OT Comments -- Unix documentation / speed question

From: allisonp_at_world.std.com <(allisonp_at_world.std.com)>
Date: Wed Apr 12 11:33:48 2000

> While I was never a VMS or other DEC programmer, and hence never
> saw the "orange" or "gray" walls of documentation, I was for a
> time a Sun/Unix programmer. So I did see Sun's "green and white"
> wall of SunOS documentation -- about 3-4 four feet long of four-
> inch binders. It was a very good resource that was quickly

Very similar....

> I have RedHat Linux 6 and I am not happy. I was very dismayed to
> see how big the loaded version was, which very quickly filled
> 400+ MB of material onto my 540MB hard drive with just basic
> stuff, and it seems to run slow to boot (including very slow to

Same for rh5.2, I may add it didn't seem any faster than NT4/ws either.

> boot-up). In contrast, when I earlier played with FreeBSD (2.2.5),
> that seemed to be a lean and mean, fast running system on a

I have 2.2.6 and it's faster, much faster! I'm currently running it
on a 386sx/16 and it's amazingly useful even with 4mb ram.

> comparable 486-33 that I have the Linux on. Software bloat is
> most definitely an issue -- and unless you REALLY KNOW Unix, it is
> tough (like for Win9x) to know which files can be trimmed away.
> And reliance on package installs/removes doesn't help, as they
> don't tell you of Unix dependencies in their documentation, hence
> a growing problem like for WinDoze. Not good I think.

Both winders and packaed linux offer installations in custome mode and
using that makes a difference. I regualy build printservers using old
120mb disks (60mb free!) using W95osr2 after custom install and pruning
off crud like IE, MSN, Exchange that aren't needed.

> Has anyone actually done an speed comparison between Linux, FreeBSD,
> and NetBSD?

I did one for Freebsd and linux for my use as possible candidate against
NT4 server.

> My impression (from limited exposure) is that BSD-based kernel
> versions run much faster (and are generally smaller in size) than
> comparable SYS-V or Linux systems. That comment stems from

yes, they are lighter to a point. if you build linux for a specific
system it's close.

> In particular, I would like to know how FreeBSD compares to the
> more open (cross-platform) implementation in NetBSD.

My $0.02:

 Linux freely available and supported. Weak config control.
 Netbsd, runs on anything.
 Freebsd, strong, robust, good security, does not run everything not
   as pretty for the desktop.
 
In the end they lost to NT4/SP4 as I needed to host 40 W95 clients.
Linux is not quite ready for W95 user desktops.. yet.


Allison
Received on Wed Apr 12 2000 - 11:33:48 BST