects. Quick to
> setup, has a very convenient utility, network setup.
> Essentially the worst part is partitioning, but it is a tricky matter.
> On classic BIOS PC setup it works quite well though... quick and fast.
> Try to partition MacPPC and you get crazy.
>
> > FreeBSD is the worst inasmuch as it does the least complete job.
> I agree... however it has some interesting points.
> I think Debian has a good, but complicated, heavy installer. NetBSD
> could learn something from it, but not too much.
> Debian has a decent partitioning tool
>
> >
> > Some OpenBSD folks are angry with me because I criticise its disk
> > partitioner. When I tell them the config I work with and they recoil
> > and go "OMG that is _impossible!_"
>
> OpenBSD are complicated people.. but they do good stuff. Also the prompt
> based installer is quite good! Upgrading is excellent! But certain
> things are a bit extreme. like no dhcp setup (must test latest
> though, maybe they changed it again).
>
> > The point being: cross-platform installers that work on multiple very
> > different distros with different packaging tools are 100% a thing.
> I'm not expert there, but they should have peraps more per
>
> > I am sure it would be possible to write a program which, when run,
> > tests the console or terminal to determine if it can use colour and
> > cursor controls, and if it can, which presents a
> > cursor-key-driven-menu based UI with CUA-style controls -- but  if the
> > terminal does not, then falls back gracefully to simple numeric or
> > letter-choice menus.
>
> Terminal type does that for you... and NetBSD install works well even
> ona 9600 baud serial vt100, which is really legacy technology.
>
> >
> >
> > Long-term users often tell me that they do not notice the issues
> > because they simply upgrade from one version to the next and never see
> > the installer. Well, in that case, offer that opportunity to visitors
> > as well: it would be to the benefit of all of the BSD family if the
> > projects supplied pre-installed and pre-configured VM images for
> > direct download, so that the curious could simply download an OVA
> > file, import it into the hypervisor of their choice, and try the OS
> > out without installing it at all.
>
> Yes, upgrading sometimes does not well test the bare install. However
> both are important applications.
> I tend to too to upgrade... In the case of NetBSD however you still test
> a big part of the install - except partitioning. You do all steps!
>
> I just did an upgrade on SPARC64 and it worked wonderfully.
>
>
>
> Cheers,
>
> Riccardo
>

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Riccardo Mottola]

Ciao Liam!

Liam Proven wrote:

I really wish there were more technology sharing between the BSDs.


There is actually, but it is never easy. I have seen good transfer 
between NetBSD and OpenBSD in the years, including drivers and such.




Dragonfly has the best installer, IMHO, but of course it has many
fewer options to cover.


I only use the "canonical" three. I must say as a user I like NetBSD and 
OpenBSD best.
Of course the less platforms the easier it is. Things like partitioning, 
bootloader complicate things.


I think NetBSD has a quite good installer in many aspects. Quick to 
setup, has a very convenient utility, network setup.
Essentially the worst part is partitioning, but it is a tricky matter. 
On classic BIOS PC setup it works quite well though... quick and fast.

Try to partition MacPPC and you get crazy.


FreeBSD is the worst inasmuch as it does the least complete job.

I agree... however it has some interesting points.
I think Debian has a good, but complicated, heavy installer. NetBSD 
could learn something from it, but not too much.

Debian has a decent partitioning tool



Some OpenBSD folks are angry with me because I criticise its disk
partitioner. When I tell them the config I work with and they recoil
and go "OMG that is _impossible!_"


OpenBSD are complicated people.. but they do good stuff. Also the prompt 
based installer is quite good! Upgrading is excellent! But certain 
things are a bit extreme. like no dhcp setup (must test latest 
though, maybe they changed it again).



The point being: cross-platform installers that work on multiple very
different distros with different packaging tools are 100% a thing.

I'm not expert there, but they should have peraps more per


I am sure it would be possible to write a program which, when run,
tests the console or terminal to determine if it can use colour and
cursor controls, and if it can, which presents a
cursor-key-driven-menu based UI with CUA-style controls -- but  if the
terminal does not, then falls back gracefully to simple numeric or
letter-choice menus.


Terminal type does that for you... and NetBSD install works well even 
ona 9600 baud serial vt100, which is really legacy technology.





