# Using FreeBSD as Desktop OS



## asifnaz (Aug 17, 2016)

I know FreeBSD is a very stable OS . I want to use it as Desktop OS (with some GUI) . How do I do that..?


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## shepherdAZ (Aug 17, 2016)

https://antumdeluge.wordpress.com/2014/07/19/how-to-install-freebsd/ discusses desktop options.


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## Murph (Aug 17, 2016)

Please have a read of The X Window System in the FreeBSD Handbook.

X11 is the open standard window system, originally from MIT, for Unix (and Linux, when that came along).


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## gofer_touch (Aug 17, 2016)

Here is another one for you:

https://cooltrainer.org/a-freebsd-desktop-howto/

There is also the script `desktop-installer` in the package repository and the ports tree. You simply do `pkg install desktop-installer` in a new install and follow the instructions. You can have a basic FreeBSD desktop up and running literally within about 15 minutes.


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## tobik@ (Aug 17, 2016)

asifnaz said:


> I know FreeBSD is a very stable OS . I want to use it as Desktop OS (with some GUI) . How do I do that..?


Install PC-BSD.

Or see https://www.freebsdfoundation.org/freebsd/how-to-guides/installing-a-desktop-environment-on-freebsd/


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## drhowarddrfine (Aug 17, 2016)

Search this forum


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## scottro (Aug 17, 2016)

What sort of desktop are you expecting?  For example, the link in the previous post is good if you're looking for a minimal desktop.

Will this be a laptop or desktop?   FreeBSD lacks support for some wireless cards supported by Linux, though you can use a USB to wireless, like the Edimax 7811-UN (I probably have the dashes in the wrong place.)  Synaptics can be problematic and several newer Intel video cards aren't supported.  

This is not to put you off trying it, but just be aware that there may be some things that don't work properly depending upon your hardware. On the other hand, on a desktop I have, FreeBSD installed like a charm, installed the NVidia drivers from packages, and I got set up as quickly as I would some Linux desktops.


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## fossette (Aug 18, 2016)

tobik said:


> Install PC-BSD.


_*SOAPBOX on*_
Sorry, but why do I keep seeing this when the question is about *FreeBSD*?  As if some members do not wish new users to use FreeBSD, as if new users can't learn. FreeBSD is quite capable to be a desktop OS.  To me, PC-BSD is a bundle, and bundles are a set of frozen-in-time packages (until the next upgrade).  FreeBSD is more than that!
_*SOAPBOX off*_

Well, if a new user wants PC-BSD, go for it.  The option exists!  The choice is his!

Dominique.


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## wblock@ (Aug 18, 2016)

Yes.  The thing is that PCBSD is FreeBSD, and it's a lot easier to tell someone to install it than to walk them through the process of installing and configuring X and desktop managers.  An install that includes X and a desktop manager is also what a lot of people expect when they install an "operating system".

Now if they want to set it up on FreeBSD, it definitely can be done, as those of us who have been using FreeBSD desktops for years can prove.  It just takes a bit of time and effort.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Sep 9, 2016)

Did not found more appropriate topic, may be this info will be helpful for someone 
who will use FreeBSD as a desktop OS.
If I found out this solution when I started to use FreeBSD as a desktop OS,
it could save me a lot of time while I mounted my mp3 player with
`mount_msdosfs -L en_US.UTF-8 /dev/da4 /media/WALKMAN`
All my mp3-s are like "209≠SINS — ⱭɆMɆ℞ǾⱠ ▲ D￥И∆ϟȾ￥ " ,
so to open files and dirs from my mp3 player,
it should be mounted in UTF-8 locale.

*Auto mount attached USB devices in UTF-8 locale with your file manager using hal.*
(Works  with x11-fm/nautilus, x11-fm/thunar, x11-fm/pcmanfm… etc)
By default (with hald_enable="YES" in /etc/rc.conf) x11-fm/nautilus will auto mount with HAL all your attached USB devices, but it won't automount these devices in UTF-8 locale (even if your system locale is UTF-8 locale), so if there are some folders/files that use unicode symbols (✞✞☹☹☹✞✞) or hindi/arabic/cyrillic letters in its names — you won't be able to open it. So to change this appearance, install sysutils/gconf-editor, open it and navigate to /system/storage/default_options/vfat/mount_options and add

```
-L=en_US.UTF-8
```






to its values (or another *.UTF-8 locale).


Or just enter
`gconftool-2 --set "/system/storage/default_options/vfat/mount_options" --type list --list-type=string "[longnames,-u=,-L=en_US.UTF-8]"`
and press return.


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## zirias@ (Sep 9, 2016)

fossette said:


> Sorry, but why do I keep seeing this when the question is about *FreeBSD*? As if some members do not wish new users to use FreeBSD, _as *if new users can't learn*_. FreeBSD is quite capable to be a desktop OS. To me, PC-BSD is a bundle, and bundles are a set of frozen-in-time packages (until the next upgrade). FreeBSD is more than that!


Most can, only some want, the one willing to learn will check google first and e.g. find this "cooltrainer.org" howto. Although a _bit_ dated, it gave _me_ quite some idea before my first test with FreeBSD, which then was 11.0-CURRENT with KDE4 on a notebook 

So, I'm all with you, I wouldn't want everything bundled. But it's a matter of taste whether you value maximum control of the system higher than the time needed to get that going


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## Snurg (Sep 10, 2016)

Except of the lacking hibernation functionality FreeBSD is a perfect desktop system imho.
In terms of stability, it is different category than Linux or even Windows.
So, if you can live with S3 instead of S4 suspend, FreeBSD is your perfect desktop OS.
Disadvantage is a bit more manual configuration, though.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Sep 10, 2016)

Snurg said:


> In terms of stability, it is different category than Linux *or even Windows.*


 Not in my opinion. Yes, FreeBSD is much better in security, performance and "terms of stability" than Linux,
but Linux is much better than Windows… In ALL "terms"  except in terms of proprietary software amount, Windows wins here 
While FreeBSD and GNU/Linux are successful and Free *nix operating systems (FreeBSD is a successor to UNIX and GNU/Linux is a UNIX-like OS with a "_little bit_" different license ), Windows is a proprietary piece of garbage with spying features, a buggy, slow and stupid operating system for housewifes…


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## ANOKNUSA (Sep 10, 2016)

fossette said:


> Sorry, but why do I keep seeing this when the question is about *FreeBSD*? As if some members do not wish new users to use FreeBSD, as if new users can't learn. FreeBSD is quite capable to be a desktop OS.



The debate about *nix as a "desktop OS" confounded for a while, having used Linux as my main OS on laptops all through my college years and now using FreeBSD in my day job. It took me a while to realize that people wondering whether *nix could work as a "desktop OS" were envisioning a stereotypical "desktop user" with a stereotypical "desktop" use case. You know the type: they think of computers as magic boxes full of little hamster genies that run around fetching thems their Bookfaces and the emails. Whether an OS can be used to do "desktop" stuff is irrelevant: everything should just work without any effort or learning on the user's part. It's hand-holding these people want. The PC-BSD folks are willing to hold those hands. Well, let's send them there, rather than bogging down this community with the same inane questions over and over. I've been using FreeBSD for about two years now, and the question of whether FreeBSD could be used as a "desktop  OS" has come up quite a few times. The abundance of X applications ought to answer that, but then the usual "desktop OS" crowd can't be bothered to look that stuff up, so they ask here instead, letting someone else spend the time and effort because _they_ have _better things_ to do with their time than ...*snort*... _learn_ things.

I say stop the discussion then and there. Call me callous, but from my observation the quality of a community and its products dropping as it lowers its standards to accommodate noobs is a very real phenomenon, because noobs don't know what they're talking about and can't articulate what they want, and can't properly participate in the right discussions. Some of them eventually will be able to; many won't even try, and will simply demand things from developers. If someone else somewhere wants to pick up the quality operating system that is FreeBSD and make it "user-friendly" for another crowd, good for them. Funnel all the people wanting user-friendliness here, and the quality of FreeBSD will drop below sea level when the focus shifts from stability, reliability, performance, and security, to the convenience and novelty "desktop users" want.


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## teo (Sep 10, 2016)

Look at this cute FreeBSD system in a graphical desktop, and why not dream of a FreeBSD system with a graphical desktop by default from the array?


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## xavi (Sep 12, 2016)

ANOKNUSA said:


> I've been using FreeBSD for about two years now, and the question of whether FreeBSD could be used as a "desktop  OS" has come up quite a few times



Add an option to install a desktop in the installer and this question goes away 

Seriously, I've seen this point of view before and I'm always slightly mystified by it. Why make things harder than they have to be? This is the 21st Century after all. Why not include a desktop installer as part of the install process, but allow people who want to run a headless server to skip past it? We don't expect people to set up everything manually, hence the use of an installer. So, why should the installation of a desktop UI be any different? 

How many good people have moved on to another OS simply because they struggled with setting up a desktop on FreeBSD. You may claim that this 'rite of passage' solves a problem by filtering out people that don't know enough or persist enough to get things working. But people have deadlines, jobs, families and other issues impacting them that stops them wasting time on something that should just work. And first impressions count. Those same people may have gone on to be excellent additions to the FreeBSD project if only their first foray had been a bit more friendly. 

More than once I've come across remarks on other forums of people that have installed OpenBSD and been pleasantly surprised at how friendly the install process is and the fact that OpenBSD even comes with a minimal WM by default. It's often not the one that they want to use but it at least bootstraps them and makes their system usable. And this, from a project that is often seen as unforgiving of new users.

Some of us will never use FreeBSD as a server. I don't even use FreeBSD at work. So my only contact with FreeBSD is on a laptop at home, running it as a desktop. So, if I couldn't have got a desktop running you would have lost my contribution to the project (as small as it is). And I'm sure that there are many others like me on this forum.  

There are enough hard problems to solve in the FreeBSD project already, without the installation of a desktop being one of them. IMO, making the project more welcoming (without dumbing it down) should be the number one priority of the Foundation.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 12, 2016)

ANOKNUSA You said that very eloquently. I've tried saying the same thing for years but wind up in gibberish as I slam my hands against the keyboard.



xavi said:


> This is the 21st Century after all. Why not include a desktop installer as part of the install process


There is! Not in the standard installer but it's there. After all, FreeBSD is a professional operating system for professionals. If it's too difficult to install a window manager, then one should move on to something else. We're not out to win any popularity or beauty contest.



> There are enough hard problems to solve in the FreeBSD project already, without the installation of a desktop being one of them.


That's a very good case for not including it in the standard install.

And which desktop software would you install? Would you want to run up against all the people who will rail against your choice? How much manpower does FreeBSD have to throw at this work?


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## scottro (Sep 12, 2016)

It's a reasonable question, but the simple answer is that there are only so many resources to go around.  PCBSD, with some commercial backing, is doing a lot of that already.  

Additionally, judging from several Linux distributions, as they concentrate more on the GUI, it becomes harder to do the regular sysadmin stuff--for example, RedHat, a billion dollar company, crippled their text installer, which, judging from various forums and mailing lists, frequently causes issues when X doesn't work properly during installation.


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## zirias@ (Sep 12, 2016)

xavi said:


> Seriously, I've seen this point of view before and I'm always slightly mystified by it. Why make things harder than they have to be? This is the 21st Century after all. Why not include a desktop installer as part of the install process, but allow people who want to run a headless server to skip past it? We don't expect people to set up everything manually, hence the use of an installer. So, why should the installation of a desktop UI be any different?


One very simple and yet important reason (IMHO): Keep the _base_ system minimal, complete, self-contained and strictly separated from anything else. FreeBSD is a complete operating system on its own (unlike Linux, which is basically still just a kernel). GUIs aren't part of that OS, and you wouldn't want to integrate something like xorg in the base system.

What you get in the Linux world is distributions, and there's nothing wrong with distributions pre-configuring software for e.g. a desktop environment. A "FreeBSD distribution" could do the same. But out of the box, for FreeBSD itself, I think this would be a bad idea, somehow comparable to kernel.org delivering an installer for xorg and KDE -- silly, isn't it? That would bind resources better invested in developing the OS itself.

Of course you _can_ install all the necessary extra software yourself. You can do the same on Linux (see the _LFS_ book), but that's a bit more complicated, because Linux isn't a complete operating system and doesn't come with a ports tree (although some distributor does something similar).


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## ronaldlees (Sep 12, 2016)

Zirias said:


> ...
> But out of the box, for FreeBSD itself, I think this would be a bad idea ...



I agree.  Even if the extended installer were to have a selection for a full blown UI, but only as an option, there could down-the-road be a tendency to blur the edges, and bring unwanted dependencies into the picture. For one thing, developers would be predisposed to develop with a bias for the (somewhat arbitrary) UI setup.

The UI stuff would likely bring into the picture extra responsibilities relative to security issues.  And - those (potential) security issues would not be in the bread-and-butter workload of the OS developers.

I like the idea that I can install only a base+kernel system, to do things that I want to do with more security than I (might) have with a full blown desktop.  So, it's not always that a base install is done to set up a server.


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## ANOKNUSA (Sep 13, 2016)

xavi said:


> How many good people have moved on to another OS simply because they struggled with setting up a desktop on FreeBSD. You may claim that this 'rite of passage' solves a problem by filtering out people that don't know enough or persist enough to get things working. But people have deadlines, jobs, families and other issues impacting them that stops them wasting time on something that should just work.



*It doesn't "just work." It has never "just worked."* Things only "just work" from the perspective of people who wish to be spoon-fed those things to which they are already accustomed; anything else "doesn't work," insofar as people then need to make an effort to change their habits in order to adapt to the new thing, or change the "broken" thing to accommodate their habits.

In a similar vein, people who think [insert thing here] would be better if only it were just like [insert other thing here] don't know what the hell they're talking about. Make one thing just like another thing, and you have ...one thing. Just two copies of it. And you already had the one copy, so why'd you piddle your time away making the second? Perhaps the first thing would be better if it were just _more_ like the second, but how much more? Who decides that? You---the person making all the demands and none of the effort? Might it not be better to slightly change the second thing than completely overhaul the first? And so on...

FreeBSD doesn't work that way. It does what _you_ want, how _you_ want it to, provided _you_ are willing to put the time and effort into crafting it into _your_ desired system. The "solution" of providing an installer that installs one particular desktop or another is just gonna leave more people unsatisfied than it leaves satisfied, because people are either gonna want something else and have to do the extra work to replace it, or they're gonna spend a small amount of time with it and decide they don't like it because it's not exactly like what they already have---what they're already used to. People who want something that's rigged up to work the way the unspoken masses ostensibly want it to have other options already available. Send 'em toward those options.


