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From: burgess@cynjut.neonramp.com (Dave Burgess)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.announce,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.announce,comp.answers,news.answers
Subject: [comp.unix.bsd] NetBSD, FreeBSD, and 386BSD (0.1) FAQ (Part 1 of 10)
Supersedes: <386bsd-faq-1-841241603@cynjut.neonramp.com>
Followup-To: comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc
Date: 13 Sep 1996 01:00:04 -0500
Organization: Dave's House in Omaha
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Reply-To: burgess@cynjut.neonramp.com (386bsd FAQ Maintainer)
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Keywords: FAQ 386bsd NetBSD FreeBSD !Linux
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Posted-By: auto-faq 3.1.1.2
Archive-name: 386bsd-faq/part1




			Frequently Asked Questions
		       386BSD, NetBSD, FreeBSD, and
		       other BSD derived Operating 
				 Systems.


		   	   EXTREMELY UNOFFICIAL


  Original FAQ by:
	Terry Lambert

  New FAQ by:
	Dave Burgess

	burgess@cynjut.neonramp.com


			   Last Update:  28 Aug 1996 


Section 0.  (Basic FAQ information)

0.0	Master Index.

	0.0          Master Index.
	0.1          A brief history of the *BSD family.
	0.1.1        Which of the 4.3 BSD files were identified as
		     encumbered? What's all this about `binary-only files'?
		     Will BSDI continue to ship source code? What did NetBSD
		     and FreeBSD do about the encumbered files? 
	0.1.2        How close is NetBSD (or FreeBSD) to BSD 4.4?
	0.1.3        Where can I get more information about the *BSD family
		     of Operating Systems? 
	0.2          About this FAQ.
	0.2a         What are the differences between *BSD and (your favorite
		     operating system name here)? 
	0.2b         Which is better, (your favorite operating system name
		     here) or *BSD? 
	0.2c         Is 386bsd better than (your favorite operating system
		     name here)? 
	0.2.1        So what ARE the differences between the *BSD family and
		     Linux? 
	0.2.2        I want to start up a thread about why *BSD is or isn't
		     as good as some other operating system. Can anyone
		     suggest a good reason why I shouldn't? 
	0.2.3        Are all of the Berkeley derived systems binary
		     compatible? If not, what are the differences? 
	0.3          Are there any resources on the Net (like URLs)
		     associated with the BSD family of operating systems? 
	0.4          How to add your pet answer to the FAQ.
	0.5          Administrivia.
	0.6          Does anyone reading this have any sense of humor at all?
		     
	1.0          I just downloaded all of 386bsd version 0.1 and I can't
		     get [some feature] to work? Do you have any suggestions?
		     
	1.1          Feature summary
	1.2          *BSD software projects in progress
	1.2.1        Contacting software authors
	1.3          Minimum hardware configuration recommended
	1.4          Where to get the source and binaries
	1.4.1        Where can I get the distribution on floppy or tape?
	1.4.2        Where can I get the distribution via FTP?
	1.4.3        Where can I get the distribution on CD ROM?
	1.5          Electronic Information Groups for *BSD
	1.5.1        Usenet newsgroups
	1.5.2        Newsgroup archives.
	1.5.3        *BSD system mailing lists.
	1.5.4        System Updates.
	1.6          Documentation available
	1.6.1        BSD manuals
	1.6.2        BSD books
	1.6.3        The Jolitz Book
	1.6.4        Dr. Dobbs' journal
	1.6.5        Documentation that comes with most of the distributions.
		     
	1.6.6        The O'Reilly and Associates BSD 4.4 Set.
	1.6.7        Other FAQ's on the net that are relevant
	1.7          FTP sites for *BSD
	1.7.1        Official distribution sites
	1.7.3        Reference sites
	1.7.4        Unofficial archive sites that have neat stuff!
	1.7.5        Where can I get a non-X cdplayer program for NetBSD?
	1.7.6        X Ported Software List
	1.8.7        Motif for the *BSD family. (Infomercial to follow)
	2.0          Install process
	2.0.1        Boot disks (versions and media formats)
	2.0.1.2a     The floppy booted, but now the hard disk won't boot?
	2.0.1.2b     I am trying to reinstall. I run install and it loops
		     asking me if I want to use the whole disk? 
	2.0.1.4      What are the options on the boot prompt?
	2.0.1.5      I just used the '-s' option on the boot, but I can't
		     write anything onto the disk. What is wrong? If I use a
		     plain 'mount' command it tells me that my root file
		     system is read-only. 
	2.0.2        Fix-it boot disk
	2.1          Binary distribution
	2.1.1        I want to install by NFS but I am having all kinds of
		     problems. 
	2.2          Configuration
	2.5.1        Partitions
	2.5.1.1      What is a 'disklabel' and why do I need one?
	2.2.1.2      What other kinds of information do I need if I really
		     want to tune my hard drive's performance in conjunction
		     with a newfs? 
	2.2.2        Common Disk Label Problems.
	2.2.2.1      Increasing the *BSD partition size.
	2.2.2.2      I can access the DOS partition on my second disk from
		     Unix but not DOS? Any suggestions? 
	2.2.2.3      I want to use my entire 2 Gig drive as the root
		     partition. Why doesn't it work? 
	2.5.3        How do I set up the system so that I can boot from more
		     than one operating system/file-loader without using
		     floppies? 
	2.2.3        How do I get the system to boot from the second hard
		     drive? 
	2.2.4        How do I disklabel my second hard drive?
	2.2.5        NetBSD and FreeBSD cannot handle disk geometry
		     translations, but it turns out that my disk geometry is
		     translated. It has five zones, each with a different
		     sec/track! What kind of things can I do about the disk
		     translation my hard disk controller uses? 
	2.2.6        I am having trouble installing on the EIDE hard drive.
		     What are some of the things that I need to look into? 
	2.2.7        My disk label is complaining about '256 heads' in the
		     disklabel. This is obviously bogus, but it doesn't seem
		     to be hurting anything. Is it Okay or should I fix it? 
	2.2.8        What are the options for the bootup prompt?
	2.5.9        I am having trouble installing WRT 'syslogd: bind: Can't
		     assign requested address' errors. What are some of the
		     things I should look at? I also am having trouble with
		     the network: 'starting network ... ifconfig: localhost:
		     badvalue'. 
	2.2.10       I am having trouble getting net aliases to work. What
		     could some of the problems be? 
	2.2.11       I'm having trouble with the networking code
		     (specifically the PPP stuff to my ISP). How can I debug
		     NetBSD's networking? 
	2.2.12       I want to hard wire my SCSI devices to a particular
		     device number. Is that possible? 
	2.3          Common installation problems.
	2.3.1        Swap space not identified correctly.
	2.3.2        Endless reboot cycles.
	2.4          The computer just sits there, or 'that isn't right'.
	2.4.1        The boot disk works all right on one computer but not
		     another. 
	2.4.2        Really strange errors in the various *BSD flavors.
	2.4.2.1      I am using the original 386bsd 0.1 with no patches
		     installed and I get flashing multicolored characters and
		     a "ptdi 81061" prompt error? 
	2.4.2.2      Using the new code in NetBSD, I get a "panic: pdti
		     206067" in pmap_enter(). What should I do? 
	2.4.3a       I get the error "isr 15 and error: isr 17" on an NE2000
		     card. 
	2.4.3b       I have some card on IRQ2 and it doesn't work; why?
	2.4.3c       I am getting lousy performance out of my network card.
		     What are some of the other possibilities? 
	2.4.4        What is the difference between IRQ2 and IRQ9? Are they
		     really the same, or are they really different? 
	2.4.5        Some of my SCSI devices (like a tape drive) don't work;
		     why? 
	2.4.6        I try to run 'ps' or 'w' and get ': cannot get namelist'
		     from the TinyBSD kernel. What did I do wrong? 
	2.4.7        I get a 'Floating point constant out of range' when I
		     try to compile package 'n'. What is broke? 
	2.4.8        I want to use the Adaptec 1542C SCSI controller. What
		     are the problems/tricks you need to know to get it
		     working? 
	2.4.9        My system boots OK off the floppy, but once I try to
		     boot from the hard drive, the message "changing root
		     device to sd0a" appears and the system hangs. What is
		     the most likely thing that I have done wrong? 
	2.5          Other common problems that are attributed to the
		     installation process but are caused other places. 
	2.5.1        I want to use more than 16 Megabytes of memory. Will any
		     of the BSD based systems support it? 
	2.5.2        I tried to use a device in my computer that should be
		     there. When I did, I got a "Device not configured
		     error." What do I do now? 
	3.0          System Internals
	3.1          Kernel
	3.1.1        How do I build a kernel?
	3.1.1.1      Why does the kernel code for NetBSD still use the old
		     K&R style declarations when the ANSI declarations are SO
		     much better? 
	3.1.1.2      How do I port NetBSD to another platform?
	3.1.2        I want to do one of the following things:
		     * add a device not in the distributed kernel (third com
		       port, additional disk or tape, line printer driver,
		       etc).
		     * use a patch from the net or the patchkit to fix a
		       kernel bug.
		     * add another swap device.
		     * recompile the kernel to remove extraneous devices so
		       that it takes up less space.
		     * configure more pseudo-terminals to allow for more
		       xterms or network logins. 
	3.1.3        I don't have the source distribution -- how can I
		     rebuild the kernel? 
	3.1.4        Now that I have a kernel, how do I install it?
	3.1.5        After installing the patchkit and recompiling the kernel
		     with the option "WD8013", I am no longer able to reboot
		     the machine. A cold boot (power on) runs fine, but after
		     a reboot no boot drive is found by the BIOS. Besides
		     having a 16-bit WD/SMC Ethernet card installed the
		     machines try to boot using either a Adaptec 1742 or 1542
		     SCSI board to boot from. 
	3.1.6        My system is complaining about stray interrupt 7. Is my
		     machine going to explode or anything? 
	3.1.7        I keep getting "wd0c: extra interrupt". What does it
		     mean? 
	3.1.8        I keep getting silo overflow messages, but the system
		     doesn't seem to mind. Is there a problem? 
	3.1.9        I found a bug in the kernel. How do I report it?
	3.1.10       Can someone please give a reasonably clear set of
		     instructions as to how to get a "current" version of
		     NetBSD running? 
	3.2          What exactly is this config file, anyway? What are all
		     of these cryptic notations? 
	3.2.1        Okay, fine. Why shouldn't I just add every device I can
		     find to the kernel, so I'll never have to recompile this
		     again? 
	3.2.2        What should I remove from the kernel?
	3.2.3        I can't get enough remote login sessions or xterm
		     sessions. I also can only get four sessions working at a
		     time. What can I do? 
	3.2.4        How do I get ddb, the kernel debugger, compiled into the
		     kernel and running? 
	3.2.5        I'm getting all kinds of errors when I try to build a
		     new version of GCC. How can I upgrade GCC to the most
		     current version? 
	3.2.6        Can I patch the current running OS image?
	3.2.6        Can I have more than one config file? Should I rename it
		     to something else? Any other hints? 
	3.2.7        What is the meaning of the trap codes I get in panic
		     messages? Sometimes this message appears in the form
		     "trap type nn". 
	3.2.8        I have been getting a lot of "virtual memory exhausted"
		     errors when I am compiling a program with a really big
		     static array. I have 128Meg of memory and 8Gig of swap.
		     How can this be happening? 
	3.2.9        Where can I learn more about all this?
	3.2.10       Has the method for system call changed?
	3.2.11       Does anyone have a system building script that takes
		     things like building a new config and multiple config
		     files into account? 
	3.2.12       How do I upgrade from my release version of NetBSD (and
		     probably FreeBSD) to the '-current' development sources?
		     