Long-term users often tell me that they do not notice the issues
because they simply upgrade from one version to the next and never see
the installer. Well, in that case, offer that opportunity to visitors
as well: it would be to the benefit of all of the BSD family if the
projects supplied pre-installed and pre-configured VM images for
direct download, so that the curious could simply download an OVA
file, import it into the hypervisor of their choice, and try the OS
out without installing it at all.


Yes, upgrading sometimes does not well test the bare install. However 
both are important applications.
I tend to too to upgrade... In the case of NetBSD however you still test 
a big part of the install - except partitioning. You do all steps!


I just did an upgrade on SPARC64 and it worked wonderfully.



Cheers,

Riccardo

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Liam Proven]

On Fri, 19 Apr 2024 at 10:01, Riccardo Mottola
 wrote:
>
> Hi Liam.

Ciao!

> Nice share and thanks for taking the time to write it.

Oh, thank you!

I really wish there were more technology sharing between the BSDs.

In the last ~2 years, I have tried Net, Open, Free, Dragonfly, Ghost,
Midnight, Nomad, the Hello System, plus XigmaNAS and TrueNAS Core.

(I have also installed and written about 9Front, Redox OS, Serenity
OS, Genode, Arca OS, FreeDOS, RISC OS Open, RISC OS Direct, and
others.)

I really am trying to cover as many bases as I can here.

Dragonfly has the best installer, IMHO, but of course it has many
fewer options to cover.

FreeBSD is the worst inasmuch as it does the least complete job.

Some OpenBSD folks are angry with me because I criticise its disk
partitioner. When I tell them the config I work with and they recoil
and go "OMG that is _impossible!_"

One of the better Linux installers is Calamares, which does not depend
upon any distribution: it's an independent project. Pop OS and
Elementary OS share an installer. Multiple Ubuntu remixes share
variants of Ubiquity and Subiquity. Some variants of this can run in
both GUI and text-driven modes.

The point being: cross-platform installers that work on multiple very
different distros with different packaging tools are 100% a thing.

I am sure it would be possible to write a program which, when run,
tests the console or terminal to determine if it can use colour and
cursor controls, and if it can, which presents a
cursor-key-driven-menu based UI with CUA-style controls -- but  if the
terminal does not, then falls back gracefully to simple numeric or
letter-choice menus.

Binary compatibility is not really an issue because this is an ideal
kind of application of a scripting language.

It would be to the advantage of all the BSDs if they worked together
on this, pick the best of each OS's installer, and combined them into
one.

Long-term users often tell me that they do not notice the issues
because they simply upgrade from one version to the next and never see
the installer. Well, in that case, offer that opportunity to visitors
as well: it would be to the benefit of all of the BSD family if the
projects supplied pre-installed and pre-configured VM images for
direct download, so that the curious could simply download an OVA
file, import it into the hypervisor of their choice, and try the OS
out without installing it at all.

Several Linux distros do this, especially the enterprise ones which do
not expect to run on bare metal.

-- 
Liam Proven ~ Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk ~ gMail/gTalk/FB: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/LinkedIn: lproven ~ Skype: liamproven
IoM: (+44) 7624 277612: UK: (+44) 7939-087884
Czech [+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal]: (+420) 702-829-053

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Riccardo Mottola]

Hi Liam.

Liam Proven wrote:

I thought this might interest folks here...


Nice share and thanks for taking the time to write it.


NetBSD 10 proves old tech can still kick apps and take names three decades later

Proper old-school Unix, not like those lazy, decadent Linux types

https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/30yo_netbsd_releases_v10/

Comments and feedback welcomed!


I mostly agree with the article, the citations, it gives the mood back. 
Then it shares some personal opinions about experience.


Some considerations:

* About "size" and "performance". NetBSD runs well on a lot of software, 
in my experience the core OS is very comparable to OpenBSD, but a litte 
bit easier since it doesn't have the relink stuff, and base Linux. 
However recent linux with systemd are definitely worse. However still 
there is "imported userland" and then "pkgsrc". Except for raw speed in 
system calls, kernel management, if you install package X it will about 
be similar in size on different operating systems. So for sure since 
XFCE has gotten fatty, you get the same fat on NetBSD. Same goes for  
GCC which gets fatter and slower with each release :) Of course, new 
features are added. You start to see the size of packages installed more 
than the OS itself


* installation experience. I like the menu-driven installer, it has the 
classic semi-GUI with windows and arrows, but still very usable on a 
serial console (handy if you install on a server!). The rough edges in 
my opinion are in the partitioning. I am myself bitten right now by an 
upgrade on a "standard x86-64 laptop". Resizing partitions, selecting, 
labels... that part. Of course it is complicated by all the many 
differences in BIOS, UEFI... OpenFirmware on mac, etc etc
However, when things go smooth, e.g. on a classic BIOS-based PC where 
you take over the whole disk, it is very fine and convenient.