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## forquare (Sep 13, 2016)

xavi said:


> Add an option to install a desktop in the installer and this question goes away



From what I understand, there was one. But it became broken after becoming unmaintained, which it did because those that could maintain it didn't use it. And perhaps those that couldn't use it because it was broken didn't know enough to troubleshoot it? 



xavi said:


> How many good people have moved on to another OS simply because they struggled with setting up a desktop on FreeBSD.



Possibly many, but if a person can't follow a handful of pages in the handbook then we might need to talk about he definition of good. 

I don't know what it used to be like, but setting up Xfce was the easiest part of my first installation for me. The hard bits included: figuring out how to correctly copy the image to a USB stick (no optical drive), figuring out why wireless didn't work, which led to figuring out how to install -CURRENT and upgrade that to get required drivers.
Installation took several days of trial and error. A suitable desktop took minutes, thanks to the handbook.


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## zirias@ (Sep 13, 2016)

ANOKNUSA said:


> FreeBSD doesn't work that way. It does what _you_ want, how _you_ want it to, provided _you_ are willing to put the time and effort into crafting it into _your_ desired system. The "solution" of providing an installer that installs one particular desktop or another is just gonna leave more people unsatisfied than it leaves satisfied, because people are either gonna want something else and have to do the extra work to replace it, or they're gonna spend a small amount of time with it and decide they don't like it because it's not exactly like what they already have---what they're already used to.


Although I completely agree, I still think the stronger argument is the architectural concept from a software engineering point of view, for which I'll try to further clarify my point. This is probably best understood when compared to Linux, because many people asking for things like "desktop installers" have some knowledge about Linux:

Neither FreeBSD nor Linux are "distributions", they are free opensource software projects.
The FreeBSD project is a full (somewhat minimal) operating system.
The Linux project is "just" a kernel, with here and there some little userspace helpers directly related to that kernel.
Concluding from the above, FreeBSD can be installed as a working system, Linux can't.
There's still a way to install Linux without a distribution, but you have to get a set of GNU userland tools yourself and know yourself how to build and install (or follow some instructions from a book)
FreeBSD on the other hand comes with an installer, which makes sense because everything needed to get it up and running is part of the project.
So my argument is: you should never expect a software project to provide means for installing other software, because that's not in the scope of the project. If you want an installer for a fully working Linux system, don't ask the Linux developers but look for a distribution. Same thing goes for a "desktop installer" for FreeBSD, if such a thing is desired, it should be done in a separate distribution project.

Given all that, I must acknowledge that the ports and packages actually _are_ a simple but powerful form of distribution, and that makes it quite easy to install FreeBSD with extra software "from scratch". Still the ports are strictly separated from the base system, they don't even have releases. This is actually a benefit for many users and tying them to base, e.g. by providing base installer options for ports, would make things very complicated. So, it's nice to have the ports around, and they're most useful when _not_ mixed up with the base system. They're a separate project (living in a separate source code repository for a reason) and that's a very good decision.



forquare said:


> [Desktop installer option]
> From what I understand, there was one. But it became broken after becoming unmaintained, which it did because those that could maintain it didn't use it. And perhaps those that couldn't use it because it was broken didn't know enough to troubleshoot it?


And this, if this really happened, is just a good practical example for why you shouldn't do this.


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## monwarez (Sep 15, 2016)

I would say that since FreeBSD does not come with any a desktop it's allow more flexibility. If you want to have a very customized desktop you can have it without having another desktop installed that you may don't like. When you look at GNU/Linux distribution it's more a matter of which desktop is default,what program are used for managing installation, and what program installed by default that will help you to choose one distribution against an other.
So to answer the question, FreeBSD can easily be used as a desktop. Now for the how I do that, it's depend on which desktop do you want ?
The basic step will be to install x11/xorg-minimal, then if your video driver is not installed you can install it (or else you will not have full 3D acceleration, but it could be the case if your video card is not supported). The next step is to install a window manager, there is a lot see in x11-wm.
Depending on the window manager, you may need to use gdm,kdm or not.
then you will need to add to $HOME/.xinitrc (depending on which desktop)

```
exec openbox-session
```
or

```
exec fluxbox
```
etc...
Finnaly if you choose to not login on a graphical login, just need to type
`startx`
You may want to have at least x11/xterm to have a terminal (or another one).
After that you can install other software that you will be using.


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## Seagate (Jan 4, 2017)

ILUXA said:


> Did not found more appropriate topic, may be this info will be helpful for someone
> who will use FreeBSD as a desktop OS.
> If I found out this solution when I started to use FreeBSD as a desktop OS,
> it could save me a lot of time while I mounted my walkman player with
> ...


for usb drive is works.

how to use external hdd ? i've installed fusefs_ntfs, ntfs-3g but still can't mount. 
i don't know proper configuration mount_options in gconf-editor system/storage/ntfs or ntfs-3g. This time when ever i mount always display error :


```
Unable to mount the volume 'Seagate Backup Plus Drive'.
mount : illegal option -- m usage : mount [-t fstype] [- o options] target_fs_mount_point
```



> alternative that I currently use sysutils/volman and mount from terminal and also volman can't integrate with thunar or DE filemanager.


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## nuklear (Jan 4, 2017)

Yes you can! 
I have installed  it in this order:
1. freebsd;
2. xorg;
3. kde.
following the handbook and it works fine. 
Enjoy it!


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## roddierod (Jan 5, 2017)

Seagate said:


> ```
> Unable to mount the volume 'Seagate Backup Plus Drive'.
> mount : illegal option -- m usage : mount [-t fstype] [- o options] target_fs_mount_point
> ```



I have a Seagate backup plus drive, it's comes formatted as NTFS so you have to use ntfs-3g to mount it, this is the entry in /etc/fstab I use:


```
/dev/da0s1      /usr/local/plexdata/smb     ntfs   mountprog=/usr/local/bin/ntfs-3g,late,rw    0   0
```

*/usr/local/plexdata/smb *is my mount point you would change that to where you want to mount the drive.

I don't know anything about gconftool, but maybe this will give you a clue.


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## rigoletto@ (Jan 11, 2017)

There is a FreeBSD "Desktop Distribution", without the all custom PC-BSD/TrueOS addictions what would be a good start for whom want some kind _pure_ "FreeBSD Desktop Installer":  GhostBSD

What OP is asking for is, _mutatis mutandis,_ the same of asking for a Gentoo/Linux Desktop Installer -> Sabayon/Linux or Calculate/Linux. Gentoo itself does not even have a installer.


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## wolffnx (Jan 26, 2017)

In my personal experience I have to move from Debian after 10 years of using it to FreeBSD and the things were not difficult. The only thing I have to do is patch audacious to use a 31 band equalizer (in Debian I use xmms2,but in FreeBSD does not have equalizer support) 
So I use it in my home to watch movies, listen music, internet, etc. And in my work, for the desktop compared to Linux is not the big change.


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## drhowarddrfine (Jan 27, 2017)

audio/xmms2

Are you saying FreeBSD doesn't have xmms2 or the port doesn't have the equalizer? I don't see that stated anywhere.


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## fernandel (Jan 27, 2017)

I came to FreeBSD 6.?? (forgot) from Linux and all the time I use it as desktop. OpenOffice and LibreOffice were/is good for my job (research) and many presentation which I had/have are made with LyX.
GIMP is on my computer from first version, Blender and Mplayer/Vlc and Aqualung...and very helpful community.


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## aht0 (Jan 27, 2017)

How's the x11/Cinnamon in your experience? Stable/unstable.

It looks quite stable on Linux Mint 18.2, if it's much the same on FreeBSD, I'd rather change the OS back.


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## fernandel (Jan 27, 2017)

aht0 said:


> How's the x11/Cinnamon in your experience? Stable/unstable.
> 
> It looks quite stable on Linux Mint 18.2, if it's much the same on FreeBSD, I'd rather change the OS back.


I never tried Cinnamon but I was long time user of KDE than I changed to GNOME3 and all the time I am using Fluxbox and sometimes also CDE .


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## Sevendogs (Jan 27, 2017)

I used x11-wm/cinnamon on Mint Linux a long time ago and it was fine. Not used it on FreeBSD.  I abandoned Gnome after the move to version 3. I now only use minimal WM's, namely x11-wm/dwm. I have also had pretty good luck with x11-wm/mate on FreeBSD.


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## rigoletto@ (Jan 27, 2017)

juan9182 said:


> In my personal experience I have to move from Debian after 10 years of using it to FreeBSD and the things were not difficult. The only thing I have to do is patch audacious to use a 31 band equalizer (in Debian I use xmms2,but in FreeBSD does not have equalizer support)
> So I use it in my home to watch movies, listen music, internet, etc. And in my work, for the desktop compared to Linux is not the big change.



If you are in a Qt environment you may want to give a try to audio/sayonara.


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## wolffnx (Jan 27, 2017)

drhowarddrfine said:


> audio/xmms2
> 
> Are you saying FreeBSD doesn't have xmms2 or the port doesn't have the equalizer? I don't see that stated anywhere.



doesnt-t have the equalizer, not in ports and binaries


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## wolffnx (Jan 27, 2017)

lebarondemerde said:


> If you are in a Qt environment you may want to give a try to audio/sayonara.


thanks, it has a very nice interface,but the equalizer has only 10 bands


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## puretone (Jan 31, 2017)

wblock@ said:


> Yes.  The thing is that PCBSD is FreeBSD, and it's a lot easier to tell someone to install it than to walk them through the process of installing and configuring X and desktop managers.  An install that includes X and a desktop manager is also what a lot of people expect when they install an "operating system".
> 
> Now if they want to set it up on FreeBSD, it definitely can be done, as those of us who have been using FreeBSD desktops for years can prove.  It just takes a bit of time and effort.



Indeed. Altho in the interest of Google schleppers who end up here when looking for "I want a FreeBSD desktop", we should tell them all to head off to TrueOS now. Given the effort the devs of TrueOS have put into their creation, I say hats of to them. 

As for original-poster 'asifnaz': I've been using FreeBSD as a desktop from somewhere near 4.6 or 4.8-release. Today it is a much more capable piece of robustly built OS as far as its desktoppable-ilities. 8/9/10 & now 11 are a joy to live with as a primary desktop OS. You can get yourself warmed up to the idea by using either TrueOS or GhostBSD. Both will serve you (lol pun!) well. You *could* also cut your teeth on a BunsenLabs (Debian) set up and get comfortable with it... I basically run something quite similar to it. That is to say FreeBSD10/11 with OpenBox & tint2 to handle all the "desktop" duties. One recommendation I will definitely suggest is to use a video card that is well-supported. I'm a fanboy of Quadro cards on FreeBSD. nVidia's support for FreeBSD pretty much beats all others.


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## Sevendogs (Jan 31, 2017)

Funny, but I've gone the full gamut: started with Linux in the mid 90's and wanted it to hold my hand, quickly learned that I DIDN'T want it to hold my hand. Used Gentoo Linux for years and it definitely doesn't hold your hand. For 2 or 3 years in the mid 2000's I got where I wanted something to "just work" so bought a Mac. Got bored of having my hands tied and a black bag over my head, plus an empty wallet, so back to Linux, but then realized I wanted something else because the direction had changed and I didn't like it. Gave FreeBSD another shot at v10 (tried years ago around v5x) and slowly worked through the docs and setup for my equipment. I can most assuredly say the effort was worth it. It doesn't hold your hand, but I didn't want that. I wanted a solid OS I can tweak if I want to, but that was reliable and easy to maintain. I am 100% comfortable at the cli and although not at all an admin, I do pretty well at maintaining my system. I am not at all dependent on either of those two "other" OS's and my daily tasks are done 100% on FreeBSD, at home anyway, I would be so lucky to have it at work. I am a very satisfied customer


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## puretone (Jan 31, 2017)

Sevendogs said:


> Funny, but I've gone the full gamut: started with Linux in the mid 90's and wanted it to hold my hand, quickly learned that I DIDN'T want it to hold my hand. Used Gentoo Linux for years and it definitely doesn't hold your hand. For 2 or 3 years in the mid 2000's I got where I wanted something to "just work" so bought a Mac. Got bored of having my hands tied and a black bag over my head, plus an empty wallet, so back to Linux, but then realized I wanted something else because the direction had changed and I didn't like it. Gave FreeBSD another shot at v10 (tried years ago around v5x) and slowly worked through the docs and setup for my equipment. I can most assuredly say the effort was worth it. It doesn't hold your hand, but I didn't want that. I wanted a solid OS I can tweak if I want to, but that was reliable and easy to maintain. I am 100% comfortable at the cli and although not at all an admin, I do pretty well at maintaining my system. I am not at all dependent on either of those two "other" OS's and my daily tasks are done 100% on FreeBSD, at home anyway, I would be so lucky to have it at work. I am a very satisfied customer



Funny how that company that purports not to be a pear and admonishes to 'think different' has almost everything about its activities in lockstep with that bastion of freedom & self-expression known as North Korea. Conform or be punished. Say as we do and do as we tell you to, should really be their slogan. Credit be to them that they haven't opted for the 3 generations worth of hard labor should you be caught slippin'. I've had one of those store-borne "Geniuses" completely lose her mind on me and go on a tirade when I coyly muttered I'd use their telephone product as a Frisbee if I felt like it. Flabbergasting!
MS did pretty darn good with Win 7 & 10, but I find myself running both of those in some form of a vm/vbox/witchcraft, when it is absolutely necessary to run a windows box.
The real key to having a happy take-all do-all FreeBSD desky is to spend that extra 60 minutes setting all the tweaks, tunables and switches after the initial install.
Welcome back  !!


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## puretone (Jan 31, 2017)

juan9182 said:


> In my personal experience I have to move from Debian after 10 years of using it to FreeBSD and the things were not difficult. The only thing I have to do is patch audacious to use a 31 band equalizer (in Debian I use xmms2,but in FreeBSD does not have equalizer support)
> So I use it in my home to watch movies, listen music, internet, etc. And in my work, for the desktop compared to Linux is not the big change.





drhowarddrfine said:


> audio/xmms2
> 
> Are you saying FreeBSD doesn't have xmms2 or the port doesn't have the equalizer? I don't see that stated anywhere.



You guys should really look into `audio/deadbeef`


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## drhowarddrfine (Jan 31, 2017)

puretone said:


> Conform or be punished.


When you promise all your software and hardware will work together, and it does, you MUST require such things. Notice all the issues Windows has where Microsoft does not or cannot enforce such policies.



puretone said:


> MS did pretty darn good with Win 7 & 10


That's the first time I've ever heard anyone say that about Windows 10. Especially when my wife agreed to update her new notebook to it and now struggles with it daily.