	3.2.13       Is there a Makefile that does all that happy
		     world-building stuff? 
	3.3          X11/XFree86/XS3
	3.3.1        What options should I define to get the X extensions
		     included? 
	3.3.2        Where can I get the FAQ for 'X'?
	3.3.3        Why does X drop characters when using xdm? When I run
		     xdm from the console, it keeps losing keystrokes and the
		     shift keys don't always work. Why? 
	3.3.4        What does the error 'netscape: uname() failed; can't
		     tell what system we're running on' from the BSDi version
		     of 'netscape' really mean? 
	3.3.5        Under NetBSD and FreeBSD, xlock (or any other program
		     that uses passwords) fails to validate user passwords.
		     Anyone know why? 
	3.4          Compiler and Library routines
	3.4.1        Where is libcompat.a?
	3.5          I want to run 'XYZA' which is dynamically linked and
		     from 'some other operating system'. What special things
		     do I have to do to get it working? 
	3.6          You promised to talk about timezones below. Are you
		     going to? 
	3.6.1        How do you change the timezone on NetBSD (FreeBSD
		     also?)? 
	3.6.2        The translation between seconds-since-the-epoch and date
		     differs by about 18 seconds between BSD and other Unixes
		     when running ntp; why? 
	3.7          How can I implement CVS to track MY changes to the
		     kernel source tree, yet still follow the -current
		     development tree? 
	3.8          Optional Op-codes for NetBSD, FreeBSD, and other
		     systems. 
	4.0          Introduction
	4.1          Common Kernel-related problems
	4.1.1        Where are the commands "rpcinfo" and "rpcgen"?
	4.1.2        How can I fix NFS to work with my NE2000 board?
	4.1.3        How can I get "ps" and "w" to work?
	4.1.5        Where are re_comp and re_exec?
	4.1.6        What about the termio, termios, and termcap stuff?
	4.1.6.1      Sometimes I have trouble with my system resetting the
		     terminal to seven bit mode. Isn't BSD eight bit clean? 
	4.1.7        The system hangs with the HD light on after intense disk
		     usage. The system hangs when trying to fsck -p both of
		     my IDE hard drives at boot-up. 
	4.1.8        How do you implement quotas on Net/2 derived BSD
		     systems? 
	4.1.9        What are the correct permissions for the /tmp, /usr/tmp,
		     and /var/tmp directories? 
	4.2          Available kernel add-ons
	4.2.1        The Patch-Kit
	4.2.2        Shared Libraries
	4.2.3        Sound Blaster Drivers
	4.2.4        Bus Mouse Drivers
	4.2.7        Kernel Loadable Modules
	4.3          Other program building type problems.
	4.3.1        Greetings from Mars. I am building a program that
		     requires access to the crypt library. Either I have it
		     and it isn't getting copied into the executable, or I
		     don't have it; why? 
	4.3.2        I am having trouble with long file names in my
		     libraries. It seems like there is a 16 character limit
		     in the library somewhere. 
	4.3.3        I'm getting annoyed with having this "conflicting types
		     for `sys_errlist'" problem show up nearly every time I
		     build a program. What do I need to do? 
	4.4          System Administration Questions
	4.4.1        Where can I get good books about NetBSD or FreeBSD?
	4.4.2        I am concerned about system security. What should I do
		     to protect my system from net attacks? 
	4.4.3        How can I log failed login attempts?
	4.4.4        Can I use a Concatenated Filesystem with NetBSD?
	4.4.4.1      Why, when I type "ccdconfig ccd0 16 none /dev/wd0a >
		     /dev/wd1a", do I get back "ccdconfig: ioctl (CCDIOCSET):
		     /dev/ccd0d: Device not configured"? 
	4.4.5        I am really new to Unix System Administration. I need
		     some real basic help. 
	4.4.5.1      What is the System Administrator's username?
	4.4.5.2      I can't log in as 'su'. What does that message mean when
		     I log in as root. 
	4.4.5.3      Are there any books I can 'bootstrap' myself with?
	4.4.5.4      How about some code examples?
	4.5          Daemon questions
	4.5.1        I'd like to use amd to mount a file system (/dev/sd0f
		     aka /usr/local) on another machine as "/usr/local".
		     What's the magic? 
	4.5.2        I am having trouble with my nameserver refusing to
		     acception 'nslookup's from my SunOS machine after I
		     installed the resolver fix. The exact error message is
		     "*** Can't find server name for address 194.100.46.2:
		     Query refused". Can you help? 
	4.5.3        Are there any alternatives to 'NIS' available for
		     NetBSD, etal.? 
	4.6          Adding new users.
	4.6.1        Where can I FTP the 'adduser' program?
	4.5.2        Where is the 'adduser' program?
	5.0          Introduction
	5.1          Available Kernel Replacements
	5.1.2        pcvt
	5.1.3        syscons
	5.1.9        A replacement curses program/library.
	5.2          Floppy Disk problems.
	5.2.1        How do I get a bootable floppy?
	5.2.2        How do I maximize the space on a mountable floppy disk. 
	5.3          Character Device Driver info
	5.3.1        Printers
	5.3.2        Terminals/Keyboards
	5.3.3        Modems/FAX Modems
	5.3.3.1      How do I add a modem to *BSD:
	5.3.3.2      Adding a modem to NetBSD.
	5.3.3.3      Adding a modem to FreeBSD.
	5.3.3.4      Adding a Dial-in/Dial-out FAX to NetBSD or FreeBSD.
	5.3.4        What is the trick for getting Kermit to work with rz and
		     sz? 
	5.4          Tape Drives
	5.4.1        Does the tape need to be formatted?
	5.4.2        If I execute the command 'st -f /dev/st0 status', I get:
		     Archive/Tandberg? tape drive, residual=0, blocksize=512
		     Density: high = 16 (0x10), medium = 15 (0xf), low = 5
		     (0x5) ds=0 er=0 
	5.4.3        When is erst0 used?
	5.4.4        How is density (bpi) computed? I am using 3M DC 6250
		     cassettes which have a 250MB capacity on the Viper 150.
		     But computing the bits/inch based on 250MB/tape-length
		     (1020 ft.), I get a density of 171335 bpi, which is
		     nowhere near the 10000 bpi associated with QIC-150 in
		     the st(1) man page. Why the discrepancy? 
	5.4.5        How is an appropriate block size determined (and in what
		     units are they specified in the st(1) command)? 
	5.4.6        From the 4.3BSD mtio(4) man page, it sounds like data is
		     typically (traditionally?) stored on tape in
		     eof-terminated sequences of 1K records. 
	5.4.6.1      Is st's notion of "file" the record sequence between two
		     eof marks? 
	5.4.6.2      What about a "record"?
	5.4.6.3      Is a "record" one "block", as determined by st's
		     "blocksize" command? If not, what is the connection
		     between them? 
	5.4.6.4      Can I change the "record" size?
	5.4.6.5      When would I want a block size that is different from
		     the default? 1KB is the size of writes used by dd or
		     whatever. QIC specifies 512 byte records (well at least
		     its what people use..) Whatever you write in will be
		     broken into 512 byte sections. They must be multiples of
		     512 though. 
	5.4.7.1      How do I write several archives to a single tape? I
		     tried without success: $ st -f /dev/rst4 rewind $ tar cf
		     /dev/nst4 archive1 $ st -f /dev/nrst4 weof $ tar cf
		     /dev/nst4 archive2 $ st -f /dev/nrst4 weof 
	5.4.7.2      Later, I would expect to be able to access, say,
		     archive3 via the fsf directive to skip over the first
		     two archives. What is the correct sequence? 
	5.4.8        Since the Viper 150 writes on QIC-150/120, I guess I
		     don't need to worry about writing variable-length
		     records? How about reading a tape written with
		     variable-length records. Is this possible with the
		     Viper? If so, what's involved? 
	5.4.9        The very scant documentation that came with my drive
		     mentions a "selectable buffer disconnect size," whose
		     default is 16K. This is evidently the "maximum number of
		     bytes that can be sent over the SCSI bus during a single
		     data transfer phase." What's that? How is it connected
		     st's "blocksize" command? Do I want to use 16K blocks,
		     or might I even want to set the disconnect size to a
		     higher value? 
	5.4.10       What is "streaming"? When I tar a directory of files to
		     tape, I notice that the tape often stops. Streaming
		     means it doesn't stop? How would I get the viper 150 to
		     stream using tar or cpio or dump? 
	5.4.11       Where are all the answers to the above and related
		     questions written down? Neither on the net nor in the
		     4.3BSD manuals nor Administration text which I have
		     could I find this stuff covered! 
	5.4.12       What else should I know? For example, it seems that a
		     new tape must stretched. How is this done? 
	5.4.13       My tape drive doesn't work.
	5.4.14       I am trying to restore a tape from a FreeBSD machine on
		     a Sun. What kinds of problems should I expect? 
	5.4.15       What are the jumper settings for the Archive Viper tape
		     drive? 
	5.4.16       My Viper-150 autodetects fine; however, the first
		     attempt to read a tape fails after a boot due to an
		     "illegal SCSI command". What could be the problem? 
	5.4.17       Why haven't we changed the defaults in rdump and
		     rrestore to something that makes sense? I was trying to
		     dump a filesystem to a remote tape and ran into an error
		     complaining about being unable to execute /etc/rmt. 
	5.5          Network
	5.5.1        How can I get my system to work as a network router?
	5.5.2        I recently has a problem where I got a message that said
		     "panic: kmem_malloc: mb_map too small". What is the
		     solution to this problem? 
	5.6          I want to use my ZIP drive. Are there any weird things I
		     need to know? 
	6.0          Working with DOS and BNR/2 related software.
	6.1          Formatting a floppy
	6.2          Sharing the Disk with MS-DOS
	6.2.1        How can I partition my drive to support both MS-DOS and
		     *bsd? 
	6.2.2        I can install using the whole disk, but I can't install
		     when I try to share the drive between *BSD and MS-DOS.
		     Why? 
	6.2.4        Is there any hope of ever running MS-DOS applications
		     under any of the free BSD systems? 
	6.2.5        How do I get Linux executables to run under NetBSD?
	6.3          Accessing the MS-DOS filesystem
	6.4          NFS/PC-NFS support
	6.4.1        Can I use 8K packets for NFS? When I try, I have all
		     kinds of problems. Specifically, I get 'ring buffer
		     overflows' or the performance is real bad. 
	6.4.2        How do I get around the NFS "Permission denied" error? 
	6.4.3        What does the message "BAD MNT RPC: RPC Authentication
		     error; why = Invalid client credential" mean when I try
		     to mount something from another machine? 
	6.4.4        What does the message "Bad MNT RPC: RPC: Authentication
		     error; why = Client credential too weak" mean when I try
		     to mount something from another machine? 
	6.4.5        I get a lot of 'ring buffer overflow' messages using NFS
		     and the ed0 driver. Is there a problem? 
	6.4.6        I am getting really poor performance out of my network,
		     especially when talking to older networks or when
		     performing short file transfers. What's the problem? 
	6.4.7        Is there any PC software that will allow me to use my
		     enormous PC with all of the unsupported hardware as a
		     PC-NFS server? 
	6.5          How can I use mtools with the 'new' floppy naming
		     convention? 
	7.0          Communications
	7.1          SLIP/CSLIP
	7.2          PPP
	7.3          TCP/IP
	7.4          UUCP
	7.4.1        TIP/CU
	7.4.2        What is the magic incantation that allows the modem to
		     dial? 
	7.4.3        My modem on DOS COM3 or DOS COM4 works with DOS, but not
		     with *BSD. It is set up using IRQ 4 (or 3) respectively.
		     