Riccardo

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[adr]

On Thu, 18 Apr 2024, Taylor R Campbell wrote:


Date: Thu, 18 Apr 2024 15:53:27 +
From: Taylor R Campbell 
To: adr 
Cc: netbsd-users@NetBSD.org, Liam Proven 
Subject: Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

Hi adr,

Liam provided valuable feedback in both reviews, and if anything we
haven't put enough effort into smoothing out the rough edges Liam
pointed out, like figuring out why command-line editing and PATH
weren't set up right out of the box.  There's always room for
improvement, and our documentation is sometimes hard to follow,
missing parts, or too wordy in places.

This feedback helps us to improve the out-of-the-box experience for
users, fix unnecessarily confusing parts of the experience, and
identify where the documentation is lacking or hard to find.

Gatekeeping NetBSD on the basis of prior expertise is not good for the
community, and not good for the project.  sysinst is supposed to be a
tool to help you, not a test of your patience or knowledge.

We would appreciate it if you toned down your criticism of a new user
and their honest feedback about the experience so we as a community
don't discourage other users and further feedback as we continue to
improve NetBSD.

Thanks,
-Riastradh, NetBSD core team



This person wasn't talking only about the problems that someone
could have installing netbsd. There are problems. If you read the
review that he or she did to the las version of netbsd, you'll find
that the majority of the problems were a result of this person don't
bothering to read the documentation, and ignorance of basic unix.

All of us are here in this world to learn.

The problem is when you start making affirmations based on that
ignorance missleading people an creating a bad image of the project.

This person didn't say "I don't know what is happening with the
shell when you install netbsd". This person said "netbsd doesn't
support cursor keys". Just one example among so many. You should
read some commentaries of surprised readers in that article.

If that's ok with you, and with what this king of thing does to
the image of the netbsd project among unix-like operating system
users, and you want to encourage that, I will respect it because
you are part of the core team and this is not my house.

Next time I'll ignore it.

Regards.

adr.

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[adr]

On Thu, 18 Apr 2024, Jonathan A. Kollasch wrote:

This all was uncalled for, and is not welcome in this community.


If you think that encouraging someone that wrote this:

https://www.theregister.com/2022/08/10/netbsd_93/

is ok, then I'm not interested in your opinion more that I'm in the
opinion of that person about netbsd.

PS. I've always found of bad taste individuals pretending to be
the voice of a community.

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Taylor R Campbell]

Hi adr,

Liam provided valuable feedback in both reviews, and if anything we
haven't put enough effort into smoothing out the rough edges Liam
pointed out, like figuring out why command-line editing and PATH
weren't set up right out of the box.  There's always room for
improvement, and our documentation is sometimes hard to follow,
missing parts, or too wordy in places.

This feedback helps us to improve the out-of-the-box experience for
users, fix unnecessarily confusing parts of the experience, and
identify where the documentation is lacking or hard to find.

Gatekeeping NetBSD on the basis of prior expertise is not good for the
community, and not good for the project.  sysinst is supposed to be a
tool to help you, not a test of your patience or knowledge.

We would appreciate it if you toned down your criticism of a new user
and their honest feedback about the experience so we as a community
don't discourage other users and further feedback as we continue to
improve NetBSD.

Thanks,
-Riastradh, NetBSD core team

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Jonathan A. Kollasch]

On Thu, Apr 18, 2024 at 03:23:34PM +, adr wrote:
> On Thu, 18 Apr 2024, Liam Proven wrote:
~ ~ 
> > Comments and feedback welcomed!
> 
> [...]The last time we looked at NetBSD, we checked out version 9.3[...]
> 
> I remember reading that and not understanding how the person who
> wrote that encouraged him|her self to review the os.
~ 
> So unprofessional.

This all was uncalled for, and is not welcome in this community.

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[adr]

On Thu, 18 Apr 2024, Liam Proven wrote:


Date: Thu, 18 Apr 2024 12:00:32 +0100
From: Liam Proven 
To: Netbsd-Users-List 
Subject: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

I thought this might interest folks here...