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## wolffnx (Jan 31, 2017)

puretone said:


> You guys should really look into `audio/deadbeef`



It is also a good player, but audacious came with various effect plugins(crystalizer,dinamic range compressor)


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## priyadarshan (Feb 10, 2017)

juan9182 said:


> It is also a good player, but audacious came with various effect plugins(crystalizer,dinamic range compressor)



audio/deadbeef has also quite a few plugins:

http://www.freshports.org/search.php?query=deadbeef


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## knightjp (Feb 21, 2018)

Hello Everyone, 
Sorry to raise up an old thread. I came across it, while trying to decide if I should move away from Mac OS as a desktop or not. 
I have been using various versions of Linux, but always had a soft spot for FreeBSD; although never could get to work properly whatever hardware I had at the time. When I got my first mac, I was hooked on OS X. But now I'm running a Hackintosh and I was wondering whether I would be better of running FreeBSD... 
Might sound crazy asking this question on this forum, but I'm hoping for an objective answer. Is it worth moving from MacOS to FreeBSD as a Desktop? What will I miss from MacOS... 
I'm not a developer or a programmer, etc. Just a geek who likes Unix stuff.


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## forquare (Feb 21, 2018)

knightjp said:


> What will I miss from MacOS...



This mainly depends on what you currently use. As a macOS user and a FreeBSD desktop (laptop) user, I miss specific apps:

Pixelmator
1Password (and therefore Dropbox)
I also miss iCloud syncing of photos from my iPhone. 
Other than that, there’s nothing I regularly miss, and of the above there are some workarounds. (WINE for 1Password (Windows version), manual syncing for photos)


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## priyadarshan (Feb 21, 2018)

The only thing I was missing was Adobe InDesign.

I just installed OS X on VirtualBox, and I have it running there for those things I can't do with LaTeX.

If for you Windows is fine too, you could try installing Win 10, as, in my experience, it is a bit faster than OS X on VirtualBox.


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## rigoletto@ (Feb 21, 2018)

forquare

TLDR; you can use security/keepassxc for password management + net/syncthing to sync the database (and other stuff) with other devices.


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## knightjp (Feb 21, 2018)

I think the thing that I would miss the most of MacOS is the fact that I could install and uninstall an app just by dragging it. 
OK.. Speaking of apps.... Here are some of the apps that I use on my Hackintosh. 
Moom - Window manager for Mac that also tiles. 
Pages, Keynote, Numbers
Safari, Brave browser
Whatsapp desktop app
twitter app
Mail - which also handles my work Exchange emails as well. 
Calendar
Terminal, iTerm2
MplayerX for my video as well as VLC. 
And iTunes to manage my music library. 
I like to keep a neat desktop. So there are no icons and my menubar and dock are hidden until needed. 

I like the Mission Control feature of Mac OS. Is there something like that on FreeBSD?


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## rigoletto@ (Feb 21, 2018)

The MacOS "Mission Control" seems to be the same "expose" effect, what is present in many non-tiling compositing WMs, including the old compiz-fusion, which probably was the first to implement that.


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## xchris (Feb 21, 2018)

forquare said:


> I also miss iCloud syncing of photos from my iPhone.



I sync documents between my mobile + desktop by running FTP server on the phone and lftp scripts on the desktop


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## knightjp (Feb 21, 2018)

lebarondemerde said:


> The MacOS "Mission Control" seems to be the same "expose" effect, what is present in many non-tiling compositing WMs, including the old compiz-fusion, which probably was the first to implement that.


Thanks for the info. I am not that well familiar with the OpenSource apps at the moment. A couple of months ago, my brother had tried KDE on a laptop. I didn't, see the "expose" effect on that; even an an option. I remember Compiz.. Liked it when I was using Gnome2. I loved the fish tank effect and stuff. Is it possible to have Compiz on a KDE Desktop? (Forgive my ignorance)


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## rigoletto@ (Feb 21, 2018)

KWin, the KDE WM does the expose. I do not remember if that is set by default but IIRC the effect is activated placing the pointer at the top left corner.

Compiz is in ports, I've not used that since many years but yes it does. At least used to do.


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## knightjp (Feb 21, 2018)

Just out of curiosity, what is the preferred environment for those running FreeBSD as a desktop.
I recall DesktopBSD that used KDE (I think) and PC-BSD that used something like KDE, but I don’t have a clue.
On the Linux side, people can literally get into religious wars about distros, GUIs, etc. It’s one of the few things I don’t like about Linux.


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## Maxnix (Feb 21, 2018)

Well, it's always a matter of personal preference, more than a OS related thing; however, if this can mean something, I've seen a lot of people using simple window managers (i.e. x11-wm/fluxbox, x11-wm/openbox, x11-wm/cwm, x11-wm/ratpoison...)over full DE. Personally I use x11-wm/cwm.


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## rigoletto@ (Feb 21, 2018)

There are many many WMs. I use x11-wm/bspwm, x11-wm/i3 is also very good and have more users. But if you prefer a complete DE XFCE should be the most well supported.


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## tobik@ (Feb 21, 2018)

Yeah, there is no preferred environment. Just use what you like. For me that is x11-wm/cwm in combination with x11-wm/xfce4-panel.


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## wolffnx (Feb 21, 2018)

dont forget x11-wm/fvwm2


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## herrbischoff (Feb 22, 2018)

I'd really appreciate a current and working how-to or tutorial on getting a MATE desktop to work on FreeBSD within VMWare Fusion on a MacBook Pro. I consider the ability to mount/unmount external disks, mount network volumes, shutdown or reboot directly from MATE and actually being able to double-click on an external file and have it open said file instead of opening just the application because the path to the file is actually not exposed from the file manager to the system to be essential. The latter happened to me the last time I tried XFCE. sysutils/desktop-installer didn't work for me. Also, booting straight to the desktop without having to log in would be a plus.


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## knightjp (Feb 22, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> I'd really appreciate a current and working how-to or tutorial on getting a MATE desktop to work on FreeBSD within VMWare Fusion on a MacBook Pro.


I recall seeing a youtube video about this. Would it be OK if I posted a link?


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I recall seeing a youtube video about this. Would it be OK if I posted a link?


Of course. We always like links to good information.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 22, 2018)

Never saw any point to configure something desktop related in VirtualBox/VMWare etc.
Why? Better play some others, more interesting games  The beauty of FreeBSD is in its performance 
and in its stable work, configure it once and use it for years on your real hardware.


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## knightjp (Feb 22, 2018)




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## herrbischoff (Feb 22, 2018)

I’ve watched through the videos. They are beginner level, are interrupted by arrows asking to share and were a complete waste of time for me because they don’t improve upon what (little) information is already available in the handbook. Classic videos that only exist to generate clicks. They just show to you what you are going to see anyway. The creator is clearly a Linux user, he does things in a Linux kind of way. They also don’t touch my configuration issues that don’t work (mounting/unmounting, etc.) at all.

Somehow I knew it: YouTube = 99.99% crap.


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## knightjp (Feb 22, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Thanks, although I positively hate videos of installations that don’t have an accompanying transcript. Having to glimpse every single command and pausing the video repeatedly is pretty annoying. It’s what lazy people and those looking to monetize their videos via YouTube are doing.


I understand. I would have liked to see something in the description that links to a step by step guide. But that is the best that I could find. Seeing those videos gave me the idea of using FreeBSD as my primary system. But I am still on the fence. I like MacOS. It works well on my Hackintosh.



ILUXA said:


> The beauty of FreeBSD is in its performance
> and in its stable work, configure it once and use it for years on your real hardware.


 I can say the same thing about MacOS. I have been using my Hackintosh for years and it get upgraded to the latest OS without any hassle. 
There are a couple of instances when an update breaks the drivers for the nvidia card. But that is quickly resolved.


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## xchris (Feb 22, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Thanks, although I positively hate videos of installations that don’t have an accompanying transcript.



this is something that I found long time ago, lots of useful info.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 22, 2018)

xchris said:


> this is something that I found long time ago, lots of useful info.



Nice, that looks promising. If I ever get a working system together, I’m going to write a how-to myself, from start to finish. Funny how WM’s or developers assume the user is not going to do simple things like accessing network shares. In a company of any size, people would be unable to work if this did not work.

FreeBSD is rather exceptional as a server platform, as a desktop it’s “meh”.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> But I am still on the fence. I like MacOS. It works well on my Hackintosh.



As you’re running a Hackintosh, you’re probably not too concerned about stability. You may find that FreeBSD, once configured, is more stable. There are no niceties though, like consistent HiDPi or working network share mounting. Things that are so basic to macOS they are just treated as a given.



knightjp said:


> I can say the same thing about MacOS.



I’m with you on that. Ignore the poster, he’s a fanboy who is often just stirring up trouble.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 22, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Ignore the poster, he’s a fanboy who is often just stirring up trouble.


Unfortunately the fan boy is you 
I'm not a fan of anything, I just like *good* open source software,
no matter how it is licensed (GPL/BSD/MIT) or what company/guy created it.
While you use stuff from one company and promote it everywhere in your postings...
So who is an Apple™ fan-boy?  Yes, it's clear enough that it is you.

BTW, it is much better to ignore you, herrbischoff, because you never post any technical stuff,
only "...bla-bla-bla..." or "apple bla-bla-bla..." or "macos bla-bla-bla-bla desktop...",
more than 100 postings and 0 of them are useful.

P.S.: In my original first post I wrote nothing about Macos,
I wrote about FreeBSD, that it is stable, do not know why you guys
started to comparing Macos and FreeBSD, it is stupid,
it is two completely different operating systems.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I like MacOS.


Probably cause parts of OSX come from FreeBSD and OSX is certified UNIX while FreeBSD is a direct ATT UNIX descendant .


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## knightjp (Feb 22, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> I’m with you on that. Ignore the poster, he’s a fanboy who is often just stirring up trouble.


I don't believe he is trying to stir up anything. He was pointing out FreeBSD's stability and I was also claiming that in my experience with my Hackintosh, I had no issues. MacOS has been just as stable. So stability is not the issue for me looking into running FreeBSD as a Desktop.



herrbischoff said:


> As you’re running a Hackintosh, you’re probably not too concerned about stability. You may find that FreeBSD, once configured, is more stable. There are no niceties though, like consistent HiDPi or working network share mounting. Things that are so basic to macOS they are just treated as a given.


The Hackintosh has been running for years without an issue. Does everything I need really. I guess my only reason for asking about FreeBSD is the allure of building up something from scratch just the way you want it.

There are somethings that you just take for granted in MacOS (or any mainstream OS; even Linux distros). Stuff like...

Microsoft Exchange Support in the mail client.
Being able to mount a USB by just plugging it in. I have seen some Linux distros need text files edited and terminal commands done just to accomplish that. No thank you.. I need it plug and play.
Mount network drives and folders.
Watch movies, etc. Stream tv shows on Kodi.
Graphics drivers that give you all the performance of your graphics card.
Drivers for my Kensington trackball. I need to be able to configure all the buttons to use all the features.
I guess these and other things are the ones that keep me on the fence.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> don't believe he is trying to stir up anything.



Fair enough. I'm probably biased because in the past he acted quite inappropriate at times with personal insults and whatnot. I retract my comment.



knightjp said:


> Stuff like...



I see what you mean. Some of those points are exactly what's preventing me from switching to FreeBSD full-time, as much as I want to. Personally, I don't want to have to use Linux, so the next best thing for me is macOS. I guess it's a similar situation for you. Good to hear that the Hackintosh setup is stable. The last time I checked, it was rather flaky and Apple services like iMessage and iCloud (not really essential stuff) did not work at all.

I hope to be able to resolve some of the points in my trial with a VM. Certain functionality like proper ZFS support and Jails are just too useful to easily dismiss for a development machine setup.  Being part of a product development team, I'm also tied to the Microsoft online ecosystem like Teams, Skype for Business, Outlook and the like. Having to use all those services via a web browser is just not workable in the long run. I'm not in the position to change this, so I have to work within certain restrictions I am given. There's also no official Visual Studio Code version for FreeBSD, which is mainly because of Electron not being properly supported. There's experimental work going on but I wouldn't exactly call that production-ready. Because of the type and complexity of the applications being developed, Vim doesn't cut it, which is unfortunate because I love it and used it for years.


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## knightjp (Feb 22, 2018)

I do not have any ties to Microsoft. I could do without Outlook. Skype is useful, but I use WhatsApp more. I use Apple Mail rather than Outlook. I use iTunes for my music. For me, I just want something that works and has all the abilities that we take for granted.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I do not have any ties to Microsoft.



Lucky you!


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## giahung1997 (Feb 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


>


Look like copied of Riba Linux. Frankly speaking, I followed it and any time ended up with something nothing like the final result in the video. It's much ugly or sometime break.


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## knightjp (Feb 22, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Lucky you!


I have to use Windows at work. But I don't use any Microsoft stuff at home. The only thing that I need is a email client that will connect to Microsoft Exchange Server. This is so I can access my work email from home.


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## knightjp (Feb 22, 2018)

giahung1997 said:


> Look like copied of Riba Linux. Frankly speaking, I followed it and any time ended up with something nothing like the final result in the video. It's much ugly or sometime break.


A lot has to do with the hardware as well.


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## xchris (Feb 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> The only thing that I need is a email client that will connect to Microsoft Exchange Server. This is so I can access my work email from home.



No OWA there?


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## knightjp (Feb 22, 2018)

xchris said:


> No OWA there?


I work in aviation. Need to be able to access my work emails all the time.


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## knightjp (Feb 23, 2018)

OK... I’ve taken the plunge. I’ve completely removed MacOS and in the process of installing BSD. But, with the GUI, I would like to use KDE. But I see Plasma is not supported. Can anyone tell me which is a really good modern GUI good enough to complete with MacOS.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 23, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Can anyone tell me which is a really good modern GUI good enough to complete with MacOS.


Do not search something, that isn't there.
it silly to search Macos experience when using FreeBSD,
it reminds me people, who search Windows experience when they're trying to use GNU/Linux.

But you got few options to try, if you want full DE, try x11-wm/xfce4 or x11/mate,
personally I like lightweight WM-s (window managers), like x11-wm/fvwm2,
some people like x11-wm/fluxbox and x11-wm/openbox or x11-wm/awesome,
all other applications, like file manager (x11-fm/pcmanfm), archive manager (archivers/file-roller
built without "nautilus" option), editor (editors/vim), video player (multimedia/mpv) etc I install manually.


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## knightjp (Feb 23, 2018)

I would really like KDE. It’s is my preferred desktop for Linux installations. I really would like Plasma. I saw quite a few sites on getting it running, but it looks pretty hard for me.