	7.5          How do I configure my nameserver?
	7.6          Terminals
	7.7          My network manager (or UUCP feed site admin) just
		     informed me that the way I have installed sendmail
		     through my UUCP connection and has caused a sendmail
		     loop. Can you help me get sendmail installed correctly? 
	7.8          Can network attached assets be used by/from NetBSD?
		     FreeBSD? OpenBSD? 
	7.8.1        Is it possible to Network boot a NetBSD machine from a
		     network on a diskless Sparc? 
	7.8.2        I have been working with FreeBSD 1.5.1 with some
		     machines configured as diskless. How can I do the same
		     for 2.0R (i.e., Which are the magic words to put in the
		     Kernel configuration file?) 
	8.0          What hardware works!
	8.1          Video cards
	8.2          Mice and Trackballs
	8.3          Serial Cards
	8.3.1        How do I configure multiport cards? Is there a
		     possibility of using multiport serial boards? How do you
		     configure an AST/4 in the kernel? It looks like the AST
		     driver only supports 4-port cards, but it looks like it
		     would be easy to add support for 8 ports ... or am I
		     wrong? 
	8.3.2        Now that I have FreeBSD 1.0 installed, how do I set up
		     the serial ports for bi-directional use? 
	8.3.3        What is the difference between baud and bits per second?
		     
	8.3.4        How do I get a serial console to work?
	8.4          Disk Controller Problems
	8.4.1        IDE controller problems
	8.4.2        SCSI controller problems
	8.5          SCSI Controllers
	8.6          Network Cards
	8.7          Printers
	8.7.1        How can I print big files (especially from SAMBA, the
		     WfWg network program)? 
	8.8          Tape Drives.
	8.8.1        What are the jumper configurations for the Exbyte 8200
		     DAT tape drive? 
	8.9          QIC-40/80 tape drives
	8.10         CD-ROMs
	8.10.1       How can I mount my CD-ROM so that it appears to be
		     writable? 
	9.0          What GNU software has been tested and is working with
		     Net/2 derived BSD systems for the 386? 
	9.1          Has anyone ever gotten news to work?
	9.1.1        I want to make sure I have every set up right for my
		     news partition. What newfs options do I need to use to
		     get this information stored OK without future problems? 
	9.2          How did you get emacs to compile?
	9.2          Has anyone tried to get Postgres to work?
	9.3          How about the BSD Song?


0.1	A brief history of the *BSD family.

	In the beginning, there was Research Unix.  Bell Labs, in a
	moment of utter abandon said "Let us produce progeny of Unix.
	yea verily, that we might garner a market share with this white
	elephant."  In order to beget as many pretenders to the Unix
	throne as possible, they removed most of the copyright notices
	and released huge gobbets of code to Universities throughout the
	United States.  From that humble decision came the very spark of
	what has arguably become the most successful, completely free
	Unix-style operating system you can make money on.

	There were several version of BSD roaming around, but they all
	had one thing in common.  You HAD to have a source code license
	to the original Unix source to get a working version going.  The
	bulk of the code was written at Berkeley, much of it by
	long-haired computer geeks, complete with bad complexions and
	pocket protectors.  Many Master's Degrees were built on what was
	to follow.

	Then, suddenly, someone realized the amount of source code from
	the original Unix distribution was pretty much down to zilch.
	They decided that making the distribution available to the whole
	world (not just the select Unix license holders) seemed like a
	pretty 'groovy' (to use the vernacular) idea.  From that came
	the Net distribution.

	William and Lynne Jolitz, with their standard flair and panache,
	decided to write the pieces that needed to be written.  From
	that decision came 386BSD Version 0.0.  Generally considered to
	be unusable, it was nonetheless a major coup, in that one no
	longer needed the dreaded 'source license' to produce working
	operating system images.

	386BSD 0.1 eventually came to be.  Linux, the other entrant in
	the Free Unix-style OS family, had been running for about a year
	by then.  Many people, wanting to stick with code that they
	already knew and which was in use in the commercial sector,
	decided to start using (and fixing) the 386BSD 0.1 code.  As such,
	many contributions to the system are provided through interaction
	by people who communicate via many means.  Many new and innovative
	features have been added to 386BSD since it's original release in 
	June of '92.  There was an 'unofficial' patchkit which was available
	from many anonymous FTP sources which made 386BSD more stable and
	usable.  Many problems associated with the use of 386BSD Version 
	0.1 were solved through the application of patches from the 
	patchkit.  Now, more or less overcome by events, the original
	386BSD, with its relationship to the AT&T/Berkeley out-of-court
	settlement, has become a rare piece of code to find.  With some
	of the code considered 'suspect', it was removed from FTP sites
	world-wide.

	To replace the original 386BSD, three newer versions of the 
	system are available, under new names.  NetBSD is the oldest, 
	FreeBSD followed shortly thereafter.  Both systems have evolved 
	into programs that are superior to their progenitor and both 
	have sizable (if a little rabid) followings.  The third entry in
	the group is a fairly recent entrant, called OpenBSD.  

	Most of the statements made in this FAQ will apply to all three 
	of the replacement systems, although I will try to differentiate 
	one from another whenever the difference matters.  Any place 
	that says 386bsd either means the original 386bsd 0.1 or any 
	of the members of the PC BSD family.  

	There have been many attempts to polarize the *BSD development 
	groups in the past.  One of the reasons that I am still 
	maintaining the FAQ is that it simply is a good source for
	historical information, as well as a reasonable source for 
	information that is specific to the implementations of NetBSD, 
	FreeBSD, and OpenBSD.

	It should be remembered that when the *BSD family started out, Bill
	and Lynne used a source called the "Berkeley Net Release/2" tape 
	as their foundation.  While this provided a stable starting point, 
	it also built a possible bomb into the system.  Due to a legal 
	battle (which has now been resolved) the following files are 
	identified as 'encumbered' in the BNR/2 source tree.  These
	kernel files are identified as the 'binary only' files in the
	BSDI distribution, and either have been or must be replaced
	before we can have a truly free OS family.  These files are the
	primary reason you won't find the original 386BSD Version 0.1
	available for FTP anymore.


0.1.1	Which of the 4.3 BSD files were identified as encumbered?  What's 
	all this about `binary-only files'?  Will BSDI continue to ship 
	source code?  What did NetBSD and FreeBSD do about the
	encumbered files?

	For Version 1.1 only, BSDI will ship the following kernel
	files in binary format:

	kern/init_main.c	kern/subr_rmap.c	ufs/ufs_bmap.c
	kern/kern_clock.c	kern/sys_generic.c	ufs/ufs_disksubr.c
	kern/kern_exit.c	kern/sys_process.c	ufs/ufs_inode.c
	kern/kern_physio.c	kern/tty.c		ufs/ufs_vnops.c
	kern/kern_sig.c		kern/tty_subr.c
	kern/kern_synch.c	kern/vfs_syscalls.c

	Our (Berkeley's) 4.4Lite-based release will again include the
	entire source tree (with the exception of a tiny number of
	device drivers whose interfaces are kept confidential at the
	request of their authors.

	For NetBSD and FreeBSD, these files either have been completely 
	rewritten in a 'clean room' development effort or were replaced 
	with code from other sources (such as CMU or GNU).  The 
	encumbered sources for the user land portion of the system have 
	long since been replaced.


0.1.2	How close is NetBSD (or FreeBSD) to BSD 4.4?

	If you take a look at the README files that accompany each of
	these packages, you will find that each is based as closely as
	possible to BSD 4.4-Lite.  The core development team for FreeBSD 
	used the 4.4 Lite distribution and re-engineered the missing 
	pieces to come up with the the current version of FreeBSD.  The
	NetBSD developers started with the existing 386BSD files, and
	compared them to the unencumbered, freely releaeable files from
	BSD 4.4.  For both groups, any files which were not available
	(through being encumbered) were written from scratch to provide
	the functionality that was needed.  Either way, both systems are
	close to BSD 4.4.  Of course, each has differences that make it
	different from the other, and different from regular BSD 4.4.  


0.1.3	Where can I get more information about the *BSD family of
	Operating Systems?

	Here are the current members of the *BSD family.  These are
	presented in alphabetical order, to avoid implying anything.

	386BSD - An older version of BSD now targetted exclusively at 
	the research and academic community.  CD distributions only, 
	sold by Dr. Dobb's Journal.

	FreeBSD - A version of BSD for Intel platforms only and targeted 
	at a broad user base.  See http://www.freebsd.org for details or 
	ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD for the latest release.

	NetBSD - A version of BSD for many different platforms, from 
	Intel to the 68K to the DEC ALPHA.  See http://www.netbsd.org for 
	more details or ftp://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/NetBSD for the latest 
	release.

	OpenBSD - A variant of NetBSD.  See http://www.openbsd.org for 
	more details or ftp://ftp.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD for the latest 
	release.


0.2	About this FAQ.

	This FAQ consists of several parts:

		Section 0.  Basic FAQ information
		Section 1.  General Network Information
		Section 2.  Common installation questions
		Section 3.  Kernel Building and Maintenance
		Section 4.  Kernel Additions
		Section 5.  Kernel Replacement Parts
		Section 6.  Interaction with MS-DOS
		Section 7.  System Communication
		Section 8.  NetBSD for the Mac FAQ
		Section 9.  NetBSD for the Amiga FAQ
		...
		Section n.  NetBSD for the Timex Sinclair FAQ

	It has been suggested that I remove some of the older, less 
	relevant information from this FAQ.  I have given it some 
	thought, and I might.  Of course, if someone were to do it for 
	me, it sure wouldn't break my heart.


0.2a	What are the differences between *BSD and (your favorite operating
	system name here)?
0.2b	Which is better, (your favorite operating system name here) or 
	*BSD?
0.2c	Is 386bsd better than (your favorite operating system name here)?

	I decided to put this in section 0, primarily because it by far 
	the most asked and least useful question in comp.os.386bsd.*.  

	You will often see this question veiled as a request for a brief 
	description of the differences between 386bsd and (YFOS).  This 
	type of request, while seeming to be a reasonable one, is usually
	looked upon as either an attempt by some folks for the net to do 
	their homework, or as an attempt to start yet another flame-war.

	What is the answer to this question, then?
	
	No.  It is not.

	Nor is it any worse.

	It is DIFFERENT.  There are alternative Operating Systems 
	available, both free and commercial.  386bsd, NetBSD, FreeBSD, 
	and Linux are examples of "free" Unix style Operating Systems.

	If you ask any of these questions, you are wasting a LOT of 
	bandwidth and making a real name for yourself.  Don't bother.
	It nearly always ends up in name calling and 'mine is bigger
	(or littler) than yours...' arguments.  I have included an 
	excerpt below:

	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>>>> Is so!
	>>>>>>>> Is not!
	>>>>>>> Is so!

	[the rest of this scintillating debate is deleted...]

	Where BSD and POSIX differ, 386BSD conforms by default to
	BSD; Linux to POSIX.  Furthermore, while both run mostly GNU
	utilities, Linux tends toward the SysV flavor (e.g. init vs.
	initab) where 386BSD sticks with the BSD style.  However, sources 
	for different flavors of utilities are available for both, and
	both support compiler options which allow more BSD or more
	POSIX semantics.

