Menhir a distro for FreeBSD plus three other free operating systems.

[Gueven Bay]

Dear FreeBSD community,

With this post I started the work on Menhir.

Menhir is a source based distribution of 4 free
operating systems: Slackware, FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenSolaris.

Menhir will distribute the sources of:
FreeBSD Release 6.1 (base system)
Slackware 11.0 (all packages which are required for "starting with pkgsrc)
NetBSD Release 3.1 (base system)
OpenSolaris build 65 + two tar balls of closed binaries which are required.
+
pkgsrc 2007Q1

The base systems are _forever_ "frozen" . Only bug fixing and security
updates will be
included in the source files. Only the pkgsrc tree is a "moving" part for
actual and fresh userland.

I want to distribute these 4 operating systems side by side
for following reasons:

1) Collaboration:
I want to make Menhir the meeting point of the users and developers from all
the four operating systems. They should chat, develop and test together
their
systems for interoperability, security, stability and so on.

With this I want to get rid of the ever ongoing of rivalry between the users
and
developers of the (free) Unix-like operating systems.

2) Teaching:
I want to make Menhir a distribution for training the administration and
development
skills for all the four operating systems.
You know that people are driving heterogeneous systems at their workplace
and also
in some cases at home. I also don't have to explain to you that
heterogeneous systems
are more stable and secure.
With Menhir you will get the basis for building up skills for such a
multi-operating system
environment.

I witness that if today someone learns about some Unix-like operating system
then it is
mostly Linux. I want to change that with Menhir. I want to bring the broad
knowledge
about all four operating systems to the users.

3) Experimenting:
With Menhir you can start your own experiments (system building and also
development) without
fear because the stable base systems give you a point to where you can
return if your experiments
were not successful.

With this I want to encourage users to build their systems not only with
Linux but also
with FreeBSD or NetBSD or OpenSolaris using the best combination for the
appropriate "use-case".

The principles of Menhir are:
I) Strength : You, as a user, get four distributions with one medium. You,
as a user, get one united documentation for every system. You get a really
stable system as the base system will forever be constant.
II) Vigour : You get a maximum flexible system. From the kernel up to the
graphical userland you can choose every part of your system. As the base
system is constant the userland will be always developing forward. This is
dynamics to the max.
III) Security : As the base system will be constant, after training yourself
or your employees your skills never get old. As the base system will be
constant, the testing and bug fixing will make the most possible stable
system. With the overall quality management of the constant base system the
most possible secure interaction between every operating system will be
ensured.
IV) Knowledge : This is the essence for using a computer system for maximum
efficiency in private life and and business alike. With the concentrated,
united documentation you get knowledge about all operating systems for
deployment, administration and use.
V) Freedom : Every included operating system is free. You are free to use
them as you want. You are free to build upon them as you want.

Today, I am building up the site for Menhir. Soon I will post you the
address.
But in the meantime every (constructive or non-constructive) comment is
welcome.

best regards
Gueven Bay