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## scottro (Feb 23, 2018)

I don't think anything is that comparable to MacOS in FreeBSD.  There's several articles around about making Gnome3 look like MacOS, but I don't think the experience will be the same. They are, IMHO, two rather different target audiences.  I haven't checked the whole thread, have you had experience with Linux desktops? If so, was there one you liked? In that case, you can get a very comparable experience with FreeBSD, though a few things, usually proprietary, may be lacking.

EDIT: (I think you posted as I typing)

Yes, judging from a quick google, plasma isn't yet available for FreeBSD.  I personally prefer lighter weight window managers, mostly openbox and dwm, depending upon monitor size and number, so can't be that much help.  I will say, though, that if you get used to the lighter weight window managers, that you can find them very satisfactory.


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## rigoletto@ (Feb 23, 2018)

Thread 47280/post-360701


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## knightjp (Feb 23, 2018)

I have used Linux distros. I am currently using OpenSUSE as a file server. 
You asked my fav distro, it’s OpenSUSE & Fedora. 
I know that running or FreeBSD, but I’m looking for a desktop environment that gives a similar experience. 
That is why I prefer to have KDE on my FreeBSD installation. But when I say KDE, I’m talking Plasma, not KDE 4. 
Otherwise my next choice would be Gnome3.


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## scottro (Feb 23, 2018)

lebarondemerde's post indicates it is possible.  No personal experience.  Gnome3 is also available as far as I know.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 23, 2018)

Prepare yourself for lots of tinkering to get the desktop working for you in a way that you expect it to work. "Similar experience" is a wide field. You won't be able to find something truly similar in open source but if you're open to experimentation, you may find a lighter weight WM to your liking. And as was correctly pointed out, there's always GNOME3. As a Mac user myself, I didn't find it to my liking though. x11/mate and x11-wm/xfce4 worked out far better for me, even though they are different. I was quite intrigued by x11-wm/i3 for a completely different approach but never found the time to properly set it up with all the key bindings. It shows its strengths when you work inside the shell a lot but need graphical applications besides it.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 23, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I would really like KDE. It’s is my preferred desktop for Linux installations. I really would like Plasma. I saw quite a few sites on getting it running, but it looks pretty hard for me.


You probably have different needs than I do, but I've been running KDE on FreeBSD for 8 years now. I don't do anything special to set it up. Just install it like anything else.

Yes, plasma was a bit flaky for a while, but since upgrading to FreeBSD 11.1-RELEASE I haven't had any problems.


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## knightjp (Feb 23, 2018)

OJ said:


> You probably have different needs than I do, but I've been running KDE on FreeBSD for 8 years now. I don't do anything special to set it up. Just install it like anything else.
> 
> Yes, plasma was a bit flaky for a while, but since upgrading to FreeBSD 11.1-RELEASE I haven't had any problems.


Are you running KDE4 or Plasma?
How did you get Plasma on your installation?


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 24, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Are you running KDE4 or Plasma?
> How did you get Plasma on your installation?


seems when you install KDE on FreeBSD it's the KDE4 version that we have. Plasma is part of that.


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## Snurg (Feb 24, 2018)

It is KDE 4.14. Its end-of-life was August 2015.
There is a small team working on KDE5 for FreeBSD. They probably will release it this year.


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## forquare (Feb 24, 2018)

I like the idea of getting Pantheon ported to FreeBSD, but alas I don’t have the skills and enough motivation to do so.  But I think that would give a good macOS-like experience.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 24, 2018)

Let me just say that all this paints a pretty drab picture of FreeBSD as a desktop operating system. My VM trial did go okay-ish but I ran into dozens of small annoyances and I'm not prepared to continue further down that path. It's too much fuss for so very little return. To be honest, if I didn't dislike the Linux ecosystem so much, I would be using that, period. Windows is a non-starter. There's no serious desktop alternative to macOS for me. Literally none.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 24, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Let me just say that all this paints a pretty drab picture of FreeBSD as a desktop operating system.



I respect your feelings and thoughts about it. But wonder just why you and I have such different experiences with this. I've had a great experience with KDE on FreeBSD for 8 years now. I'm not a professional, nor that skilled for that matter, so perhaps that's why I'm happy and you aren't.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 24, 2018)

I don't use KDE or Gnome or any of that. I use i3 and am thrilled to death.


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## Snurg (Feb 24, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Let me just say that all this paints a pretty drab picture of FreeBSD as a desktop operating system.


Yes, sadly you are right.
No nouveau. No hibernate. 
But instead Meltdown, Spectre and CoC, for at least 1/2 more year.

No wonder more and more users are considering systemdcide.


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## knightjp (Feb 24, 2018)

So far my install is going OK... I settled on MATE with Compiz Fusion. 
I suppose most of the issues, if not all, can be resolved if we just install GhostBSD. But the whole point of this experiment and experience was to build from scratch like a Gentoo Linux install. 
On one side, I do have a new found appreciation for MacOS. It’s not completely free. You can’t customize it completely. You can pick and choose parts of it. It looks like you’re trapped in an ecosystem, etc.
But, in building your own, you almost forget about the little things it does in the background... Don’t notice that stuff until they’re not there anymore. I plugged in USB, it didn’t mount automatically. I used to have two different wallpapers on my two screens. Don’t know how to do that on here. Seems to want just the one on both. Slim seems to stretch itself across both screens. 
I will get there eventually... Maybe use a different login screen program. 
The good thing is that I’m learning.


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## knightjp (Feb 24, 2018)

In terms of looks, I don’t need anything that completely looks like MacOS. 
I would however like something that looks like the Desktop interface of Tony Stark’s garage in the 1st IronMan movie.


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## fernandel (Feb 24, 2018)

OJ said:


> seems when you install KDE on FreeBSD it's the KDE4 version that we have. Plasma is part of that.


I was KDE user from when it came out but the latest KDE 4 had on my system all the time some problems and I do not know about security updates...I switched to GNOME 3 and it works.


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## fernandel (Feb 24, 2018)

Snurg said:


> It is KDE 4.14. Its end-of-life was August 2015.
> There is a small team working on KDE5 for FreeBSD. They probably will release it this year.



"...will release it this year" I am listening two years...


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 24, 2018)

Snurg said:


> No nouveau


nouveau is an unusual install, not a norm. For one to diss an OS for not having it, especially when it's a third party software, is also unusual.



Snurg said:


> But instead Meltdown, Spectre...for at least 1/2 more year.


FreeBSD has a commit for this two days ago.

As far as that CoC goes, and I hate the mention of it, it's not the first time this sort of thing has come up here and I'd bet most of us have forgotten or never knew of it. This fluff will be forgotten in a few months, too.


Snurg said:


> No wonder more and more users are considering systemdcide.


Do you honestly think Linux or any other software group has fewer issues than FreeBSD does with such things? Do you honestly think a knowledgeable, technical person will switch OSes to something with the same and more issues?

Meanwhile, professional software engineers will continue as before and the number of people in the world who will consider switching due to this can probably be counted on your hands. And then they still won't.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 24, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> professional software engineers will continue as before



This is my only gripe with your comment. Having a smooth desktop experience shouldn't require being a professional software engineer. A graphical desktop environment is not and has never been a first class citizen on FreeBSD. Other than that you're correct of course. Why bothering to give yourself even more headaches. I think Snurg's post unfortunately comes across as lamenting although it raises valid points with regard to desktop environments.

I for one love FreeBSD for most everything _except_ my main work laptop. I think it would be fitting if more users were enabled to go full circle but I get that a graphical desktop is a very different beast to develop for than a single system application. Even more so in the context of a laptop computer which requires specialized hardware support, proper power management and lots of little optimizations that do not apply to workstations. It's probably also not a rewarding area to work in: either it works as expected or users are complaining. Very little "wow, that's cool" to be had there.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 24, 2018)

herrbischoff My comment was about his paragraph regarding things unrelated to desktop software. I am saying software engineers will continue as before without regard all the ballyhoo mentioned in that.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 24, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Let me just say that all this paints a pretty drab picture of FreeBSD as a desktop operating system.


I don't know, never tried using FreeBSD for a desktop.  Although my attempts to use Linux as a desktop weren't very satisfying, which makes me think that FreeBSD would be no better, meaning not good enough.

But we should not jump to the conclusion that the picture of FreeBSD as a server operating system is drab.



Snurg said:


> Yes, sadly you are right.
> No nouveau. No hibernate.
> But instead Meltdown, Spectre and CoC, for at least 1/2 more year.


Don't care about nouveau or hibernate.  My server never sleeps 
The CoC doesn't make my server run faster or slower, not does it introduce bugs or features.
And I understand the risk of meltdown, spectre and friends, and I'm just as cool with it as I was 8 weeks ago when I didn't know.

We need to be careful to not throw the baby out with the bathwater.


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## rigoletto@ (Feb 24, 2018)

> The CoC doesn't make my server run faster or slower, not does it introduce bugs or features.



Some good devs left due to CoC.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 25, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> Don't care about nouveau or hibernate.


Me neither.

It's amazing how many people are using portable devices these days and considering that normal. So often we're talking apples and oranges when talking "desktop" because they fail to mention that they're not using a stationary computer - ie. what we used to call a desktop in the old days.  I personally have no interest whatsoever in things like power saving, hibernating, and wireless stuff. So, my experence with FreeBSD on the desktop has very little relation to somebody's experience on a portable device like a laptop. To me a "desktop" is much like a server in that once turned on, I want it to stay that way. And indeed, that's the part that FreeBSD seems to be particularly good at.


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## Snurg (Feb 25, 2018)

The topic is about desktops, not servers...

To me it is just annoying how much electricity gets burnt by letting run the computers when they aren't being used.
In particular when these are power-hungry workstations. Thus hibernating overnight is a good thing to have.

The bug in the vesa kernel driver that breaks suspend/resume with Nvidia cards does not get fixed.
In spite of the fact that the FreeBSD devs know about it since years.
So Nvidia has no incentive to make their blob suspend-safe any longer.
Building a vesa.ko-less kernel does not help much any longer since driver 390.
Thus sleep suspend with Nvidia seens broken completely now with FreeBSD. 
If FreeBSD had Nouveau, this probably won't be this way.

And running the computer overnight not only costs energy, but shortens the cleaning intervals substantially, too.
I do not like to have to rebuild the workplace with all these windows every day, no matter whether with desktop or laptop.
Thus hibernate, or at least suspend is a thing that I really want.

Because of these and the Meltspectre issues I have now installed systemDOS 4.15 on my second PC.
It has latest software, hibernates fine, has low latency with swappiness=0, and the .desktop files are complete.
That makes big difference for desktop usage.


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## knightjp (Feb 25, 2018)

Okay everyone. So ended my short stint with FreeBSD. But not completely... I might give in another go, once KDE4 is gone and KDE5 Plasma is in.
Mate was great, but I felt it lacking in a way in terms of aesthetics.
This is the thing about MacOS... Its a real Marmite operating system. There are those who love it and those who hate it. 
MacOS' interface is a mix of Gnome and Mate with a bit of compiz in between. 
When it comes to open source interfaces on Linux and BSD, the only interface that I can really like to use is KDE. This because it is so customizable that I can put all the things that I like of various interfaces in there to make my own.  
I will admit that i3 has me intrigued, but seeing it in operation on Linux boxes, and having tried similar tiling setups on MacOS, I am a little hesitant. I'm not into the full tiling window managers. Fluxbox has me interested as well.

I think that I would give FreeBSD another try, once I have completely committed to what I interface I would like to run on it.
As far as the operating system itself, I was not having an easy time. I tried to copy a folder from my file server to the desktop and was having a hard time. It just was a folder with 20 .jpg files and it was taking like hours. MacOS does that in minutes.
In terms of installation, I followed the advice posted here. Don't really know what went wrong. 
Maybe there is something that I'm missing.

Couple the "copying" issue and not being able to do what I wanted with the aesthetics of the system, I just gave up and went back to MacOS. This is reiterates my points in my previous post. The little things that happen behind the scenes that we take for granted.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 25, 2018)

Snurg said:


> To me it is just annoying how much electricity gets burnt by letting run the computers when they aren't being used.
> In particular when these are power-hungry workstations. Thus hibernating overnight is a good thing to have.



No servers here, but I guess people have different ideas of "power-hungry". Not sure if dual core or I5 CPUs are in that category. In any case for my rural household with water pumps, refrigerators, many kilowatts of heaters, and stationary tools ranging to 5hp, the amount of electricity usage for a handful of computers is just not detectable on my hydro bill. Even if it was, I'd just be supplementing my heat in a positive manner. As for "cleaning", well this relatively dirty environment doesn't seem to cause any problems in my computer boxes. I just blow them out with compressed air when I change the motherboard, hard drives, or some such, every 5 years perhaps. Nothing wrong with being finicky about electricity usage and cleanliness for sure, but it serves little purpose in this environment. 

That said, the bios slows the clock down progressively when there is little load. Nothing to do with my OS. But it certainly takes an annoying amount of time to get a computer monitor to respond on one box which runs Gnome. Even when I've been away for only a few minutes. I'm guessing the DE designers assumed that a monitor would be connected all the time, but I've used a KVM for 30 years now, so it's just what I'm used to. KDE has a setting to make the video respond on demand but Gnome seemingly has no such control and is thus difficult to use productively when switching between computers.


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## knightjp (Feb 25, 2018)

I do like what I see with Fluxbox. It could be the interface that I am looking for. The thing is that Fluxbox is just a window manager and not a full DE.


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## scottro (Feb 25, 2018)

Fluxbox, having been around for a long time, has lots of things written for it. It may be (untested by me, as I prefer window managers to DE's--just my personal taste and probably habit from long ago when computers were weaker) possible to make it into something approaching a desktop environment, though it would probably require some work. But for example, I'm sure you could add some sort of printing tool, network tool and so on, to run with fluxbox.


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## knightjp (Feb 25, 2018)

scottro said:


> Fluxbox, having been around for a long time, has lots of things written for it. It may be (untested by me, as I prefer window managers to DE's--just my personal taste and probably habit from long ago when computers were weaker) possible to make it into something approaching a desktop environment, though it would probably require some work. But for example, I'm sure you could add some sort of printing tool, network tool and so on, to run with fluxbox.



What other stuff would I need to install just to come close to a DE? Or better yet, what would I need to get something similar to what is in my two previous attachments? Could I just mix and match GTK and QT apps? 
If I can get a list of items, that would be great.


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## scottro (Feb 25, 2018)

Argh, I have no idea.  
I guess you'd have to look at what you use now, and see.  Some people want printing stuff, others want networking.  Again, as I haven't used a desktop environment in so long, I can't give much help.   And, I freely admit, creating such a list for yourself would be a lot of work.