	Clifford Stoll talks about the 'West Coast/East Coast' feeling 
	of BSD/SysV in his book "The Cuckoo's Egg".  In keeping with 
	that, BSD feels like BSD/West Coast, Linux feels like SysV/East 
	Coast (actually, Finland is what it says on the passport, but 
	stay with me for a minute).   If you don't believe me, just 
	look at the primary U.S. archive sites.   Linux is available 
	from MIT, BSD is available from Berkeley.  Can't get much more 
	'Coast' than that. :-)

	Actually, NetBSD and FreeBSD are feeling more and more POSIX all 
	the time.  Recent releases of both products have implemented many
	more POSIX compliant utilities, features, and low-level hooks into
	the operating system.  A great deal of effort has gone into
	supporting and improving the POSIX standards compliance
	throughout all of the systems.  One of the stated goals for both
	NetBSD and FreeBSD is Spec 1170 compliance.  While no one has
	jumped up with the check to pay for the testing of compliance,
	the spec is still there and being persued with vigor. 

	There is a document available via the World Wide Web at
	http://www.leo.org/pub/comp/os/bsd/cracauer/ that tries to 
	describe the differences in FreeBSD and NetBSD,  I haven't
	personally reviewed it, but it is worth another shot to try and
	get this pointless debate stopped.

	Linux, NetBSD, FreeBSD, and OpenBSD share two vitally important 
	facets.  All are free and all include source.  They are all 
	excellent, and all fill a niche that the others (specifically
	commercial language and OS vendors) would gladly leave available.  
	
	Also, don't forget one of the most important things; get what 
	your friends have.  Then they can help you.

	Finally, remember that this FAQ and the BSD Newsgroups are 
	intended as places for *BSD users and developers to meet and 
	discuss topics which are germain to the further development of 
	these systems.  For more information about Linux, you can read 
	the comp.os.linux.* newsgroups.


0.2.1	So what ARE the differences between the *BSD family and Linux?

	Here it is, in its 'right for today' glory.  As of 1 July,
	1994, these statements were more or less accurate.  Against my
	better judgement, I am going to include this, primarily because
	it is a very even handed approach to describing two very
	different systems.  

	As of 1 July 1996 (two years later) the systems have evolved
	considerably.  NetBSD and FreeBSD have been joined by OpenBSD in
	the *BSD family.  In addition, each of the BSD systems and each
	of the Linux distributions has had considerable chances to
	evolve.  Several updates to the original article are included
	below, so that the comparison still remains valid.  Thanks to <>
	for his updates on the Linux side of this debate.
	- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
	For those of you that find it, I hope that it answers some of 
	your questions.  The original was written by:

		Thomas Heiling Pharmacist & Doctorate at 
		Pharmazeutisches Institut Uni Wuerzburg - Germany 
		Email phar006@rzbox.uni-wuerzburg.de (HP-UX)
      		      tom@wpzd07.pzlc.uni-wuerzburg.de (Linux)
		   or phar006@vax.rz.uni-wuerzburg.de ( VAX )
 	- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
	What is missing here is an overview and a comparison of the free
	available Unixsystems. And this info should be in the FAQ!  I 
	will start here such a comparison.

	Q:  For whom should this be ?

	A:  For a (hopefully) new Unix-user, who wants to install one of
	the free Unixes.  He should be able to read this document, look 
	at his hardware, define his needs for a Unix-systems and then he 
	should be able to choose a system which meets his needs.

	Q:  Who am I and why should I be able to write such a doc ?

	A:  Good Question! My name is Thomas Heiling, I am working at 
	the University of Wuerzburg in Germany as a doctorate.  My job 
	is to program an Ultraviolett/Vis-spectrum comparison program.  
	Furthermore I am the person, who maintains the Internet
	connections and computers of our Department.  I have running
	Linux and NetBSD 0.9, the main Server is a 486/33 + 16 MB which
	runs Linux. A 486/66 is for numerical work.  Then there are
	some clients mostly 386 with either 4 MB or 8 MB.  One 386 with
	NetBSD, but this is just for testing.

	So I would say I can speak for Linux, a little bit for NetBSD
	and I have no idea for FreeBSD beside the Installation Guide.
	(I have no access to the BSD386 1.0 CD, which was announced some
	time ago).

	Hardware requirements :

	Linux:
	CPU: Anything that runs 386 protected mode programs (all models 
	of 386s and 486s should work; 286s don't work, and never will). 

	Architecture: ISA or EISA bus. MCA (mostly true blue PS/2's) 
	does not work. Local busses (VLB and PCI) work. 

	RAM: Theoretically up to 1 GB. This has not been tested. Some 
	people (including Linus) have noted that adding ram has slowed 
	down their machine extremely without adding more cache at the 
	same time, so if you add memory and find your machine slower, 
	try adding more cache. 

	Data storage: Generic AT drives (IDE, 16 bit HD controllers with 
	MFM or RLL) are supported, as are SCSI hard disks and CD-ROMs 
	with a supported SCSI adaptor. Enhanced IDE controllers and
	devices (including ATAPI CD-ROMs) and generic XT controllers (8 
	bit controllers with MFM or RLL). Supported SCSI cards include
	7000FASST; Adaptec 152X/2825, 1542, 1740, 274X/284X/294X; 
	AdvanSys; Always IN2000; AM53/79C974 PCI; BusLogic; 
	DTC3180/3280; EATA ISA/EISA (DPT PM2011/021/012/022/122/322); 
	EATA-DMA (DPT, NEC, AT&T, SNI, AST, Olivetti, Alphatronix); 
	EATA-PIO (old DPT PM2001, PM2012A); Future Domain 16xx; 
	Generic NCR5380/53c400; NCR53c406a; NCR53c7,8xx; 
	IOMEGA Parallel Port ZIP drive; PAS16; Qlogic FAS; 
	Qlogic ISP (EXPERIMENTAL); Seagate ST-02; Future Domain TMC-8xx; 
	Trantor T128/T128F/T228; UltraStor 14F/34F; UltraStor 24F
	The various IDE chipsets (CMD640, Intel 430FX [Triton], RZ1000, 
	ALI M1439/M1445, DTC-2278, Holtek HT6560B, QDI QD6580, UMC 8672); 
	removable IDE interfaces (PCMCIA); RAM disk (can be root 
	filesystem); Multiple devices (Linear [append], RAID-0 [striping]).

	The following file systems are supported in Linux:
	Quota, Mandatory lock, Minix FS, Standard Linux (EXT, EXT2, 
	XIAFS), DOS (FAT, VFAT, umsdos (Unix like fs on top of FAT)),
	/proc, Sun NFS, SMB, NCP (for NetWare volumes), ISO9660 cdrom, 

	The following CD-ROM drives are supported:
	SCSI, IDE/ATAPI, Others (Aztech/Orchid/Okano/Wearnes/TXC/CyDROM; 
	Goldstar R420; Matsushita/Panasonic/Creative, 
	Longshine, TEAC; Mitsumi; Optics Storage DOLPHIN 8000AT; 
	Philips/LMS CM206; Sanyo CDR-H94A; ISP16/MAD16/Mozart soft 
	configurable cdrom interface card; Sony CDU31A/CDU33A; Sony CDU535)
	SCSI and QIC-02 tapes are also supported.
	(*Ed Note:  Virtually all of the CD-ROMs listed in the 'others'
	category are either originally manufactured by Matsushita
	(Panasonic in the US), Sony, or Mitsumi.)

	Video: VGA, EGA, CGA, or Hercules (and compatibles) work in text 
	mode. For graphics and X, there is support for (at least) normal 
	VGA, some super-VGA cards (most of the cards based on ET3000, 
	ET4000, Paradise, and some Trident chipsets), S3 (except for 
	Diamond Stealth cards, because the manufacturer won't tell how 
	to program it), 8514/A, ATI MACH8, ATI MACH32, and hercules. 
	(Linux uses the Xfree86 X server, so that determines what cards 
	are supported.) 

	The following types of network interfaces are supported in Linux:
	    EQL (serial line load balancing)
	    SDLA (Sangoma S502/S508)
	    PLIP (parallel port IP)
	    PPP, SLIP (CSLIP, keepalive, linefill, six-bit SLIP)
	    Radio network interfaces:
	    BAYCOM ser12 and par96 kiss emulation driver for AX.25
	    Gracilis PackeTwin support
	    Ottawa PI and PI/2
	    STRIP (Metricom starmode radio IP)
	    WaveLAN
	    WIC Radio IP bridge (EXPERIMENTAL)
	    Z8530 SCC kiss emulation driver for AX.25
	Ethernet (10 or 100 Mbit):
	    3COM (3c501, 3c503, 3c505, 3c507, 3c509/3c579, 3c590 series 
		[592/595/597] "Vortex")
	    AMD Lance and PCnet (AT1500 and NE2100); AMD PCInet32 
		(VLB and PCI) 
	    Western Digital/SMC (WD80*3, SMC Ultra, SMC 9194) 
	    Cabletron E21xx, DEPCA, DE200, DE201, DE202, DE422, 
		EtherWORKS 3 [DE203, DE204, DE205], EtherExpress 16, 
		EtherExpressPro, FMV-181/182/183/184, 
	    HP PCLAN+ (27247B, 27252A, 27245, other 27xxx series), 
		HP 10/100VG PCLAN (ISA, EISA, PCI), ICL EtherTeam 16i/32, 
		NE2000/NE1000, NI5210, NI6510, SK_G16)
	EISA, VLB, PCI and on board controllers (Ansel Communications, 
	    Apricot Xen-II onboard, DE425, DE434, DE435, DE450, DE500, 
	    DECchip Tulip [dc21x4x] PCI, Digi Intl. RightSwitch SE-X)
	Pocket and portable adaptors (AT-LAN-TEC/RealTek, D-Link DE600, 
	    D-Link DE620)
	Token Ring driver (IBM Tropic chipset based)
	ARCnet (arc0e ["Ether-Encap" packet format], 
	    arc0s [RFC1051 packet format])
	ISDN (ICN 2B and 4B, PCBIT-D, Teles/NICCY1016PC/Creatix)

	The following TCP/IP options are supported in Linux:
	    Forwarding/gatewaying
	    Multicasting
	    Firewalling
	    Firewall packet logging
	    Accounting 
	    Tunneling 
	    Aliasing support 
	    PC/TCP compatibility
	    Reverse ARP 
	    Disable Path MTU Discovery [normally enabled] 
	    Drop source routed frames 
	    Allow large windows

	The following entwork protocols are also supported:
	    IPX
	    Appletalk DDP
	    Amateur Radio AX.25 Level 2
	    AX.25 over Ethernet
	    Amateur Radio NET/ROM  

	Sound cards supported:
	ProAudioSpectrum 16, SoundBlaster (SB, SBPro, SB16, clones), 
	Generic OPL2/OPL3 FM synthesizer, Gravis Ultrasound, MPU-401 
	(not for SB16), 6850 UART Midi, PSS (ECHO-ADI2111), 16 bit 
	sampling option of GUS, GUS MAX, Microsoft Sound System, Ensoniq 
	Soundscape, MediaTriX Audio TriX Pro, MAD16 and/or Mozart based 
	cards, Crystal CS4232 based (Pnp), Turtle Beach Wave Front (Maui, 
	Tropez) synthesizers

	Other cards supported by Linux:
	Digiboard PC/Xx, Cyclades async mux, Stallion multiport serial 
	(EasyIO or EC8/32, EC864, ONboard, Brumby), SDL RISCom/8 card, 
	Parallel printer, Bus mouse (ATIXL, Logitech, Microsoft), PS/2 
	mouse, C&T 82C710 mouse port (as on TI Travelmate), QIC-02 tape 
	drives, Travan QIC-80, Advanced Power Management BIOS, Watchdog 
	Timer, WDT Watchdog timer, and Enhanced Real Time Clock

	FreeBSD:

	    CPU:
		Any i386sx or better with at least 4 Meg of RAM (8 Meg
		for X Windows).

