why BSDs got no love

[Peer Schaefer]

I disagree (partially).

1st: PCBSD has a graphical installer. But I don't think a graphical
installer is needed. An installer with a curses-like menu-driven
interface is sufficient for most techy users (and face it: aunt Jamie is
not the target audience for *BSD). But I admit that some menus of the
*BSD installers are a little bit cryptic. The installer also lacks a
good help facility. Perhaps it needs a little polishing.

2nd: The lack of a live CD is a real problem. A live CD is crucial for
testing hardware compatibility and for data rescue (accessing a UFS
formatted BSD-slice from a Linux live CD should be theoretically
possible, but I never got it working).

3rd: *BSD is a great server OS. It tried to switch my desktop machine
too, but in the end two problems blocked that: (a) Automounting USB
media never worked really good. (b) I have large amount of data on
ext2/ext3 formatted media. I can't convert them online to UFS, and I
never got the ext2/ext3 fs-driver for *BSD to correct work.

Conclusion: A graphical installer is a nice add-on, but no must-have. An
curses-like interface is ok. But perhaps the installer needs some
polishing. The lack of a live CD is a real problem. And for desktop
usage *BSD needs working automounting and a good ext2/ext3 driver.

Best wishes,
--Peer


Am Dienstag, den 15.12.2009, 16:33 +0100 schrieb Jan Husar:
> http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/opensource/?p=1123&tag=nl.e011
>