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## macondo (Feb 25, 2018)

In the howtos section there are articles about icewm, jwm, et.al.
here's one for LXDE- light DE:

https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/howto-lxde.59338/


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## herrbischoff (Feb 25, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> But we should not jump to the conclusion that the picture of FreeBSD as a server operating system is drab.



As this thread is about desktop usage, I see no one suggesting anything like that.


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## giahung1997 (Feb 25, 2018)

Snurg said:


> The topic is about desktops, not servers...


Yes you're right. Everyone here should focus on the real problem.

I'm end user I don't want to play with i3, fluxbox, etc... The heavy and complete (bloatful) DE now stick with Linux, XFCE4 is modern enough and open to the BSD world, made a working system can be installed from live usb like Linux and work out of the box. It's all.


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## Snurg (Feb 25, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Could I just mix and match GTK and QT apps?


Exactly this is what I do.
I install Gnome, KDE, Mate, LXDE, Xfce, Thunderbird and a pack of browsers, Thunderbird, Gimp, LibreOffice and a bunch of other things, and on top of that I use FVWM as "desktop" with minimal annoyance factor.
That is, no screen goo like menu bars, icons and all that eeky stuff that distracts me from work. Just a pager to navigate between screens.
I have the same fvwm config for years. No waste of time tailoring the DMs this way


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## giahung1997 (Feb 25, 2018)

Snurg said:


> Exactly this is what I do.
> I install Gnome, KDE, Mate, LXDE, Xfce, Thunderbird and a pack of browsers, Thunderbird, Gimp, LibreOffice and a bunch of other things, and on top of that I use FVWM as "desktop" with minimal annoyance factor.
> That is, no screen goo like menu bars, icons and all that eeky stuff that distracts me from work. Just a pager to navigate between screens.
> I have the same fvwm config for years. No waste of time tailoring the DMs this way


I don't like you. I choose the one I want and married with it, never change again (unless forced) and learn to use it in-dept.


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## Snurg (Feb 25, 2018)

giahung1997 said:


> I choose the one I want and married with it, never change again (unless forced) and learn to use it in-dept.


The reason why I just throw all these DM's onto a pile is that every one has its specialities, and for example if one wants multiple file managers open, sometimes one has to open alternative file managers (i.e. one of another DE) for that. And so I learn the differences of all these apps


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## gnath (Feb 25, 2018)

Snurg said:


> No nouveau. No hibernate


I am happy with what I have on my laptop/box & would like to play around.
I can not improve the situation. Have faith in you and other dev's. contribution.



ralphbsz said:


> We need to be careful to not throw the baby out with the bathwater


Sometime emotions plays over technical  need. Distro hopping in linux world is bad trend. I spent lot of time with debian/devuan and now loyal to Freebsd. Instead of trying 10+ distro , lot of desktop wallpaper staff, it is better to spend some time on this forum & stick to one requirement at a time. Require fresh air.
(English is not my NL)


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 25, 2018)

knightjp said:


> If I can get a list of items, that would be great.


https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/software-recommendatios-for-a-new-bie-system.63270/#post-365575



Snurg said:


> No nouveau. No hibernate.


Yes, it is really very sad, that such basic functionality like suspend, on OS from 2018,
is unavailable on some machines. As far as I know, suspend to RAM (suspend to disk
is unavailable on every graphic card…) works OK only when using Intel integrated graphics,
on my PC with Nvidia video card suspend doesn't work at all, while on my laptop with
Intel graphics it is working OK. Don't know nothing about AMD graphic cards, because
I've never tried to use it with FreeBSD.

That's beacause only few people are interested in FreeBSD as in a desktop OS,
even many FreeBSD developers do not use it on their desktops. Because many of them
are Apple®©™ employees and, I think, they don't want to help to create a competitor
to themselves in desktop OS market… I use FreeBSD as a desktop OS for years (since FreeBSD 10.0),
but nothing changed and won't change, I believe, may be it is time to switch…


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## knightjp (Feb 25, 2018)

Snurg said:


> Exactly this is what I do.
> I install Gnome, KDE, Mate, LXDE, Xfce, Thunderbird and a pack of browsers, Thunderbird, Gimp, LibreOffice and a bunch of other things, and on top of that I use FVWM as "desktop" with minimal annoyance factor.
> That is, no screen goo like menu bars, icons and all that eeky stuff that distracts me from work. Just a pager to navigate between screens.
> I have the same fvwm config for years. No waste of time tailoring the DMs this way


I am assuming that you use something like i3 or Awesome or maybe Fluxbox itself. 

In terms of the apps, I would tend to agree with you. If you are using any kind of open-source software, you do need to have a mixed bunch of apps. I can't believe I was stupid enough to even ask the question of mixing apps. For instance, kden-live is pretty much the best video editing software on the open source area. I will not debate on whether it is better than its proprietary counterparts (Final Cut / Premier), but if you are using for instance Linux, you need to install kden-live for video editing. That's a given. And Kden-live is a QT app. So even if you are using Gnome, you need QT libraries to run it. Gnome and GTK does not have anything like similar in their ranks. At least not to my knowledge. So yeah I would need to mix and match apps.

For now MacOS actually. Does what I need and it look cool enough I guess.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 25, 2018)

Personally I don't use any qt apps at all.
Try multimedia/openshot, it is GTK video editor.
Here is how my desktop looks like 




I'm using x11-wm/fvwm2, my config can be found here http://trihexagonal.org/iluxa.html .


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 26, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Having a smooth desktop experience shouldn't require being a professional software engineer. A graphical desktop environment is not and has never been a first class citizen on FreeBSD.
> 
> *snip
> 
> Even more so in the context of a laptop computer which requires specialized hardware support, proper power management and lots of little optimizations that do not apply to workstations. It's probably also not a rewarding area to work in: either it works as expected or users are complaining. Very little "wow, that's cool" to be had there.



I hardly qualify as a "software engineer" in any sense of the term.

I've never taken a computer class besides something I read online in my life, IIRC Texas Instruments came out the the pocket calculator when I was in high school, and everything I know about computers is from reading, or (mostly) trail and error.

I got a job in 1993 somewhere they had an APPLE II and taught myself to use it without ever having touched a computer before. My experience with menus in playing video games was instrumental in me figuring it out. When they upgraded to a new one I had to set it up and show them how to boot it up, as you had to flip-the-floppy during the boot process on this one.

But. I do have 5 laptops running FreeBSD, 2 OpenBSD and I really could not be happier with them or I would be using something else. I don't usually describe them as  "smooth", I prefer rock solid. I do slightly prefer FreeBSD as a desktop as it seems more "polished" but that maybe due to familiarization. My configuration is maximized for my style of work and what I've found most efficient for me over time, though not for everybody

My OpenBSD W520 is considered a mobile workstation, or was when it was made.  My T61 are business class machines.

That said, I do run all Win7or Vista vintage machines so hardware compatibility is rarely an issue, but that's what I like and want to run. Vintage Thinkpads preferably. FreeBSD was fussy about Nvidia Optimus, but it ran out of the box with OpenBSD.

I haven't bought a brand new computer since my Sony Vaio in 2007 and it still faithfully serves me running i386 FreeBSD, but I try to let rest as much as possible.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 26, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> ... even many FreeBSD developers do not use it on their desktops. Because many of them are Apple®©™ employees and, I think, they don't want to help to create a competitor
> to themselves in desktop OS market…



Are a lot of Apple employees really FreeBSD developers?  And if they really are, do they work on FreeBSD as part of their job?  Are you saying that Apple supports FreeBSD by paying its employees to work on FreeBSD?

I know this happens in Linux, a lot.  A lot of Linux work (in particular in the kernel) is done by people who are employees of companies such as HP, Oracle, IBM, LSI Logic (now called Avago/Broadcom), Mellanox, nVidia, and who do that work as part of their job.  That's because these companies have a vested interest in Linux succeeding.  But what would be Apple's interest in FreeBSD succeeding?  While Mac OS was originally derived partly from FreeBSD (and partly from Mach, via the NeXT operating system that Steve Jobs brought along when he returned to Apple), I don't think more recent updates to FreeBSD help Apple in any way.  The kernel has long forked from *BSD, and the userland (command-line) stuff they seem to do themselves (and it doesn't move very fast anyway).

Are you claiming that those FreeBSD developers are deliberately, and under orders from their employer Apple, working on FreeBSD, but deliberately not working on the GUI?  That would be fantastically interesting; I think it's just an unlikely conspiracy theory.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 26, 2018)

OJ said:


> It's amazing how many people are using portable devices these days and considering that normal. So often we're talking apples and oranges when talking "desktop" because they fail to mention that they're not using a stationary computer - ie. what we used to call a desktop in the old days.  I personally have no interest whatsoever in things like power saving, hibernating, and wireless stuff.



I leave my laptops plugged in and use them as you would have a PC. I probably haven't taken one of mine out of the apartment 2-3 times, if that. I don't care about hibernate either and leave the ones I'm using running 24/7. 

WiFi? With 50 other apartments within stones throw in my building alone, several Govt. buildings all with wifi in signal range, I wouldn't think of enabling mine. I was without internet service for a year, and convinced the Administrator to enable a hotspot for us, but I wouldn't use it either.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 26, 2018)

The statement that FreeBSD developers use Macs has certainly become a meme. One would think that any FreeBSD developer would find it reasonably easy to set up FreeBSD. But . . . whatever.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 26, 2018)

We've been through this discussion several time.  For a FreeBSD developer who works on something that is *not* the GUI, there is no advantage to using FreeBSD as a desktop.  They should use whatever they are most productive with.

I was a developer who worked professionally on Linux projects (which ended up in the kernel) for many years.  For the first ~8 years, I used Windows on my company-owned laptop; then I switched to a Mac.  Both were very productive environments.  I had a Linux desktop for a while too, but eventually having two computers got to be too much of a hassle, and I switched to using rack-mounted development machines in a computer room, and my laptop to log remotely into them.  With both Windows and Mac, you can get X, so you can run graphical applications on a remote machine if you want to.  Looking at my colleagues on those projects, it was probably an even split between Windows, Mac and Linux as a GUI.

The only time I used Linux on a laptop was for my personal home machine.  I gave up on that when switching my server at home from Linux to *BSD; Linux on a laptop (in the early 2000s) was way too stressful and hard work.

Anecdote: In the early 90s, due to a bizarre coincidence, I was issued a NeXT as my desktop machine (this was before laptops were commonly available).  It was a nightmare.  Nothing worked right on that machine, and using non-native applications (in particular those that wanted to use X rather than the NeXT's native display-postscript based graphics) was torture.  My officemate had an IBM AIX desktop machine.  After a year of fighting the NeXT, I gave up, hid it in a lab, brought a VT200 emulator with Tektronix graphics from home, connected it with two 38kBaud serial lines to my office mate's AIX machine, and gave up on GUIs for work use.  What is the moral of that anecdote?  Being forced to use a GUI that you don't get along with really kills your productivity.


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## Snurg (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz
Which "FreeBSD GUI"? There is none...
Maybe Apple's sponsorship just means "free Macs for the FreeBSD staff"? *wildly speculating*
Product placement and competitor sabotage at its best 

OJ
It is sadly a truth. wblock@ some time ago tried to find FreeBSD devs who were actually using it, but apparently failed.
Is there a better proof that its devs consider it unfit as desktop OS?  
FreeBSD core devs seem to like Debian Stretch


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## herrbischoff (Feb 26, 2018)

OJ said:


> It's amazing how many people are using portable devices these days and considering that normal.



Welcome to 2018, laptop computers are the new default desktop hardware. It is indeed normal, at least since 2010, with regard to numbers sold (https://www.statista.com/statistics...forecast-for-tablets-laptops-and-desktop-pcs/). This may be different for certain niche areas like developers working with compiled languages (because https://xkcd.com/303/) or users in need of excessive graphics power. The majority uses mobile machines. Additionally, if you take a look at the tablet market share, it becomes painfully clear just how completely traditional desktop environments have failed to offer a compelling experience to anyone not specifically looking for that very experience and flexibility.

A modern graphical desktop requires an operating system below that supports all this special hardware and functionality or it will never be a compelling choice for this use case. In fact, thinking deeper about it, I'd argue that FreeBSD does the right thing by focusing on its strengths in the server, embedded and appliance space to remain clean. Adding all the extra functionality and drivers needed to support a wide range of laptop hardware (especially in the kernel) could be problematic in the long run. It may not even be feasible to try to achieve both — server and desktop — since both follow vastly different models of operation.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> We've been through this discussion several time. For a FreeBSD developer who works on something that is *not* the GUI, there is no advantage to using FreeBSD as a desktop. They should use whatever they are most productive with.



Thank you for your in-depth explanation of your experience. Nevertheless, it sounds like there is no particular advantage to any one system other than personal familiarity - particularly if one is using "non GUI" workspace. By which I presume you mean a terminal.

I'm a rank amateur and have little trouble setting up FreeBSD with KDE and just counted (usually don't give it any thought) 16 open terminals. There are of course many other programs of my usual favorites open in various places. How this could possibly be anything but a productive environment or improved upon, other than using whatever personal arrangement a person might want, is beyond me. Nothing in ;your post suggests anything else. It seems to me that a developer using a Mac for work is really a personal statement of some kind - which is certainly fair enough. I can't argue with that. It just seems odd to me.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 26, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> I'd argue that FreeBSD does the right thing by focusing on its strengths in the server


I certainly would too. Even as a desktop user, I've very happy with the solidity of the underlying system - not to mention it's easy and logic of configuration. To my way of thinking, that is actually the most important part of a desktop system.


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## Snurg (Feb 26, 2018)

OJ said:


> It seems to me that a developer using a Mac for work is really a personal statement of some kind - which is certainly fair enough. I can't argue with that. It just seems odd to me.


Using Macs is often a statement, like driving Porsche instead of Volkswagen.


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## Snurg (Feb 26, 2018)

OJ said:


> ... solidity of the underlying system - not to mention it's easy and logic of configuration. To my way of thinking, that is actually the most important part of a desktop system.


In terms of solidity as desktop, systemDOS is probably even abit better than FreeBSD.
However, in terms of ease of use and logic of configuration, MacOs seems to be the best straight jacket. 

People do not need to learn much. It is standardized, it just works, else things wont get approved by the big corporation.
Many people just like _standardized fast food without surprises_, bad ones as well as good ones.
And no need to cook, no need for dishwashing, _no need for individuality_.
Just like a burger...


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 26, 2018)

OJ said:


> It may not even be feasible to try to achieve both — server and desktop — since both follow vastly different models of operation.



Not to beat a dead equine, but the screenshot thread alone gives testiment to how many of us have managed to do just that.