	    Disk Controllers:
		WD1003 (any generic MFM/RLL)
		WD1007 (any generic IDE/ESDI)
		IDE, including ATA
		Adaptec 152x series ISA SCSI controllers
		Adaptec 154x series ISA SCSI controllers
		Adaptec 174x series EISA SCSI controller in standard and 
		    enhanced mode.
		Adaptec 274x/284x/2940/3940 (Narrow/Wide/Twin) series 
		    EISA/VLB/PCI SCSI controllers
		Adaptec AIC-6360 based boards, which includes the 
		    AHA-152x and SoundBlaster SCSI cards.

		Note: You cannot boot from the SoundBlaster cards as 
		    they have no on-board BIOS, which is necessary for 
		    mapping the boot device into the system BIOS I/O 
		    vectors.  They are perfectly usable for external 
		    tapes, CDROMs, etc, however.  The same goes for 
		    any other AIC-6x60 based card without a boot ROM.  
		    Some systems DO have a boot ROM, which is generally 
		    indicated by some sort of message when the system is 
		    first powered up or reset.  Check your system/board 
		    documentation for more details.
		Buslogic 545S & 545c 
		    Note: that Buslogic was formerly known as "Bustec".
		Buslogic 445S/445c VLB SCSI controller
		Buslogic 742A, 747S, 747c EISA SCSI controller.
		Buslogic 946c PCI SCSI controller.
		Buslogic 956c PCI SCSI controller.
		NCR 53C810 and 53C825 PCI SCSI controller.
		NCR5380/NCR53400 (``ProAudio Spectrum'') SCSI controller.
		DTC 3290 EISA SCSI controller in 1542 emulation mode.
		UltraStor 14F, 24F and 34F SCSI controllers.
		Seagate ST01/02 SCSI controllers.
		Future Domain 8xx/950 series SCSI controllers.
		WD7000 SCSI controllers.

	    With all supported SCSI controllers, full support is 
	    provided for SCSI-I & SCSI-II peripherals, including Disks, 
	    tape drives (including DAT) and CD ROM drives.  

	    Filesystems:

		FFS (also called UFS by some vendors)
     		QUOTA (allow quota checking on FFS)
     		NFS (Sun Network File System, compatible with PC-NFS)
     		MSDOSFS (MS-DOS Filesystems)
     		CD9660 (ISO-9660 CD-ROM. including RockRidge extensions)
     		PROCFS (/proc file system)
     		MFS (memory file systems, like RAM disk, but backed by
		    swap)
		SMB (using SAMBA, read-only to LM shares)

	    CD-ROMs:
		Soundblaster SCSI and ProAudio Spectrum SCSI (cd)
		Mitsumi (all models) proprietary interface (mcd)
		Matsushita/Panasonic (Creative) CR-562/CR-563 
		    proprietary interface (matcd)
		Sony proprietary interface (scd)
		ATAPI IDE interface (experimental and should be 
		    considered ALPHA quality!) (wcd)

	    Ethernet cards:

	    	Allied-Telesis AT1700 and RE2000 cards
		SMC Elite 16 WD8013 ethernet interface, and most other
	      	    WD8003E, WD8003EBT, WD8003W, WD8013W, WD8003S, 
		    WD8003SBT and WD8013EBT based clones.  
		SMC Elite Ultra is also supported.
		DEC EtherWORKS III NICs (DE203, DE204, and DE205)
		DEC EtherWORKS II NICs (DE200, DE201, DE202, and DE422)
		DEC DC21140 based NICs (SMC???? DE???)
		DEC FDDI (DEFPA/DEFEA) NICs
		Fujitsu FMV-181 and FMV-182
		Intel EtherExpress
		Isolan AT 4141-0 (16 bit)
		Isolink 4110     (8 bit)
		Novell NE1000, NE2000, and NE2100 ethernet interface.
		3Com 3C501 cards
		3Com 3C503 Etherlink II
		3Com 3c505 Etherlink/+
		3Com 3C507 Etherlink 16/TP
		3Com 3C509, 3C579, 3C589 (PCMCIA) Etherlink III
		Toshiba ethernet cards
		PCMCIA ethernet cards from IBM and National 
		    Semiconductor are also supported.

	    Note: FreeBSD does not currently suppport PnP (plug-n-play) 
		features present on some ethernet cards.  If your card 
		has PnP, it (PnP) should be disabled.

	    Miscellaneous devices:
		AST 4 port serial card using shared IRQ.
		ARNET 8 port serial card using shared IRQ.
		BOCA IOAT66 6 port serial card using shared IRQ.
		BOCA 2016 16 port serial card using shared IRQ.
		Cyclades Cyclom-y Serial Board.
		STB 4 port card using shared IRQ.
		SDL Communications Riscom/8 Serial Board.
		Adlib, SoundBlaster, SoundBlaster Pro, ProAudioSpectrum, 
		    Gravis UltraSound and Roland MPU-401 sound cards.
		QIC-02 and QIC-36 tape drives (wt0)

	NetBSD:

	Architecture: ISA or EISA bus. MCA does not work (although there
	is work under way to provide MCA support). Local busses (VESA 
	and PCI) are also supported.

	All NetBSD implementation use the following file system types:

		FFS             # UFS
       		QUOTA           # UFS quotas
       		LFS             # log-structured file system
        	MFS             # memory file system
	
        	NFSCLIENT       # Network File System client
        	NFSSERVER       # Network File System server
	
        	CD9660          # ISO 9660 + Rock Ridge file system
        	MSDOSFS         # MS-DOS file system
        	FDESC           # /dev/fd
        	KERNFS          # /kern
        	NULLFS          # loopback file system
        	PORTAL          # portal filesystem (still experimental)
        	PROCFS          # /proc
        	UMAPFS          # NULLFS + uid and gid remapping
        	UNION           # union file system
		CONCAT		# Concatenated (multiple physical
				# devices appear as single unit) and
				# Striped (RAID style Striping)

	    Many of these filesystem types can be mixed and used
	    together (Union Filesystems over CD-ROMs to give appearance
	    of writable CD-ROMs).
	
	    All NetBSD systems also support the following networking 
		options:

        	GATEWAY         # packet routing and forwarding
        	INET            # IP + ICMP + TCP + UDP
        	IPFILTER_LKM    # Add LKM hooks for packet filtering
		IPFIREWALL	# Add code to system for IP Firewall
        	NS              # XNS
        	ISO,TPIP        # OSI
        	EON             # OSI tunneling over IP
        	CCITT,LLC,HDLC  # X.25

	    atari:
		A4000/A1200 IDE controller.
		SCSI host adapters:
			33c93 based boards: A2091, A3000 and GVP 
			    series II.
			53c80 based boards: 12 Gauge, IVS and 
			    Wordsync/Bytesync.
			53c710 based boards: A4091, Magnum, Warp 
			    Engine and Zeus.
			FAS216 based boards: FastLane Z3, Blizzard.
		Video controllers:
			ECS, AGA and A2024 built in on various amigas.
			Retina Z2 and Retina Z3.
			Picasso II.
			GVP Spectrum.
			Piccalo.
			A2410.
			Cybervision 64.
		Ethernet controllers:
			A2065 Ethernet
			Hydra Ethernet
			ASDG Ethernet
			A4066 Ethernet
			Ariadne Ethernet
			Quicknet Ethernet
		Arcnet controllers:
			A2060 Arcnet
		Tape drives:
			Most SCSI tape drives, including Archive Viper, 
			    Cipher SCSI-2 ST150.
		CD-ROM drives:
			Most SCSI CD-ROM drives
		Serial cards:
			MultiFaceCard II and III
			A2232
		Amiga floppy drives.
		Amiga parallel port.
		Amiga serial port.
		Amiga mouse.

	    hp300:
		CPUs:
		    68020-based: 318, 319, 320, 330, and 350.
		    68030-based: 340, 345, 360, 370, 375, and 400(*).
		    68040-based: 380, 425(*), and 433(*).

		Disks:
		    HP-IB/CS80: 7912, 7914, 7933, 7936, 7937, 7945, 7957,
			    7958, 7959, 2200, and 2203.
		    SCSI-I(**), including magneto-optical and CD-ROM.

		Tape drives:
		    Low-density HP-IB/CS80 cartridge: 7914, 7946, and 
			9144.
		    High-density HP-IB/CS80 cartridge: 9145.
		    HP-IB/CS80 1/2": 7974A, 7978A/B, 7979A, 7980A, and 7980XC.
		    SCSI: HP DAT, Exabyte, and SCSI QIC drives such as
			the Archive Viper.

		RS232 interfaces:
		    98644 built-in single port (dca).
		    98642 4-port (dcm).
		    98638 8-port (dcm).

		Network interfaces:
		    98643 built-in and add-on LAN cards.

		Displays:
		    98544, 98545, and 98547 color and monochrome Topcat.
		    98548, 98549, and 98550 color and monochrome Catseye.
		    98700 and 98710 Gatorbox.
		    98720 and 98721 Renaissance.
		    98730 and 98731 DaVinci.
		    A1096A monochrome Hyperion.

		Input devices:
		    98730 and 98731 DaVinci.
		    A1096A monochrome Hyperion.

		Input devices:
		    General interface supporting all HIL devices: 
			keyboard, 2 and 3 button mice(***), and ID module.

		Miscellaneous:
		    Battery-backed real-time clock.
		    98624 built-in HP-IB interface.
		    98625A and 98625B `fast' HP-IB interface.
		    98658A built-in and add-on SCSI interface.
		    Printers and plotters on RS232 and HP-IB.
		    SCSI autochanger.

	    (*) 400-series machines configured for Domain/OS are not 
		fully supported, notably, the keyboard doesn't work and 
		the ROMs must be in `HP-UX mode'.

	    (**) SCSI-II drives are known to work, though this may require 
		changing a jumper on some drives.  See your disk's 
		documentation for details.

