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Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!constellation!paladin.american.edu!gatech!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!news.Stanford.EDU!tip-mp9-ncs-3.stanford.edu!user From: terryl@cs.stanford.edu (Terry Lee) Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.misc Subject: Re: OpenBSD. PLEASE PLEASE! Date: Sun, 22 Jan 1995 00:04:59 -0800 Organization: Stanford University Lines: 50 Message-ID: <terryl-2201950004590001@tip-mp9-ncs-3.stanford.edu> References: <3fhc5s$atq@nntp.stanford.edu> <3fhpm2$chu@agate.berkeley.edu> <terryl-1901951605120001@tip-mp4-ncs-9.stanford.edu> <3fov8v$rft@agate.berkeley.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: tip-mp9-ncs-3.stanford.edu In article <3fov8v$rft@agate.berkeley.edu>, jkh@violet.berkeley.edu (Jordan K. Hubbard) wrote: > Well, let me just say then that the true dynamics of the situation CANNOT > be deduced by reading news, primarily because we've kept this kind of > dirty laundry under as tight a lid as possible (which is not to say that > we've always been successful). To really understand why it's more > complex, you'd have to be a member of the core team for either *BSD, > or someone very close to it. I know that this sounds like a cop-out, > but please just trust me on this one. After getting some quite amazing e-mail, I believe you on this one. Thanks for the clearer explanation. > Now this is not to say that something amazing might not happen in the > future, and if it does I'll certainly be willing to look at it, Well, I'll still pray for the miracle. It sounds like for this to happen, the generals need to come out an BURY THE HATCHET. Whichever general steps forth to call to his comrads to do this will be a gentleman and hero (IMHO). Anyhow, I think I'm going to stick with BSD. One important reason is because it's so close to BSDI which still carries a lot more weight in the commercial world than Linux. Ones suggestion/request: if we can't have it all with a unified BSD, then how about making it a high priority to maintain BSDI binary compatibility. Why? Because BSDI pulls a lot of weight with commercial software developers who often develop important products. For example, Netscape Navigator, and Netscape Commerce server, and TIA (these are just things I've come across in my limited experience). Linux has gained a bit of weight in this area, but BSDI is still far ahead. By being fully binary compatible with BSDI, the *BSDs could leverage off of BSDIs success and thus gain a step ahead of Linux. Mostly compatible just isn't good enough. I think close to fully compatible could really catapult *BSD's success. The runaway success of Linux is mostly in the public sector (the People's UN*X), and a more commercial approach would be a good angle to target a different sector of the market than that of Linux. Also, the public sector might start to consider *BSD more 'commercial grade' than Linux, and 'upgrade'! Such an approach I think is consistent with the fact that *BSD is based on BSD4.4, which in itself is a reason to upgrade. This and also more user friendly installation and configuration tools might help to get a leg up on Linux, and really make *BSD fly! Of course, a unified BSD would do a lot also, but maybe I should get out of my dreamworld. But dreams come true sometimes right? Best regards, Terry