Don't get me wrong, I love the fact it's generally considered as a server and it comes with the base system and a terminal only. I wouldn't want it any other way. When I switched to cable my plan only came with a pass through modem and I ran my FreeBSD machines facing the internet for months without a second thought. The only reason I finally got a router was so I could have more than one online at once.

I also realize this isn't Windows, thankfully, and even with emulators/wine maybe not all of the apps some people need as a necessity might not run on FreeBSD. It can't be all things to all people, doesn't try to be and they have a genuine need to run something else. I don't.

Why developers use Apple is beyond me, but it's bad form at the very least IMO. Buy a sticker from FreeBSD Mart to cover up the logo at least and have some pride. I would be ticked off to see it and probably advise them I knew of a tutorial if they couldn't set it up themselves.

Or want to in a bad way.  Depending.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 26, 2018)

OJ said:


> Nevertheless, it sounds like there is no particular advantage to any one system other than personal familiarity - particularly if one is using "non GUI" workspace. By which I presume you mean a terminal.


No.  Some GUIs don't work, or don't work well.  Or they take a lot of work to maintain and configure, which is time wasted from getting work done.  It may be personal preference too.  But the terminal emulation is typically not the driving factor.

For me, the vast majority of actual "development" work is done at a command line, with an editor (I like emacs, but don't disparage vi), using command-line tools, such as diff, git, make, and debuggers.  Some of my colleagues prefer graphical editors (which range from the Xwindows version of emacs to editors they have written themselves).  I know lots of people use IDEs such as eclipse, which require a GUI too.

But much (or maybe most) of the work of a developer is not actually looking at code and typing it.  A lot of it is reading and writing e-mails, chatting via IM with colleagues that are spread all over the globe, reading and editing documents (design documents, requirements documents, end-user manuals, ...) which are typically written in Word or similar word processors, reading and updating project-internal wikis, and finding the right information for the job on the web.  In addition, many development tasks are actually data- or performance driven, and require graphical analysis tools (which can be as simple as Excel making a graph, and can be complex graphical beasts).  For a while, I spent more time making diagrams in Visio and Rational Rose than actually writing code.  So developers are mostly just normal computer users, who spend a lot of their time complaining about the e-mail program their employer forces on them (there are no good ones, just varying shapes of brokenness), fighting with bugs in either MS Office or OpenOffice, and so on.  Clearly, the shell window is the an important one (and I often have a dozen or two dozen shell windows open), but everything else matters too.

And this is where the quality of a GUI comes in.  If a developer is continuously being interrupted because he can't get MS Outlook or Excel to work correctly, or because his desktop OS needs to reboot three times a day (either because the web browser leaked all available memory, or the Windows antivirus needed to be updated), he isn't going to get work done.  A lot of it is factual: If you have ever tried to use OpenOffice in a MS-Office shop, you understand that there are significant differences and incompatibilities.  At a previous employer, we had to all give up Windows, because the ClearCase source control system worked very badly on it (those were NOT fun days, not only did our machines crash all the time, we kept losing our source code modifications several times a day).  A lot of it is just preference: Given my hands and my life experience (I've spent a lot of hours playing piano), I'm very keyboard-driven, and need keyboard shortcuts for everything to survive at full speed; I have colleagues who type very slowly, and mostly use the mouse.  To each his own, but such preferences can heavily influence with hardware, which OS, and which GUI (KDE vs. Gnome vs. ...) to use.  And in the end, it is also a question of taste.  For example, we used to use IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad machines in our office, and some people loved the little red mini-joystick in the keyboard, and couldn't survive without it; others hated it and used only the track pad; while another group always carried a mouse along.

To Snurg's comment: The cost of a Mac is insignificant to a professional software developer.  To begin with, here in Silicon Valley you can assume that the average developer costs his employer at least $200K-$300K a year (no, that is NOT the salary they get, a lot of that goes into office space, overhead, insurance, taxes+retirement); so a new MacBook Pro for $2K is peanuts.  Plus, professional-grade laptops from other high-quality manufacturers aren't much cheaper than Macs, if any.  A Mac is no longer a status symbol, since everyone has it, or has something just as good.

Anecdote: This message is being typed on my home MacBook Pro.  I bought it used in 2009, for about half of retail price (it was a lease return, 2008 model).  It it still alive, an indestructible machine.  I spend very little money on my personally owned computers.  I dread the day it will finally die (it is already on its 4th battery, 2nd touchpad, 2nd or 3rd optical drive, and at least 3rd hard disk, now a $80 SSD): While the nearest Apple store is only 20 minutes away, I really don't want to go in there and give them several K$.


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## gnath (Feb 26, 2018)

Snurg said:


> I had to build a custom kernel without the VESA driver to make S3 suspend/resume work on my HP Z800 computers.


Just have a look at your old thread. Work on this area is need of the hour. Some one may throw some light regarding porting of linux "pm-utils" or "firejail" etc.

*@ralphbsz* it is some how true that dev's also need to eat & platform to fame.
They very much require user's requirement and feedback (bug) for their own development. I think big houses don't have that scope. 
I am still searching the difference between 'free' work of professionals, tech mad ( having fun out of solving problem without any return) & 'spiritual gurus'.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> So developers are mostly just normal computer users



Exactly. And normal computer users have very little patience for things that won't work out-of-the-box since they are just obstacles preventing you from doing what you need to do.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> No. Some GUIs don't work, or don't work well. Or they take a lot of work to maintain and configure, which is time wasted from getting work done. It may be personal preference too. But the terminal emulation is typically not the driving factor.


If "some" GUI doesn't work then don't use it. There are lots to chose from that run very well on FreeBSD.


ralphbsz said:


> For me, the vast majority of actual "development" work is done at a command line, with an editor


Exactly, so  as you said above, we're good with the terminal emulators.


ralphbsz said:


> But much (or maybe most) of the work of a developer is not actually looking at code and typing it. A lot of it is reading and writing e-mails, chatting via IM with colleagues that are spread all over the globe, reading and editing documents (design documents, requirements documents, end-user manuals, ...) which are typically written in Word or similar word processors, reading and updating project-internal wikis, and finding the right information for the job on the web.


Firefox 58 is very fast and totally solid now so any browser based interaction (and that's a lot of it these days) is taken care of. Libre Office works very well, so unless you're a Microsoft shill there is no excuse for not using it - other than you just don't want to, which of course is legitimate. 


ralphbsz said:


> And this is where the quality of a GUI comes in. If a developer is continuously being interrupted because he can't get MS Outlook or Excel to work correctly, or because his desktop OS needs to reboot three times a day


Is that a bad strawman argument, or have you really not kept up in the last decade? I don't reboot my FreeBSD desktop system and there is no difficulty with the quality of my GUI. I'm sorry sir, but despite you sounding even tempered and nice, it really looks like you are trolling. At the very least, you are certainly being insulting. Why is that?


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## herrbischoff (Feb 26, 2018)

OJ: What kind of job do you work?


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## Deleted member 9563 (Feb 26, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> @OJ: What kind of job do you work?


I'm an old age pensioner. I haven't worked for many years. Otherwise have professional expertise in arts and flute playing in particular. I use FreeBSD for my desktop because of its stability and lack of surprises. It is a good OS for an old fart like me who is tired of constant changes and just want things to stay working once installed. I'm a total IT amateur, although I can type and feel most comfortable in a terminal because it feels like DOS.


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## gnath (Feb 26, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> @OJ: What kind of job do you work?


Probably positive discussion only for Freebsd, not others.


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## kpedersen (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> If a developer is continuously being interrupted because he can't get MS Outlook or Excel to work correctly.


This one used to actually be a big issue for me and unfortunately LibreOffice (or OpenOffice at the time) did not quite solve it. It isn't the fact that I wanted to run Microsoft Office, it is more the fact that everyone else in the office had an obsessive need to use it. I could not guarantee that my LibreOffice documents would display with the correct format when opened up by someone else in Microsoft Office.

Luckily in modern times, things have changed and Office is actually not at all an issue for me anymore:

1) Office 360 "Cloud" is a hilarious idea for actual work but it means that I can test my LibreOffice documents without fsck(8)ing around with Windows or MS Office. People are also more happy to blame the "cloud" when formatting is off, so I am quietly happy for them to do so 

2) LibreOffice and newer MS Office are much more compatible nowadays.

3) Many of my colleagues that I work closely with have finally given up with Office and gone to LaTeX. This was the perfect outcome.

So just like Adobe Flash... Microsoft Office was just a waiting game


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## knightjp (Feb 26, 2018)

I look at all the progress that Linux has made to become more mainstream and it is sad that BSD is not able to do the same. However, that rarity make would make our systems unique and essentially more secure.


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## kpedersen (Feb 26, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I look at all the progress that Linux has made to become more mainstream and it is sad that BSD is not able to do the same. However, that rarity make would make our systems unique and essentially more secure.



I think it is more that FreeBSD knows its current place in this world. I mean, Linux has put in a lot of effort to become mainstream and that has not only alienated some of it's long time supporters but it is now in fact *less* popular with mainstream users than it was ~2 years ago (or at least suggested by the Steam user survey). Though I personally blame Gnome 3 for that rather than Linux or systemd.

I think if Linux ever does become a big player in mainstream computing, then perhaps FreeBSD will "give it a shot". Until then, it simply isn't worth it.


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## knightjp (Feb 26, 2018)

All in all, it is possible to use FreeBSD as a Desktop. But you need to do a fair bit of work. This of course can be daunting to newbies to the platform and not everything is as straight forward as it seems in videos or articles. My experience this past weekend has certainly shown me that. While my choice of MacOS for the moment is certainly mainstream, I will say that FreeBSD is my choice of a Desktop operating system as compared to any Linux variant.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 26, 2018)

knightjp said:


> All in all, it is possible to use FreeBSD as a Desktop. But you need to do a fair bit of work. This of course can be daunting to newbies to the platform and not everything is as straight forward as it seems in videos or articles.



I've tried my best to make it as simple and concise as possible for someone who has never used UNIX or the commandline to set up a fully functional FreeBSD desktop using ports. Had something similar been available to me in 1998 I would have started using it then.

Yes, there is a lot of work to it especially if you use ports, which I always do, But when I'm done I know I've got a rock solid customized desktop like no other, except the one sitting beside it. I don't get that thrill or sense of accomplishment like the first time I successfully set up a FreeBSD desktop. Now I just expect it to happen and it does every time.

When I last installed pre-rolled Debian from a Live CD I thought. "now what?" Look and see what programs they've decided I need, etc. It is boring and nothing I actually did myself.


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## knightjp (Feb 26, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> I've tried my best to make it as simple and concise as possible for someone who has never used UNIX or the commandline to set up a fully functional FreeBSD desktop using ports. Had something similar been available to me in 1998 I would have started using it then.
> 
> Yes, there is a lot of work to it especially if you use ports, which I always do, But when I'm done I know I've got a rock solid customized desktop like no other, except the one sitting beside it. I don't get that thrill or sense of accomplishment like the first time I successfully set up a FreeBSD desktop. Now I just expect it to happen and it does every time.
> 
> When I last installed pre-rolled Debian from a Live CD I thought. "now what?" Look and see what programs they've decided I need, etc. It is boring and nothing I actually did myself.



Using the ports takes a long time as well. I guess that is why people like to use the "pkg install" system. I used the pkg method. Maybe that is why I ran into issues. That and the fact that I was not sure on which GUI to install.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 26, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I look at all the progress that Linux has made to become more mainstream and it is sad that BSD is not able to do the same.


FreeBSD has no interest in becoming "mainstream". FreeBSD is a professional operating system for professionals. Linux main goal is to replace Windows on the desktop. I'm glad FreeBSD's goal is to target our professional operations.



knightjp said:


> Using the ports takes a long time as well. I guess that is why people like to use the "pkg install" system. I used the pkg method. Maybe that is why I ran into issues.


I haven't been following this thread but I don't understand the issue. Pretty much everything I've ever installed works out of the box so...


knightjp said:


> I was not sure on which GUI to install.


I don't understand this either. Install what you want but, again, I haven't bothered to look through this thread.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 26, 2018)

Yes, I've caught plenty of heat for using ports when there is no actual need as pkg is faster. But that's how I learned and what I think best.

It may well be a little more overwhelming for new people than I anticipated and apparently not everyone is sure why they're doing this or that, but it gives valuable commandline experience and in compliing programs. Both of which are good things IMO.

And the option to use pkg is always open anyway.



knightjp said:


> That and the fact that I was not sure on which GUI to install.



x11/xorg is your GUI. If you mean Desktop Environment or Window Manager, it's your choice. There are threads detailing why each person prefers the one they use. I had a low end machine to start out with, had to choose something easy on resources, went with x11-wm/fluxbox and stuck with it.


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## kpedersen (Feb 26, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> Yes, I've caught plenty of heat for using ports when there is no actual need as pkg is faster.



For normal users, I don't think ports are very feasible and in my experience it isn't just because of the speed. The main reason being that for a "clean" port to be built, each one needs to be built in a fresh install of FreeBSD (i.e jail / VM) with nothing but it's absolute dependencies installed. This is because build systems such as GNU autotools or CMake will actually build the software differently depending on what software it finds currently installed. This makes your build of the package "non-deterministic" and different to that if you had perhaps installed VLC or LibreOffice before hand. With the fact that software these days drags in so many goddamn dependencies, these slight inconsistencies simply builds up and can cause subtle bugs. You might also get a port failing to build because the build system has detected a library that exists and is trying to build a part of the code that has not yet been supported or ported to FreeBSD.

That is why FreeBSD provides packages built in a "cleanroom" environment using tools like poudriere to create these deterministic builds.
You can of course run poudriere yourself and create a new clean Jail for each package but then it will take much, much longer than ports already do.

Personally I actually prefer the idea of ports compared to packages, but in reality I had to ere onto the side of Packages in the great Ports vs Packages debate (for a typical user)


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

It is only my personal impression, ralphbsz, because EVERY THING that concerns GPU,
GPU support, GPU performance or some essential desktop features like suspend, for example,
just works or works *much better*, for example, on GNU/Linux, but not on FreeBSD, and *the situation is the same for years*.
Also it makes sense, because it is the known fact, that many of FreeBSD developers don't use it on their desktops
and work for Apple™. So they use Macos and do not developing desktop features on FreeBSD, because
they don't use it like desktop OS. So no conspiracy, only known facts. Also it is only my personal impressions,
observations and logical thinking, if you don't agree with me, it is OK.



drhowarddrfine said:


> FreeBSD has no interest in becoming "mainstream". FreeBSD is a professional operating system for professionals. Linux main goal is to replace Windows on the desktop. I'm glad FreeBSD's goal is to target our professional operations.