	    (***) Serial mice connected to a `HIL to quad' converter are 
		also known to work.

	    i386:
		Floppy controllers.
		MFM, ESDI, IDE, and RLL hard disk controllers.
		SCSI host adapters:
		    [Adaptec host adapters only on kcadp floppy]
	       		Adaptec AHA-154xA, -B, -C, and -CF 
			Adaptec AHA-174x
			Adaptec AIC-6260 and AIC-6360 based boards, including
			    the Adaptec AHA-152x and the SoundBlaster SCSI
			    host adapter.  (Note that you cannot boot from
			    these boards if they do not have a boot ROM;
			    only the AHA-152x and motherboards using this
			    chip are likely to be bootable, consequently.)
			Adaptec AHA-294x[W] cards and some onboard PCI 
			    designs using the AIC7870 chip.  This driver 
			    does *not* currently work with non-PCI AIC-7xxx 
			    boards or the Adaptec 3940.
			Buslogic 54x (Adaptec AHA-154x clones; driver on 
			    kcadp floppy)
		    [Other host adapters only on kcoth floppy]
			BusLogic 445, 74x, 9xx  (But not the new 
			    "FlashPoint" series of BusLogic SCSI adapters)
			Symbios Logic (NCR) 53C8xx-based PCI SCSI host 
			    adapters
			Ultrastor 14f, 24f, and 34f
			Seagate/Future Domain ISA SCSI adapter cards, 
			    including ST01/02
			Future Domain TMC-885
			Future Domain TMC-950

		MDA, CGA, VGA, SVGA, and HGC Display Adapters.  (Note that 
		    not all of the display adapters NetBSD/i386 can work 
		    with are supported by X.  See the XFree86 FAQ for 
		    more information.)
		Serial ports:
		    8250/16450-based ports
		    16550-based ports
		    AST-style 4-port serial boards [*]
		    BOCA 8-port serial cards [*] 
		    Cyclades Cyclom-{4, 8, 16}Y serial boards [*]
		    IBM PC-RT 4-port serial boards [*]
		Parallel ports:
		    All standard AT-style parallel ports (with or
			without IRQ 7 support).
		Ethernet adapters:
		    AMD LANCE and PCnet-based ISA Ethernet adapters [*],
			including:
			Novell NE1500T
			Novell NE2100
			Kingston 21xx
		    AMD PCnet-based PCI Ethernet adapters, including:
			BOCALANcard/PCI
		    AT&T StarLAN 10, EN100, and StarLAN Fiber
		    3COM 3c501
		    3COM 3c503
		    3COM 3c505 [*]
		    3COM 3c507
		    3COM 3c509 and 3c579 (But not the PCI 3c59X series)
		    Digital DC21x4x-based PCI Ethernet adapters, including:
			SMC EtherPower 10, 10/100 (PCI only!)
			Znyx ZX34X
			Cogent EM100
			Digital DE450
			Digital DE500
		    BICC Isolan
		    Intel EtherExpress 16
		    SMC/WD 8003, 8013, and the SMC "Elite16" ISA boards
		    SMC/WD 8216 (the SMC "Elite16 Ultra" ISA boards)
		    Novell NE1000, NE2000
		Tape drives:
		    Most SCSI tape drives
		    QIC-02 and QIC-36 format (Archive- and Wangtek-
			compatible) tape drives [*] [+]
		CD-ROM drives:
		    Mitsumi CD-ROM drives [*] [+]
			[Note: The Mitsumi driver device probe is known 
			to cause trouble with several devices!]
		    Most SCSI CD-ROM drives
		    IDE/ATAPI CD-ROM drives (not completely tested,
			patches available from 
			ftp://lix.polytechnique.fr/pub/manu
		Mice:  ( while the kernel supports mice, there is very
			little software written which uses the mouse.
			'X' is the primary user for these supported
			mice.) 
		    "Logitech"-style bus mice [*] [+]
		    "Microsoft"-style bus mice [*] [+]
		    "PS/2"-style mice [*] [+]
		    Serial mice (no kernel support necessary)
		Sound Cards:
		    SoundBlaster [*] [+]
		    Gravis Ulrasound and Ultrasound Max [*] [+]
		[The following drivers are not extensively tested]
		    Personal Sound System [*] [+]
		    Windows Sound System [*] [+]
		    ProAudio Spectrum [*] [+]
	Drivers for hardware marked with "[*]" are NOT included on the 
	distribution floppies.  Except as noted above, all other drivers 
	are present on both kernel-copy disks.  Also, at the present time, 
	(as of 1 Nov 1995) the distributed kernels support only one SCSI 
	host adapter per machine.  NetBSD normally allows more, though, 
	so if you have more than one, you can use all of them by 
	compiling a custom kernel once NetBSD is installed.

	Support for devices marked with "[+]" IS included in the 
	"generic" kernels, although it is not in the kernels which are 
	on the distribution floppies.

	NetBSD/i386 does NOT currently support (in version 1.1), but 
	get many questions about:
	  - Adaptec AIC-7770-based SCSI host adapters (including the
		Adaptec AHA-274x, AHA-284x families).
	  - NCR 5380-based SCSI host adapters.
	  - APM power management -- if your system supports it, turn it off!
	  - PCMCIA ("PC Card") devices, including some miniature "IDE" hard
		disks.
	  - QIC-40 and QIC-80 tape drives.  (Those are the tape drives
		that connect to the floppy disk controller.)
	  - WD-7000 SCSI host adapters.
	  - PCI-PCI bridges and cards which include them, such as the
		AHA-394x SCSI host adapter and some DC21x4x-based 
		multi-Ethernet cards.
	  - 3Com 3c59x series PCI Ethernet and Fast Ethernet adapters.
	  - Multiprocessor Pentium and Pentium Pro systems.  (Ed. Note: 
	  	They run fine, you just don't get the advantages SMP 
		provides yet.  There is an SMP working group putting 
		the final touches on SMP support.)
	  - Intel EtherExpress 100 Fast Ethernet adapters.
	  - Digital DEFPA PCI FDDI adapters (the PC support barely missed 
		the November release; it works in other ports, and will 
		work in the next release)

	We are planning future support for many of these devices.  (Ed
	Note:  Version 1.2 is due out shortly, many of these devices are
	fully supported there.)

	    mac68k:
		Supported models:
		    Mac II, Mac IIx, Mac IIcx, Mac IIci, Mac SE/30,
		    Mac IIsi, Mac IIvx, Mac IIvi, Performa 600

		Supported devices on all of the above systems include:
		    Internal SCSI bus and most SCSI tapes, hard 
			drives, and CD-ROMs
		    Internal sound--enough to beep on some machines, anyway
		    Most basic NuBUS video cards (there have been some 
			problems with some 24-bit color cards) Both internal 
			serial ports 
		    ADB keyboards and mice 
		    Ethernet cards based on the National Semiconductor 
			8390 (Asante, Apple, and a few others) [problems 
			reported on the Performa 600, though].
								      
		    Some systems will boot and are usable from an external
		    terminal (serial tty or SL/IP):
			LC III 
			Performa 550 
			and possibly others

		What isn't supported, but often asked about:

		    68040-based Macs.  Work is in progress on getting
			a Quadra 700 running.  This requires a new scsi 
			driver and a new ethernet driver.

		    PowerPC-based Macs.  Work will begin on this, 
			sometime soon.  It will be separate from this 
			port, though.  The PowerPC is a much different 
			processor.

			{Ed Note:  Work on the Quadra and the Power-PC
			have begun.]

		mvme68k:
		    Motorola makes a number of m68k VME cards.  This port
			currently only works on the m68030 based VME147 
			card (diskless only for now).

		    requirements: 
			- VME147 card
        		- a machine to connect the console to
        		- network connection
        		- NFS server (to serve root and swap)
 
		pc532: [This machine should not be confused with the
			Intel Pentium system with the same name.  This
			is a completely different machine which uses a
			32032 CPU and PC peripherals.]
		    4 - 32 Megs of memory
		    8 serial lines done by 4 scn2681 chips
		    The NCR DP8490 SCSI chip (scsi only)
		    Most SCSI disks work (fixed and floppy)
		    A few SCSI tapes work
		    Some SCSI CD-ROM drives work
		    The Matthias Pfaller Parallel Port.

		pmax: [The specifics of the PMAX are a little vague at
			this point.  We'll add these in later.]

		sparc:
        	    CPUs:
			sun4c (e.g. the SS1, SS1+, SS2, IPC, ELC, IPX, 
			    and SLC)
			sun4 (e.g. the 4/100, 4/200, and 4/300. note 
			    that support for the 4/400 processor is 
			    incomplete)

			*NOT* on these machines (yet):
        		sun-4/400 (lacking support for the I/O cache, and 
			    has ethernet problems)
			sun4m (e.g. sparc classic, 4, 5, 10, and 20)
			sun4d (e.g. sparc center 2000)

			Work on porting NetBSD/sparc to the sun4m 
			platform is currently in progress, but was 
			not ready in time for the 1.1 release.

		    Video:
			sun4c sbus video: 
			    cgsix, cgthree, and bwtwo frame buffers
			sun4 video (not thoroughly tested?):
			    P4 on-board bwtwo and VME cgtwo card

		    Serial ports:
		 	ttya and ttyb (can be used as console if needed)

		    Ethernet: 
			on-board AMD Lance ethernet ("le0")
			Sbus AMD Lance ethernet cards
			On-board Intel 82586 ethernet (ie0 on 4/100's 
			    and 4/200's)
			VME Intel 82586 ethernet cards 
		    SCSI: 
			on-board "esp" SCSI controller (sun4c's, and 
			    the 4/300) 
			sbus "esp" SCSI controller 
			Sun "SUN-3"/"si" VME SCSI controller (polled 
			    mode only, slow)
			Sun "SCSI Weird"/"sw" on-board controller 
			    (4/110 only, polled) 
		    VME disks: 
			Xylogics 7053 VME/SMD disk controller ("xd")
			Xylogics 450/451 VME disk controller ("xy") 
			    [note: VME/IPI disks are not supported] 
		    Sun floppy disk drive on sun4c's 
		    Sun keyboard and mouse 
		    Sun4c audio 

		Hardware the we do NOT currently support, but get many 
		  questions about: 
		    sun4m, including multiprocessor machines 
		    interrupt driven SCSI driver for sun-4/100's and 
			sun-4/200's 

		sun3:
		    CPUs:
                	3/50, 3/60, 3/110, 3/75, 3/150, 3/160, 3/260, 3/280

		    Serial ports (RS232):
                	built-in ttya, ttyb

		    Video adapters:
			bwtwo, cgtwo, cgfour

		    Network interfaces:
			On-board Lance Ethernet (le)
			On-board or VME Intel Ethernet (ie)

		    SCSI:
			(Most SCSI disks, tapes, CD-ROMs, etc.)
			On-board "si" (SCSI-3) [Note 1]
			VME "si" (SCSI-3) board [Note 1]
			SMD Disks: (the big, heavy ones 8^)
			Xylogics 450/451 [Note 2]
			Xylogics 753/7053 [Note 2]

		    Input devices:
			Sun keyboard and mouse

		    Miscellaneous:
			Battery-backed real-time clock.

		Note 1:
		    The "si" driver now supports DMA and 
		    disconnect/reselect but due to the immaturity 
		    of the DMA code, those features are disabled by 
		    default.  To enable DMA (and get faster SCSI 
		    performance) patch the variable si_options in 
		    the file /usr/src/sys/arch/sun3/dev/ncr_si.c as 
		    indicated.
		Note 2:
		    SMD disk support is almost ready, but could not be 
		    tested in time for this release.  Drivers are 
		    provided for the Xylogics 450/451 and Xylogics 
		    753/7053 VME boards only as source code.  They 
		    compile but have never touched a disk.


	Harddisk Storage requirements :
	*BSD:
	Base System 	16 MB
	Full binary distribution			46 MB
	Full source " 					72 MB
	Kernel Source					7 MB
	Swap						8 MB

	For all of the *BSD systems, the minimum is Base + Binary + Swap, 
	and that this minimum is 80 MB.  For a complete system with 
	binary and source you need at least 210 MB.  This does NOT 
	include X or LaTeX.

	Linux:
	This is difficult, because there are different distributions
	to choose from.  Every distribution has a special goal.  The main 
	distributions are Redhat (commercial release), Slackware, 
	Yggdrasil, and Debian.  As a general rule, the Linux
	distributions take less space than a similar *BSD distribution.

	Some other features:

	virtual terminals/consoles:
	All of the *BSD and Linux systems have virtual consoles
	available. 

	shared libraries:
	NetBSD, FreeBSD, and Linux have it. I recall a thread some time
	ago, which was something like "Linux shared Libs are no
	good - A pain for the developer."  For the user this should be 
	meaningless.  NetBSD and FreeBSD shared library implementations
	are both very easy to use both from the developer and user
	point of view.  UPDATE '96:  With the change to ELF and COFF,
	Linux shared libraries are now as easy to use as the BSD
	libraries.
	