NetBSD 10 proves old tech can still kick apps and take names three decades later

Proper old-school Unix, not like those lazy, decadent Linux types

https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/30yo_netbsd_releases_v10/

Comments and feedback welcomed!


[...]The last time we looked at NetBSD, we checked out version 9.3[...]

I remember reading that and not understanding how the person who
wrote that encouraged him|her self to review the os.

* Not reading the official documentation, pointing to tutorials
like in the linux world.

* Ignorance about the edit mode of the shells, and instead of
talking about the usefulness of having one of them (vi, emacs)
activated by default, blaiming that it was a lack of support of
curor keys, and saying that linux is a modern operating system that
supports cursor keys. I couldn't stop a laugh. No idea what shell
was the person using, no idea that there are several shells to choose
and more to install.

* Not finishing the installation as recommended in the guide, and then
saying that the netbsd installation is "a three-step process".

* Not reading the pkgsrc documentation, even the introduction, and
basically whinning because it wasn't apt. Again, pointing to
tutorials on how to install pkgin...

* Not idea what PATH is. cd to /usr/pkg/bin to execute pkgin
How could this person had the balls to "review" and Operating System

* Not reading the netbsd guide about parttions, dislabel, wadges,
 and saying that unlike netbsd, linux supports partitions that
other oses can open.

And lots, lots of crap. When I followed that link and see that it
was _you_, I stoped reading.

You can use C-n, C-p to move through the menus in sysinst if for
some reason your keyboard isn't fully supported. The letters and
numbers are for selecting quickly an entry. This is common in a
lot of curses application, again, basic stuff. You could ask all
this nonsense to the list, I'm sure people here including myself
would help you.

The problem is that you went with all this lack of basic unix
knowledge and made a "review" of netbsd, missleading people with
your ignorance, something incredibly common in the linux world.

So, no, I can't give you a feedback of your last "piece".

And if anyone reading this thinks that I'm an asshole, read the
points I made and follow that link. I've contained myself. Really.

Who edit theregister by the way?

So unprofessional.

adr

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Liam Proven]

On Thu, 18 Apr 2024 at 14:21, Benny Siegert  wrote:
>
> Wonderful article, thanks for sharing! :D

Oh thank you! Thank you too for your help in inspiring it – and
putting me in touch with Martin.

-- 
Liam Proven ~ Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk ~ gMail/gTalk/FB: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/LinkedIn: lproven ~ Skype: liamproven
IoM: (+44) 7624 277612: UK: (+44) 7939-087884
Czech [+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal]: (+420) 702-829-053

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Michael Huff]

On Thu, Apr 18, 2024 at 3:01 AM Liam Proven  wrote:

> I thought this might interest folks here...
>
> NetBSD 10 proves old tech can still kick apps and take names three decades
> later
>
> Proper old-school Unix, not like those lazy, decadent Linux types
>
> https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/30yo_netbsd_releases_v10/
>
> Comments and feedback welcomed!
>
> --
> Liam Proven ~ Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
> Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk ~ gMail/gTalk/FB: lpro...@gmail.com
> Twitter/LinkedIn: lproven ~ Skype: liamproven
> IoM: (+44) 7624 277612: UK: (+44) 7939-087884
> Czech [+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal]: (+420) 702-829-053
>

I saw it on Hacker News ,
enjoyed the discussion on both sites (HN, Register) . Thanks for writing it
up and sharing it!

Re: Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Benny Siegert]

On Thu, Apr 18, 2024 at 1:01 PM Liam Proven  wrote:
> NetBSD 10 proves old tech can still kick apps and take names three decades 
> later
>
> Proper old-school Unix, not like those lazy, decadent Linux types
>
> https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/30yo_netbsd_releases_v10/
>
> Comments and feedback welcomed!

Wonderful article, thanks for sharing! :D

-- 
Benny

Please forgive a blatant plug: I reviewed v10 for the Reg

[Liam Proven]

I thought this might interest folks here...

NetBSD 10 proves old tech can still kick apps and take names three decades later

Proper old-school Unix, not like those lazy, decadent Linux types

https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/30yo_netbsd_releases_v10/

Comments and feedback welcomed!

--
Liam Proven ~ Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk ~ gMail/gTalk/FB: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/LinkedIn: lproven ~ Skype: liamproven
IoM: (+44) 7624 277612: UK: (+44) 7939-087884
Czech [+ WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal]: (+420) 702-829-053