I'm also glad that it is "non-stream", but personally I would be glad to use FULLY WORKING DESKTOP,
with all its essential features, like suspend, and not some semi-working solutions, with support for only few GPU-s.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 26, 2018)

kpedersen said:


> The main reason being that for a "clean" port to be built, each one needs to be built in a fresh install of FreeBSD (i.e jail / VM) with nothing but it's absolute dependencies installed. This is because build systems such as GNU autotools or CMake will actually build the software differently depending on what software it finds currently installed. This makes your build of the package "non-deterministic" and different to that if you had perhaps installed VLC or LibreOffice before hand.



I use ports-mgmt/portmaster if at all possible, have a limited number of 3rd party programs I install on a regular basis, and a fairly routine sequential order to build them when rebuilding my system. I never have to take over during the initial build unless there is a vulnerability in a program or conflict of 2 things wanting to install in the same place, but that does not happen often. A new user might well be confounded as what to do next.

I'm running FreeBSD 11.1-RELEASE-p4 on all my machines since the initial release date without rebuilding. I do build 3rd party programs as needed weeks or months after the build, www/waterfox and www/seamonkey most recently, and very rarely ever have problems. 

That's probably why I might have overestimated the ease of using ports-mgmt/portmaster for a beginner. When I put it to work I fully expect it to finish the job and do it right.


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## Maelstorm (Feb 26, 2018)

My my my...  Here's my two cents.

Right tool for the job.  FreeBSD was designed, first and foremost, as a server operating system.  Although lately it has been getting a lot of attention for appliances and embedded applications (including industrial).  I tried to run a GUI/Openlook system.  It ran quite well, even on my Voodoo3 3000 video card (I have a Voodoo5 laying around here somewhere).  Yes, you can use it for desktop, but you will be limited in the specific hardware that you will be able to use.

But the question that people should be asking is this:  What are the best desktop/laptop operating systems out there?  The top two that come to mind is Windows and Mac OSX.

I run Windows on my desktop.  It's hard to get a Unix style operating system to run on the desktop these days because of the myriad of hardware and software out there.  Unless hardware manufacturers actually develop drivers for their hardware that runs on FreeBSD, there is not going to be much support.  I'm not talking about core functionality like disk drives, networking, console, etc..., I'm talking about some user who is trying to download photos from his camera and edit them using Adobe Illustrator or CorelDRAW Photopaint.  Or what about a musician who wants to play his music?  Or record the keys he pressed on his keyboard through the MIDI interface on his sound card?

The main things that are holding FreeBSD back from the desktop is GPU and audio support.  Get support for those and it can work.  The only problem is the software portability issues because lets face it, virtually all software written today is written for Windows.  So for the future, I see FreeBSD becoming more entrenched into the server, appliance, and embedded applications.  Maybe if manufacturers used FreeBSD for IoT, we wouldn't be having some of the security problems that we are having today.

All of my FreeBSD software development is focused on libraries and multi-threaded server software.  I do all my development using vim.  My build environment uses gmake.  It works quite well for me.


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## Maelstorm (Feb 26, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> I'm also glad that it is "non-stream", but personally I would be glad to use FULLY WORKING DESKTOP, with all its essential features, like suspend, and not some semi-working solutions, with support for only few GPU-s.



The problem is that on FreeBSD, features that are essential for desktop/laptop are not going to work unless you have explicit support (GPU and Sound comes to mind), and probably will never work fully.  This is why FreeBSD is not really suitable for the desktop.  If you want to run FreeBSD on your desktop, that's your prerogative.

But it's the right tool for the job, and for desktop/laptop use, FreeBSD is not it.

Back in 2012, I offered to start a project to get a working suspend, resume, and full power management capabilities working on FreeBSD.  I was going to do the timer portion in software, but I needed assistance from the core developers to modify the device drivers to add some functionality to drivers to support power down and power up functions.  Unfortunately, there were no takers so the project was canceled before it even got off the ground.  My implementation was instead of using hardware to manage events, I was going to use software to do it, which is much more compatible and independent of any hardware anomalies.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

Maelstorm said:


> This is why FreeBSD is not really suitable for the desktop. If you want to run FreeBSD on your desktop, that's your prerogative.


Yes, it is true, but it is very sad, that such great operating system, which I liked and started to use it as my
only OS on all my machines (with hope for the better future), is really able to be much better than GNU/Linux,
in every aspect, with its great code quality, performance and stable work, but will never become "better". 
IMHO FreeBSD will die when it will become a "sandbox" for Apple™ employees only.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 26, 2018)

Maelstorm said:


> The main things that are holding FreeBSD back from the desktop is GPU and audio support.



That and the need for fundamentally different APIs, possibly a different init system, in-depth changes to device drivers to accommodate mobile device specific events, suspend, resume, different power management, throttling background applications... As I have written earlier, today's desktop is a laptop. If you look at all the optimizations Apple made to macOS over time, to squeeze out power savings and battery run time — those are deep, low-level changes that affect the system as a whole. Consequently, macOS sucks as a server platform which is reflected in the recent announcement of neutering and stripping down macOS Server to what amounts to little more than a glorified Samba server with device management bits sprinkled in. Calendar, Contacts, DHCP, DNS, Mail, Messages, NetInstall, VPN, Web Server and Wiki services will be deprecated. Sure, you could set all those up all by yourself and deal with countless headaches but why would you? This used to be a passable SMB server setup, now they have gone full desktop. I wouldn't want anything like that to happen to FreeBSD. FreeBSD is positioned squarely in the opposing corner: a somewhat passable desktop but a great server OS. The more I think about it, the more sense it makes. Why spend your energy on something you couldn't possibly hope to meaningfully improve upon (desktop) when you can meaningfully improve a clean foundation (server).



drhowarddrfine said:


> Linux main goal is to replace Windows on the desktop. I'm glad FreeBSD's goal is to target our professional operations.



You've got to have your priorities straight. The main goal of FreeBSD is not the desktop, not mobile devices — and after this discussion and some introspection I'm surprised that I'm actually _glad_ it isn't. The fact that you _can_ run a full desktop on it if you so choose (and some clearly do, for various reasons) is testament to its flexibility if nothing else. Even if I can't shake the sneaking suspicion that it's often used to re-purpose older hardware. Which is fine of course, just not a very common use-case for people with just one machine.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 26, 2018)

Maelstorm said:


> The problem is that on FreeBSD, features that are essential for desktop/laptop are not going to work unless you have explicit support (GPU and Sound comes to mind), and probably will never work fully.  This is why FreeBSD is not really suitable for the desktop.  If you want to run FreeBSD on your desktop, that's your prerogative.
> 
> But it's the right tool for the job, and for desktop/laptop use, FreeBSD is not it..



Respectfully, I beg to differ. 

Although they are older, I have Nvidia, Intel and ATI Radeon chipsets on my FreeBSD boxen and they all work well, with the exception of my Gateway ATI box breaking x11/eterm native transparency if you use Force Psudeo Transparency in x11-wm/fluxbox.

I have a Thinkpad X61 that serves as my dedicated .mp3 player and music source to my vintage stereo. The wiki states it has Intel HD audio and I couldn't be happier with it. If it wasn't up to the job I wouldn't use it a such, and it shines.

I use multimedia/xmms with it, never turn it off {78.5 days uptime), and listen to it for hours each day. It is fully capable as any other of my machines as far as internet, manipulating images, watching videos, etc., but I only take it online if there is an important update. It's position and role as a FreeBSD box is secure even if I were to swear off FreeBSD forever. 

When I'm online I listen to music on the one I happen to be using, I get sound out of them all, and if I'm online its a safe bet I'm listening to headphones.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> I'm surprised that I'm actually _glad_ it isn't


That's because you use Macos as your desktop,
you see FreeBSD in VMware window only,
that's because you don't care about its desktop functionality
and some other similar features.

If I was using FreeBSD in some virtual machines only, I even never wrote here nothing.


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## Maelstorm (Feb 26, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> Respectfully, I beg to differ.
> 
> Although they are older, I have Nvidia, Intel and ATI Radeon chipsets on my FreeBSD boxen and they all work well, with the exception of my Gateway ATI box breaking x11/eterm native transparency if you use Force Psudeo Transparency in x11-wm/fluxbox.
> 
> ...



Difference of opinion sparks a healthy debate.  If it works for you, then it works for you.  Who am I to try to tell you otherwise?  But as I said, explicit support.  If the hardware is explicitly supported, then by all means.  But that support will not be for cutting edge hardware.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

Also, if FreeBSD will never be fully suitable for desktop,
because it is not FreeBSD "goal", "desktop" inscription from here should be removed IMHO.





They should write something like "Use MacOS as your desktop instead", it will be a good advt


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## Maelstorm (Feb 26, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> IMHO FreeBSD will die when it will become a "sandbox" for Apple™ employees only.



I don't really see that happening anytime soon.  FreeBSD will live on as long as people are willing to develop it.



herrbischoff said:


> Consequently, macOS sucks as a server platform which is reflected in the recent announcement of neutering and stripping down macOS Server to what amounts to little more than a glorified Samba server with device management bits sprinkled in. Calendar, Contacts, DHCP, DNS, Mail, Messages, NetInstall, VPN, Web Server and Wiki services will be deprecated. Sure, you could set all those up all by yourself and deal with countless headaches but why would you? This used to be a passable SMB server setup, now they have gone full desktop. I wouldn't want anything like that to happen to FreeBSD. FreeBSD is positioned squarely in the opposing corner: a somewhat passable desktop but a great server OS.



I'm not one to support Apple because I do not want to be beholden to Steve Jobs' ghost...but that's a topic for a different discussion.  So Apple has left the server market?  They weren't really suited for it to begin with when they are competing with giants like Microsoft, IBM, and Dell.  I wouldn't be surprised if Apple fully adopted FreeBSD for their servers.  But I have never even heard of an Apple server before, let alone seen one.  Although I have seen desktops running servers though....


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## Snurg (Feb 26, 2018)

An analogy might be cooks that do not eat themselves what they make.

The core FreeBSD staff seem to be not voluntarians, but instead paid employees. So external offers competing with that what they do for $$$ have little chance.
For example, the suspend/resume stuff Maelstorm mentioned ended up being done by jkim, and was not fully finished when the FreeBSD Foundation which sponsored the work accepted it in.
This is in my impression the reason why it suffers and the issues do not get fixed (it would need only a bit code in the vesa kernel module to make it Nvidia suspend-compatible, for example).

Another indicator is the poor Wifi support, and its poor performance compared to Linux. For embedded things the Wifi throughput is not really important, a clean init system instead of a cancerous systemd is preferable there, for example.

Insofar ILUXA's suggestion is sensible imho, to point out the audience which FreeBSD aims at.


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## herrbischoff (Feb 26, 2018)

Maelstorm said:


> I wouldn't be surprised if Apple fully adopted FreeBSD for their servers.



I think they will quit the server market entirely except for a very minimal footprint with a Mac mini-like machine and the aforementioned neutered "server" add-on ($19.99 in the app store, no joke) as not to completely alienate creative professionals. Apple enterprise services are handled by IBM already.



Maelstorm said:


> But I have never even heard of an Apple server before, let alone seen one.



I used to service many a customer's Xserve back in the day. Nice machines, very reliable. There once even was a FibreChannel Xserve RAID. Apple used to sell Mac OS X Server Unlimited for $999, no kidding. PowerPC FreeBSD runs splendid on those comparably ancient machines, by the way.


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## Snurg (Feb 26, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> I think they will quit the server market entirely (...) Xserve back in the day. Nice machines, very reliable. There once even was a FibreChannel Xserve RAID. Apple used to sell Mac OS X Server Unlimited for $999, no kidding. PowerPC FreeBSD runs splendid on those comparably ancient machines, by the way.


And before that there was AppleShare... back then a good share of their fattest Macs were used as dedicated servers.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 26, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> Also, if FreeBSD will never be fully suitable for desktop,
> because it is not FreeBSD "goal", "desktop" inscription from here should be removed IMHO.


It says it's used for that and it is. 

To be clear, my company had 10 developers. All of us used FreeBSD as our desktop workstation with all the browsers, editors, graphics and so on you could want for a web dev company and we did so without issue now in our 14th year.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 26, 2018)

OJ said:


> If "some" GUI doesn't work then don't use it. There are lots to chose from that run very well on FreeBSD.


Sorry, when I used to word "GUI", I didn't mean the window manager.  Instead I meant the whole package, from the rendering and communications layer (X), the initialization/shutdown (login support, sleeping, screen saver), the window manager and desktop environment (KDE, Gnome, ...), the basic graphical applications (clock, document previewer, terminal emulation), basic communication apps (mail, IM), and most importantly the office application suite.  You interpret "GUI" to mean just the window manager and environment.



> Firefox 58 is very fast and totally solid now so any browser based interaction (and that's a lot of it these days) is taken care of.



And Firefox has bugs.  As does Chrome, as does Safari.  All browsers have bugs.  Even today, we still have to switch between browsers to get all forms of browser-based interaction to work.  At my previous employer, Firefox was officially the "supported" browser for all GUI platforms, and preinstalled on all corporate-owned machines.  In spite of it, there were company forms (like paperwork you had to do for payroll or the human resources department) that only worked with IE and Safari and not with Firefox.  No browser is perfect, and you need a collection of them.



> Libre Office works very well, so unless you're a Microsoft shill there is no excuse for not using it - other than you just don't want to, which of course is legitimate.


See below for more discussion of why LibreOffice and friends are not compatible enough.  And matter-of-fact, I have tried to heavily use various free *Office solutions myself (still have OpenOffice installed on my Mac), and I installed several hundred copies of NeoOffice on all machines at our elementary school.  Claiming that I am a Microsoft shill is laughable.  But in spite of having a large bias against using Microsoft's products, I still do use them when they are the best solution available.



> Is that a bad strawman argument, or have you really not kept up in the last decade? I don't reboot my FreeBSD desktop system and there is no difficulty with the quality of my GUI.


Sorry, I have never run FreeBSD on the desktop.  The story about having to reboot the desktop machine multiple times a day referred to Windows.  I gave the example to explain that forcing any person (whether they are an OS developer or not) to use a desktop environment that isn't good for them will lower productivity.



kpedersen said:


> This one used to actually be a big issue for me and unfortunately LibreOffice (or OpenOffice at the time) did not quite solve it. It isn't the fact that I wanted to run Microsoft Office, it is more the fact that everyone else in the office had an obsessive need to use it. I could not guarantee that my LibreOffice documents would display with the correct format when opened up by someone else in Microsoft Office.