	Networking:
	*BSD networking is more mature than the Linux networking.
	Berkeley invented TCP/IP, and since all of the BSD systems are
	based on the original Berkeley code, this should go without 
	saying.  In the development process of Linux 1.3.x/2.0, most of 
	the networking code was rewritten and parts of the BSD networking 
	code were ported to Linux in an attempt to fix any remaining 
	instabilities.  The Linux 2.0 networking code seems fairly 
	solid, but 2.0 is too recent to pass final judgement.  Eric 
	Schenk at the University of Toronto recently posted on several
	Usenet newsgroups and a couple of mailing-lists some comments 
	about the innards of the Linux networking code.  He seemed to 
	indicate that even the TCP protocol implementation is far 
	from complete.  I am looking for the specifics (his note/URL), 
	but I can't find it at the moment.

	Loadable Kernel Modules:
	LKMs have been supported in *BSD since the late 386bsd+Patchkit
	days.  Linux has supported LKMs for some time.

	File System Intrusion:
	One feature of Linux that is currently not implemented in any of
	the *BSD systems is the ability to make a filesystem on top
	of a DOS-FAT, so you don't need to repartition your Disk. This
	Filesystem is of course not as fast as a native Filesystem, but
	for trial it should be O.K.

	Here are some pro's and con's for both :

	*BSD:
	+ Full Source Code of all commands in a source tree, no need
	  to look all over the Internet for the source of a command.
	+ There is only one distribution, which is valid for some time.
	+ Networking is more mature.
	+ The system is standard BSD.
	+ System will natively execute Linux, FreeBSD, SysV, and iBCS2
	executables for all of the platforms supported
	- Releases of new versions not partiuclarly regular.
	- You need extra packages for XFree and for TeX.  They are not
	hard to find, and install into a standard location in the
	directory tree, but they are not included in the base
	distribution.  Most CD distributions include X and TeX
	implementations on the CD, and they are available from the
	primary FTP sites for each of the systems.

	Linux:
	+ Uses fewer resources
	+ Has more support for 'unusual' devices
	- Every distribution is a little bit different
	- Development is too fast without net access (typically no
	specific "version" releases.)

	I include here some info from other posts, which should help
	the new user to show the differences:

	burgess@cynjut.neonramp.com wrote:
	: NetBSD is the OS I use.  It is a BSD derived Operating System
	: that has a very stable operating envelope.  The networking code
	: has been stolen by commercial OS and network vendors the world
	: over.  NetBSD has the advantage of being meant for a wide
	: range of hardware platforms.  It is currently available for
	: something like 10 different CPUs, and has been laid out such
	: that new architectures can be added relatively painlessly.

	These arechitetures include several Sun Systems, many
	Motorolas, including the Amiga and Mac, and several other 
	mini- and microcomputer systems. 


	:
	: FreeBSD is pretty much the same (go ahead a quibble over
	: details, I don't care anymore).  The biggest difference is that 
	: NetBSD is a horizontal system (across platforms) and FreeBSD is 
	: a vertical system (intended to stay on the Intel family).  Both 
	: are based on code from 386BSD, although neither really resembles 
	: it any more.
	:
	: Linux was developed by Linus Torvalds and has the advantage of 
	: being available in source code form first.  Other than that, I 
	: have heard that it is a good OS platform for standalone Unix 
	: workstations.  It had a lot of things that made its users rabid 
	: before the *BSD folks did, but the purists insist that *BSD is 
	: (choose two:  cleaner, safer, taller, wider, better, quieter, 
	: louder, greener, older, more modern). 

	From: hedrick@geneva.rutgers.edu (Charles Hedrick)

	There are four major differences:

	1) the 386BSD family started with BSD, and Linux started with 
	POSIX.  NetBSD/FreeBSD/386BSD have been adding POSIX and System
	V compatibility, and Linux has been adding Berkeley and System
	V compatibility.  So there's a good deal of overlap.  But ...BSD 
	is still a better choice if you want to program in a Berkeley 
	environment and Linux if you want a POSIX environment.

	(Ed Note:  Linux started out with Minix, but only sort of.  The
	first file system it supported was the Minix file system.  The
	rest of the 'standard Linux' filesystems came along later.  POSIX 
	wasn't the original design document.  Linus wanted to see if he 
	could do it: apparently he could.)

	That's for the kernel and libc -- the utilities and other stuff  
	users see tends to be fairly similar.  In both cases the
	programs are what I call "typical University Unix".  The main 
	difference is that the base Unix utilities tend to be Berkeley 
	for *BSD and GNU for Linux.  GNU is fairly Berkeley-compatible, 
	but its priority is POSIX, so it tends to look slightly closer 
	to System V, with massive Berkeley extension.  There are several 
	sets of administrative utilities, but it's more likely that 
	init, getty, etc., are going to be System V style for Linux 
	and BSD for *BSD.  

	Again, these things aren't as significant as they might be
	because *BSD is also concerned about POSIX compatibility and
	GNU is concerned about BSD compatibility.  So both sets of
	software are approaching a similar sort of goal from opposite 
	directions.  You could probably use the systems for quite a
	while without noticing much difference.  (I'd like to emphasize
	that there's no similarity in overall feel between Linux and
	typical brain-dead PC System V ports.)

	The *BSD FAQ characterizes the difference as one of East
	Coast vs. West Coast.  There's a lot to be said for that
	summary.  There's more difference in Unix culture between New
	Jersey and California than between New Jersey and Finland.

	2) The nature of the development communities and distribution 
	mechanisms are different.  *BSD has three (four if you count
	BSDI) different developer communities that take code from 
	each other, but appear to hate each other's guts.  Even *BSD 
	and Linux take code from each other.  Thus there are several
	different *BSD's, each of which has an official distribution.  
	There's just one Linux kernel, and from a practical point of
	view just one set of major utilities, but there's no official 
	distribution.  So several different groups put together 
	distributions, with their own choice of kernel and utility 
	versions.  This means that it's easier to define what the One
	True Linux is than what the One True BSD is, but harder to get
	it.  Once you've decided which BSD is the right one, it's easier
	to find an authoritative distribution of it.  Development of
	Linux tends to be more distributed.  Lots of people are working
	on lots of projects: new drivers for this and that, new
	versions of this utility and that.  If you want to keep up with
	NetBSD, FreeBSD, or OpenBSD you can automatically download the
	changes for the -current from one or two places for each release.
	FreeBSD and NetBSD use 'sup' and OpenBSD uses 'anoncvs', a more 
	powerful versioning and updating system.  If you want to keep 
	up with Linux, you end up taking pieces from lots of people 
	(though they generally end up on one of two archive machines 
	-- tsx-11.mit.edu or sunsite.unc.edu).  If you don't want to 
	do this, of course the packaged distributions do it for you.

	3) The BSD networking is more mature than the Linux networking.  
	This is one area in which I don't think Linux has any 
	countervailing advantages, though in my opinion by release 1.0
	Linux networking will be acceptable. (Ed Note:  This is, in
	fact, the case.  Linux networking has matured considerably this
	was originally written).

	4) There are specific things in each system that are likely to
	be deciding factors for some people.  I don't know what unique
	things BSD has, because I'm not part of that community but here
	is the list of features that I find appealing:
	  - COFF and ELF compatiblity:
		When this was originally written, neither had ELF or
		COFF support built in.  They both do now.
	  - Windows executable emulation:
		This is probably more useful, and it's being done
	jointly by developers from both BSD and Linux cooperatively. 
	(After two years, this is still not completed.)  
	  - DOS compatibility:
		The existing releases of *BSD don't have DOS
		compatability, but the imminent releases of FreeBSD and
		NetBSD both do.  This emulator is the same one BSDI
		uses, so is exactly the same as the commercial BSD/OS
		version.  The Linux DOS emulator has a long history, but
		is generally considered slow enough and creaky enough
		that it's not generally usable.  However it certainly 
		does work for many programs, and if one of those programs 
		is critical to you, it may be a big deal.  
	  - Differences in support of devices are not likely to persist 
	  	for long.  There's a history of taking device drivers in 
		both directions, so if there's enough interest in a device, 
		and one side implements it, you can bet it will (generally)
		show up on the other side.  (Ed Note:  The floppy tape
		driver is a good example of one that didn't make it to
		all of the BSD systems.  FreeBSD has it, but NetBSD
		doesn't.)
	  - Linux uses DOS partitions (including extended partitions).  
	  - BSD creates its own partitions inside a single non-DOS 
	  	partition.  This is a difference, but it's unclear whether 
		it's a critical one.
	  - Linux and *BSD can all mount DOS filesystems and Linux can
		mount OS/2 file systems (OS/2 is read-only).

	For a lot of people, the best suggestion is to find out what
	your friends are doing.  If there's a significant user
	community near you of either kind, you're probably best off to
	go with it.  If not, flip a coin (or look at a map and see
	whether you're nearer Berkeley or Finland -- note that in this 
	comparison portions of the distance that are over an ocean
	don't count).

	There is another difference:  the use of the network share
	directories.

	The Linux file system standard (which is supported by convention
	by most Linux developers) currently says that no program 
	should look directly into /usr/share, that symlinks should be 
	provided from other places, such as /etc/termcap.  This provides
	the ability to have a heterogeneous /usr/share that anyone can
	access, but which does not NEED to be available for the system
	to operate.

	On the other hand, there is a movement to have the /usr/share
	directory tree available to all programs that need it in the
	*BSD camps.  It is more a matter of opinion than a matter of
	substance as to which is better; it is simply another
	difference, and one that is not likely to change in the near
	future.

	Bob Woods writes: 
	"My very slight experince with trying to port some ISA 
	ethernet and ISDN drivers from Linux to NetBSD left me with 
	the impression that none of the code is of very high quality.  
	I didn't get very close to much of the code still maintained 
	only by Linus, but more than one of these drivers was 
	absolutely atrocious.  I ended up dropping my plans to port the 
	driver, and would be writing from scratch if the project had 
	not been cancelled."


	
	



0.2.2	I want to start up a thread about why *BSD is or isn't as good 
	as some other operating system.  Can anyone suggest a good reason
	why I shouldn't?

	Jordan Hubbard, one of the FreeBSD core team members, has
	offered this missive on that very subject:

	[ Note:  You could very well simply substitute the word
	"NetBSD", "OpenBSD", or "Windows 95"  for "Linux" in the 
	argument that follows ]

	From time to time, a thread in both the comp.os.386bsd.misc and 
	comp.os.linux.misc groups flares up regarding which operating
	system is "better", FreeBSD or Linux.  This generally provokes 
	controversy from users on both sides, with one group claiming
	that their OS is "better" for some reason and the other group
	claiming that the first group doesn't know what the heck it's
	talking about.

	Both arguments are a waste of time.

	Rather than trying to win a rather questionable debate on
	relative (and constantly changing) technical merits, we should
	be asking ourselves what both groups are REALLY about and what
	they represent.  This is naturally going to be a matter of
	personal opinion, but I believe even the most seriously at-odds
	members would agree that both operating systems represent a
	unique and long-awaited opportunity: The ability to run a fully 
	featured operating system on popular, easily affordable
	hardware and for which all source code is freely available.
	Those who have been in computing for awhile will remember when
	the term `operating system' referred almost exclusively to
	something provided solely by the hardware vendor, with very
	little in the way of alternative options.  It was never EVER
	given out with source code, and true "wizard" status could only
	be achieved by exerting mind-numbing amounts of effort and
	patience in digging through forbidden bits of binary data.  By 
	comparison, the situation today seems almost too good to be
	true!  Certainly, the feeling of achievement that came from
	finally ferreting out some esoteric bit of information from a
	4MB printed system dump was high, but I don't think that anyone
	would argue that it was hardly the most optimal way of truly
	getting to know your operating system! :-)

	So now, within a very short space of time, we're almost spoiled
	for choice in having machines several times more powerful than
	the first multi-user VAX machines and available for under
	$2000, and we've got not one but SEVERAL perfectly reasonable
	free operating systems to chose from.  We are in a comparative 
	paradise, and what are some of us doing?  *Complaining* about 
	it!  I suppose too much is never enough, eh? :-)

	So, my essential point is simply this:  For the first time ever
	we have what previous computing generations could only dream
	about; powerful computers at a reasonable prices and a
	wonderful selection of things to run on them.  Be happy, read
	the source code you're so privileged to now have available
	(*believe* me!  What I wouldn't have given, even 5 years ago!)
	and spend your energy in making constructive use of it, not in 
	arguing with the guys on the other side of the fence!

	Additionally, it should be said that none of the FreeBSD team
	has anything but the highest degree of respect for Linus
	Torvalds and his "team" of dedicated volunteers (and we
	occasionaly exchange gripe mail about the huge volume of
	messages each of us gets as a direct result of being insane
	enough to volunteer to do something like this :-).  Our common 
	commitment to the Intel platform also gives us more common
	ground (and interests) than one might think and, if anything,
	it's a pity that we do not endeavor to share more code and
	effort - ideologically, at least, I'd say we share pretty
	similar goals.

	As to which is "best", I have only one standard reply: Try them
	both, see for yourself, think for yourself.  Both groups have
	given you something for free, at considerable personal effort,
	and the least you can do is give them the benefit of exerting
	enough effort to try what they're offering out before passing 
	judgment (or worse, blindly accepting someone else's!).

	Whichever you run, you're getting a great deal - enjoy!

				Jordan Hubbard


0.2.3	Are all of the Berkeley derived systems binary compatible?  If
	not, what are the differences?  

	(Ed Note.  This section is probably wrong, even if it was right 
	when I looked at it last.  There is a LOT of work going on, 
	including SysV ELF support and other cool stuff.)

	NetBSD/386 runs old 386BSD, FreeBSD, NetBSD/386 0.8, and most 
	BSDI executables.  However, due to upgrading to the latest 
	version of the UCB DB library, programs which use said 
	library cannot be mixed old and new; e.g. an old `ls' cannot 
	read the pwd.db file created with a new `pwd_mkdb', and vice 
	versa. 

	FreeBSD runs 386BSD, NetBSD/386 0.8, and most BSDi executables.
	You can replace the remainder of the paragraph above here too.

	NetBSD 1.1 and FreeBSD 2.1.5 are now able to run any of the
	following:

	- Linux executables (static or dynamic)
	- BSDI executables
	- 386 Common Object File Format (COFF) executables
	- Each other's executables

	In addition, there are several other CPUs that NetBSD works
	with, and these have compatability code for the native operating
	system for those CPUs built in.  Macintosh and Amiga can even
	run each others executables under NetBSD (although not necessarily
	Mac or Amiga native apps).

	In addition, the -current x86 *BSD family core teams has been 
	working on improving and porting the BSDI DOS emulator.  This 
	means that soon, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and NetBSD will all be 
	capable of running native DOS apps,


0.3	Are there any resources on the Net (like URLs) associated with 
	the BSD family of operating systems?

	Yup:

	http://www.public.iastate.edu:~gendalia/FAQ/FAQ.list.html
	http://www.freebsd.org/
	http://www.openbsd.org/
 	http://rfhs1012.fh.uni-regensburg.de/~feyrer/
	http://www.cd.chalmers.se/~nh/netbsd.html
	http://www.flame.org/netbsd/projects
	ftp://ftp.uni-regensburg.de/pub/NetBSD-Amiga/.index.html
	ftp://ftp.cdrom.com:/pub/FreeBSD/packages/WWW.tgz
	ftp://ftp.netbsd.org:pub/NetBSD/mailing-lists
	ftp://flick.lerc.nasa.gov:~ftp/pub/NetBSD/packages/i386
	ftp://ftp.iastate.edu:/pub/Netbsd/FAQ
	http://sirius.ics.es.osaka-u.ac.jp/~kamahara/NetBSD-X68060

	IF you are going to be using IRC in the near future and want to
	talk to some of the movers and shakers in NetBSD, the next time
	you log in look for one of the following people:

		Handle		Channel
		'hubertf' 	#netbsd


0.4	How to add your pet answer to the FAQ.

	This is the trickiest part of this section of the FAQ.  There are 
	only two criteria for getting an entry made into the FAQ:

	1.  Your answer should answer a question that seems to come up
	    with some regularity, or at least perplexes a group of
	    people from time to time.

	2.  Your answer should be technically correct.  In other words,
	    answers like 'RTFM' and 'everybody knows that' are not really
	    good candidates for the FAQ.  These answers should spell out,
	    in a reasonable level of detail, precisely how to fix the
	    the question asked, or explain the basis for the answer and
	    leave the implementation of the answer to the questioner.

	All answers MUST include a question.  This is not as obvious as 
	it would seem at first glance.  An answer could solve many 
	problems, especially in the realms of system halts or other 
	catastrophes. 

	Since I (Dave) am no Unix guru, I rely HEAVILY on the input of 
	other people to make the FAQ a success.  Many questions in the 
	FAQ have been made largely irrelevant through the patchkits, but 
	that doesn't means they may not reappear.  That is why the old 
	FAQ questions are still here.

	New FAQ questions should be added.  I will try to attribute the 
	question/answer to the author, but I personally think this is a 
	waste of good disk space.  As long as the answers get out, that 
	should be reward enough :-)


0.5	Administrivia.

	Send all question/answer pairs to burgess@cynjut.neonramp.com,  
	If you are going to post the Q/A to the net, then do that, but 
	be sure to mark it as a FAQ entry.  I will get it from the net 
	as easily as I do my E-Mail.  Your Q/A will be formatted to 
	look more or less like the others and be added.  Corrections, 
	deletions, flames, snivels, and whines should be addressed 
	directly to me here.  Either way, I will be sure to send out a 
	reply letting you know what I have done with your submission.

	One last thing.  I will assume that I am infalible. :-)  I will 
	not notice any mistakes that you may find.  If you find a 
	mistake and don't tell me, it will very likely stay a mistake.
	After all, if I didn't notice it before, why should I notice
	it now?


0.6	Does anyone reading this have any sense of humor at all?

	I'm not sure.  While reasearching the great 'Linux vs. everyone
	else sucks' debate, I received this in E-Mail.  The author's
	identity has been removed to protect him from the mail-bombs.
	For the humor impaired, stop reading now!

	----------------------------------------------------------------

	Many people ask the question "Which is better?  FreeBSD, NetBSD, 
	OpenBSD, or Linux?"  Up until now, not many people are willing 
	to answer thoroughly and give reasons.  I, being a brave soul, 
	am.  This mini-FAQ lists the most significant differences 
	between Linux, NetBSD, and FreeBSD in a fair and evenhanded 
	manner.  Permission is given to redistribute this mini-FAQ 
	freely, with attribution.  If anyone wants to take the burden 
	of posting it periodically on the appropriate newsgroups, be 
	my guest.

	This is based on a message I wrote some months ago.  I've 
	tried to update it substantially to reflect the changing 
	nature of x86 OS's.

	-------------
	Q) Which is better?  NetBSD, OpenBSD, Linux, or FreeBSD?


	A) NetBSD is the best of the three because of it's superb 
	error handling capabilities (this is the "Net" referred to 
	in the name).  With NetBSD, it's almost impossible to make 
	a mistake, either in installation, or operation, because the 
	system will "catch" you as you "fall".  NetBSD works on a 
	wide range of processors, including the Intel 386, 486, and 
	586, the Sun, Sparc, SGI, MIPS, Macintosh, Motorola 6809, 
	Krupf, ADC Kentrox, Whirlpool, Amana, Zilog Z80, 
	Timex-Sinclair, and the Braun.  Currently, the NetBSD team 
	is devoting all of their energies towards finishing the 
	all-important IBM RT port.


	Linux is the successor to an operating system called "Minix".  
	Linux was developed by Linus Pauling, a Finnish communist.  
	Linux tries to uphold traditional Marxist values in several 
	ways; firstly by using GNU tools from the FSF foundation 
	wherever possible.  The Linux kernel is developed by committee, 
	and the operating system reflects this:  rather than having one 
	"init" process which fathers all others, a group of co-resident 
	processes with equal powers are created simultaneously.  "Kill" 
	commands are treated as formal protests.  Linux networking has 
	come a long way since it's implementation, and there is no truth 
	whatsoever to the rumor that sudden losses of IP connectivity 
	are in any way related to future plans to limit users to 1.5 
	hours of SLIP or PPP unless they send in the registration fee.


	FreeBSD was a radical offshoot of the Linux project; you could 
	consider it to be of the Trotskyite school.  FreeBSD supports 
	an extremely wide range of PC hardware, as long as it was 
	obtained at less than cost.  FreeBSD is used by Amnesty 
	International and many other human rights organizations.  
	FreeBSD supports every peripheral available for the IBM PC 
	except the ones you have.  The FreeBSD team was actually 
	responsible for porting  "Doom" to Linux, in a successful 
	effort to slow down constructive work by distracting the 
	central committee with frivolous games.  FreeBSD has the 
	nicest installation of any of the x86 unices -- you install 
	the boot disks, which then initialize the modem and call 
	Jordan "Perky" Hubbard, who then comes to your house with the 
	rest of the disks and completes the installation.  The FreeBSD 
	CD-ROM plays various Nick Cave and Tom Waits songs Jordan is
	known to be fond of.


	386bsd was written by Bill Jolitz in a fit of pique.  It was 
	based entirely on Sun's widely-respected "Solaris" operating 
	system, as revenge against Sun's Bill Joy, who rudely chose a 
	name with the same initials as Jolitz.  A new version of 386bsd 
	will be released very soon.  Unfortunately, it will only run on 
	386es, and thus is unsuitable for anyone with a 486 or Pentium.  
	486bsd should be released "sometime in 2138," according to 
	industry insider James Monroe, Sr.

	DID YOU KNOW?
	=============

	1) The Free and Net BSD teams split up in the year 1632.  The 
	cause of the split is uncertain, but it seems to have something 
	to do with someone named "Janice."  They still get together for 
	drinks occasionally, and remember old times.  Every so often, 
	after tying on a few too many, they end up waking up next to 
	each other and feel ashamed over their night of pleasure.  The 
	kids still blame themselves.

	2) The Linux kernel has actually not changed at all since January, 
	'94?   Linus just increments "version.c" once every 48 hours and 
	unleashes the "change" on an unsuspecting Internet, bringing FTP 
	servers to their knees.  A book, "The Design and Implementation 
	of the Linux Operating System," my Gary Marshall James T. Kirk 
	McUsenet, was rejected by Addison-Wesley on the grounds that they 
	didn't feel the public was prepared to purchase a book written 
	on looseleaf paper with diagrams in crayon.

	3) All three systems claim to be "POSIX" compliant.  However, the 
	POSIX people have denied knowing anything about it.  Scuttlebutt 
	in the industry is that POSIX will soon be outdated, and will be 
	replaced by GNOPIX, a FSF standard which implements the TOPS-20 
	operating system in Scheme. 


-- 
Dave Burgess  (The man of a thousand E-Mail addresses)
*bsd FAQ Maintainer / SysAdmin for the NetBSD system in my spare bedroom
"Just because something is stupid doesn't mean there isn't someone that 
doesn't want to do it...."