Exactly.  The sad fact is that a vast majority of all office documents in the world today come from MS Office, and to be productive, you have to be 100% compatible with them, and be able to read, modify and write them.  That forces any person who interacts heavily with the outside world to use MS Office.  The problem isn't terribly big for Word, because other than minor changes in formatting, the various OpenOffice/NeoOffice/Libreoffice variants are pretty compatible.  But where it falls apart is spreadsheets (where many complex Excel spreadsheets won't work in anything else), presentations (where formatting is screwed up when leaving the PowerPoint universe), and database integration (you can't just take an Access database and move it to OpenOffice, it just doesn't work).  And even within MS Office, the versions are not compatible enough.  Example: For a while, I worked for as startup, and as we were all tired of using Windows laptops, we decided to standardize on Macs instead.  So we bought a handful of them.  Then we discovered that presentations didn't quite work perfectly when developed on PowerPoint for Mac but displayed on PowerPoint for Windows: the formatting was changed enough (due to font rendering differences) that sometimes words or sentences vanished.  Given that our CEO and CTO still had Windows laptops, and given that we were using these PowerPoint presentations to raise dozen of M$ from venture capitalists, we quickly gave up on Mac, and switched back over to Windows laptops.  By the way, this was a startup whose goal was to sell Linux-based systems!



kpedersen said:


> I think if Linux ever does become a big player in mainstream computing,


Linux is the dominant operating system in internet servers and on the cloud.  In the "top500" list of supercomputers, it has 100% market share: Of the 500 largest computers that are publicly known, every single one runs Linux.  I would think that Linux is the 400 lbs gorilla of mainstream computing - except on the desktop (the situation in Mobile is confusing, and the answer depends on whether you count Android as a version of Linux or not, which can be argued either way).



drhowarddrfine said:


> Linux main goal is to replace Windows on the desktop.


When you say "Linux main goal...", who do you mean?  Linus?  RedHat?  Suse?  I think "Linux" as a whole does not have a main goal, as it doesn't have a central decision making authority.



Trihexagonal said:


> x11/xorg is your GUI.



See above.  X is one part of it, the environment/window manager is another part of it, and then there are plenty of other parts.  Fluxbox is just a little part of the overall solution.



ILUXA said:


> ... many of FreeBSD developers don't use it on their desktops
> and work for Apple™. So they use Macos and do not developing desktop features on FreeBSD,


Two comments.  To begin with, I do not believe that the bulk of FreeBSD developers work for Apple (meaning: get a paycheck from Apple), and even less that they work on FreeBSD as part of their Apple jobs and under Apple's direction.  I think that statement is flat out wrong.

Second, the bulk of FreeBSD developers are not desktop / GUI developers.  For example, take someone who works on file systems in the kernel, or on ethernet drivers.  They do not modify the desktop, and probably don't have the wish to do so.  They may not even have the skills for that job.  What you are espousing here is that you want all FreeBSD developers to work on desktop/GUI features.  Sorry, but that's not going to happen.



Maelstorm said:


> But I have never even heard of an Apple server before, let alone seen one.


Apple used to sell rackmount servers, which had PowerPC chips in them, and ran the MacOS operating system.  They were actually quite price-competitive with Intel-based servers.

Inside IBM, many AIX, DB2 and RS-6000 development departments used these rackmount Apple servers as development machines, because they were much cheaper than IBM's own Power hardware.  They were also used for a lot of the early development of Linux on PowerPC, because early on the IBM hardware had a hard time booting anything other than AIX and the "i" operating system (no, not iOS from the cell phone, but IBM's branding of the former AS-400 operating system).

Apple's fibre channel based RAID storage boxes were already mentioned; at some point, you could build a pretty good server cluster using all Apple hardware.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> developers are not desktop / GUI developers.


You didn't understand me correct. I wasn't talking about "GUI"-s, FreeBSD comes without any GUI and it is not bad IMO,
I was talking about essential basic features on system level, like GPU support and suspend/resume, also some people,
like Snurg, got some Wi-Fi issues, etc. Such features are not supported well on FreeBSD, because such features got nothing to do with servers.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 26, 2018)

Sorry, but GPU support and suspend/resume are not basic system features.  They are completely unneeded for a server, and not even very needed for a desktop if one doesn't need massive graphics performance.  They are closely related to running a GUI and portable system.

And yes, I know about wireless issues in FreeBSD.  They are the #1 reason that my Raspberry Pi's are (unfortunately) back to running Linux (there are also other #2 and #3 issues).  But again, embedded or boutique systems (like Raspberry Pi) are not mainstream computer use, and I don't fault FreeBSD for not supporting it as well as I would like.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> Sorry, but GPU support and suspend/resume are not basic system features.


IMO it is very basic system features, that in 2018, every OS, that somehow related to desktop should have.
If it will be impossible to use suspend on FreeBSD, it will be impossible to use FreeBSD laptops efficiently,
if Wi-Fi won't work well, it will be impossible to use FreeBSD as desktop at all, etc…
IMO it is the obvious things.


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## aragats (Feb 26, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> If it will be impossible to use suspend on FreeBSD, it will be impossible to use FreeBSD laptops efficiently,


Do you mean "suspend to RAM" or "suspend to disk"? I guess, suspend to RAM works on most laptops. I used to use it every day in ThinkPad's and Dell's.
Suspend to disk is not really important for most users.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

On my laptop it works as well (intel integrated graphics), but it does not work at all for example with Nvidia cards (my PC with Nvidia GPU
is suspend free since 10.3 ), and Nvidia is the most popular GPU provider nowadays, and it is a big problem IMO. See this thread, it was already discussed.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> See above.  X is one part of it, the environment/window manager is another part of it, and then there are plenty of other parts.  Fluxbox is just a little part of the overall solution.



I've always considered X to be the base of the GUI and build everything dependant on a GUI after I build x11/xorg.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 26, 2018)

(talking about GPU support and suspend/resume)


ILUXA said:


> IMO it is very basic system features, that in 2018, every OS, that somehow related to desktop should have.


And that are unnecessary on a server.  Actually worse than unnecessary: they are superfluous, and their mere presence causes complexity, which gets in the way if the mission of a particular install is to run a server.  One of the big advantages of FreeBSD over Linux (and even more so for OpenBSD) is the simplicity and clean organization.

WiFi on a server is sometimes needed; today WiFi networks can be reliable and performant enough to run some servers on them, it can make setup easier (build the server with just a power cable, then move it to the deployment location and plug in the ethernet), and some people use small servers as WiFi access points, which requires a very sturdy WiFi software stack.  But overall, for most servers, WiFi is also irrelevant.

Matter-of-fact, one of the major criticisms of systemd in the Linux world is that Lennart is completely focused on desktop use, deliberately ignores server use, and makes design decisions that make server use harder.  Like everything in life, one has to make compromises, and Lennart isn't the kind of person who recognize a compromise if it floated in his coffee, which makes him rather unsuitable for the task as the architect and chief developer of a major system component.

I am not advocating that FreeBSD should ignore GPUs, suspend/resume and WiFi completely.  But one has to consider that every second of work invested into those tasks is a second less that's available for other tasks, and that every bit of complexity added for them detracts from other uses.


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## Maelstorm (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> Sorry, but GPU support and suspend/resume are not basic system features.  They are completely unneeded for a server, and not even very needed for a desktop if one doesn't need massive graphics performance.  They are closely related to running a GUI and portable system.



I dunno about that.  GPU support can be critical for a compute server.  I actually plan on building one once I get the funds together.  A 4 CPU 16-core each AMD with 4 GPU cards for high performance number crunching.  It just depends on what the server is doing and what it's being used for.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> I am not advocating that FreeBSD should ignore GPUs, suspend/resume and WiFi completely. But one has to consider that every second of work invested into those tasks is a second less that's available for other tasks


And this is the biggest FreeBSD problem, for those who are trying to use it as desktop,
because it is very painful to wait, when something desktop related will be fixed (never?).

There is no need to be "focused on desktop use" like "Lennart",
but such basic and essential features should just work and be available to users,
as well as GPU support IMO.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 26, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> I don't fault FreeBSD for not supporting it as well as I would like.


Is it actually Linux that supports Raspberry Pi? Or is it third parties?


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 26, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> And this is the biggest FreeBSD problem, for those who are trying to use it as desktop,
> because it is very painful to wait, when something desktop related will be fixed (never?).


Again I have to say I don't know what you're talking about. We've used i3 and fluxbox and other window managers without issue. I had wifi running on my laptop till it broke. Wifi will work if you select the right hardware and that hardware is cheap and easily available. True, that might not be built into your laptop but that might not mean anything to one on his desktop.

I can't say I recall any issues with any software we have ever used that wasn't the same on other OSes except chromium. So I just don't get what the issue is.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 26, 2018)

Of course your i3 WM will work OK on every system.
Specifically I was talking about suspend problem with Nvidia GPU-s,
suspend is broken since 10.3 or 10.2 RELEASE for my GPU.



drhowarddrfine said:


> Wifi will work if you select the right hardware and that hardware is cheap and easily available. True, that might not be built into your laptop but that might not mean anything to one on his desktop.


Yes, change your Wi-Fi, remove your Nvidia card, use crappy intel integrated graphics and be a happy desktop user 

Again, I don't want to argue with you guys,  it is only my personal opinion,
personally I see some problems with FreeBSD, when using it as desktop system,
and there are many of them, when comparing with Linux, for example.
EVERYTHING that related to GPU supported and works much better on GNU/Linux OS-es.
I believe if problem will be discussed, more likely it will be resolved, and if nobody will say nothing,
it will be overlooked, that's why I started to write something in this thread.
Of course I believe that all is working OK for you, drhowarddrfine, moreover I respect you
very much, because you've posted a lot of useful stuff here, on FreeBSD forums.

I ended this discussion. Yes, FreeBSD is perfect, if you believe so  I respect other religions as well


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## Snurg (Feb 27, 2018)

unimportant subjective OT:
My feeling is that in this thread new paradigms and old thinking patterns expose themselves in a very interesting manner.

Engelbert invented the mouse in 1962, but it got a mass article not before the Mac 1984, together with the "GUI".
The last punch card systems were phased out about that time. Terminals are almost as museal now.

The mainframes died out, too. The supercomputers came.
8bit died out when the 8088 came, and for "number crunchers" the "numeric coprocessor" 8087 came. (Which got integral part of every x86 from 486 on).

Late 1990s the first OSes started to offer hibernation. 20 years all major PC oses offer hibernation.
(suspend to ram is no substitution, it requires new startup when for example changing battery or having an extended power outage, so that UPS need to hibernate the system. It will eventually become a must for every non-trivial system to be able to just continue without restarting from scratch after power reconnect.)
Time to hibernate also becomes negligible as flash storage replaces disk drives.

You just cannot do all things with "normal" GP processors. GPUs seem the "numeric coprocessors" of tomorrow.
(Or maybe FPGAs for wider applications, not limited to number crunching or crypto hashing)

As ralphbsz said, Linux scales from supercomputers to smartwatches.
Unix seems almost as dead as dodo. FreeBSD has to find its niche - maybe it's just its license that keeps it alive.
Sorry if I offended people - this is not my intention. Happy hugs


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## Deleted member 30996 (Feb 27, 2018)

Snurg said:


> Unix seems almost as dead as dodo.



Man.... My neckbeard was just getting good, too. 

I wasn't kidding rufwoof about growing mine out last summer.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> Of course your i3 WM will work OK on every system.


Then what's the problem?


ILUXA said:


> Specifically I was talking about suspend problem with Nvidia GPU-s,
> suspend is broken since 10.3 or 10.2 RELEASE for my GPU.


I don't need suspend for my workstation. I don't use a notebook anymore since my last one broke. This sounds like one of those complaints on some boards where people go on for eons about "boot time like they booted up their computer every few minutes.


ILUXA said:


> Yes, change your Wi-Fi, remove your Nvidia card, use crappy intel integrated graphics and be a happy desktop user


I didn't change it on my old laptop. You don't have to remove your nVidia card. I use on in this system. I don't use Intel graphics cause I have an nVidia card.

Again, what is the problem?


ILUXA said:


> personally I see some problems with FreeBSD, when using it as desktop system,
> and there are many of them, when comparing with Linux


I run an i7 with 32GB ram and SSD on a 120Mb internet line (from home) nVidia graphics with i3, Firefox Chromium gimp VirtualBox, vim various editors including QtCreator and Sublime, Scribus, Inkscape, Blender, a couple of video editors, Audacity, some other things I can't recall at the moment....everything a web development company would need and more, the same version and stuff on Linux, this is just my home workstation and I don't understand what the problem is.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 27, 2018)

The problem is with suspend. Suspend works OK for you, on a machine with Nvidia GPU (especially resume part)?
Execute as root `# acpiconf -s 3` while X is running and try to resume then, you should see the issue.
Or you don't use it? It is not working at all for me, the only option is to reboot, because it is impossible to resume after suspend, it doesn't work as well for Snurg, he even posted somewhere here why it happens. It stopped working for me after some updates, long time ago. Suspend is a must have feature for laptops, and sometimes it is useful for workstations too, if you don't want to reboot regulary, or if you're curious about power consumption. Personally I tried to use FreeBSD on two different machines with two different Nvidia GPU-s, suspend (resume) didn't work on both, also on a PC with a newer Nvidia GPU I got not only suspend problems.


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## kpedersen (Feb 27, 2018)

Personally for desktop usage, I always find the hardware support argument moot.

When you want to run Mac OS X, you buy hardware that you know works (usually Apple).
When you want to run FreeBSD, you buy hardware that you know works (usually Lenovo or any rack server).

The argument that Apple hardware is newer is also a bit odd because FreeBSD can support much newer processors than the current top of the line Apple product (FreeBSD can be used on servers after all). It also supports newer wifi devices (often ported from Linux). With the binary blob, it also supports more modern NVIDIA cards.

Therefore, we can arrive at the conclusion that FreeBSD has better hardware support than Mac OS X, so is more suited to the desktop 

This may not always be the case however. One day we will be at the complete mercy of corporations and will be allowed to own nothing more than some sort of iOS based consumption device where we have to stream everything rather than run it locally for our "safety". FreeBSD will be hard to run on these bits of toxic hardware.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 27, 2018)

While it is clear why Apple do not support bunch of hardware,
because they do not want people to use their proprietary OS
on some "hackintoshs", they need people to buy their crap or
they'll lose money. It is unclear why such Free OS, like FreeBSD,
which will only win if its community will grow, ignore such
big problems like GPU support and other GPU related issues.
It is Impossible for now to use FreeBSD efficiently on laptops,
if you don't use intel integrated GPU-s (suspend works on AMD ?).
And it is on a OS from 2018, which is still alive, still in active
development and still pretends to be a Linux competitor.



kpedersen said:


> This may not always be the case however. One day we will be at the complete mercy of corporations and will be allowed to own nothing more than some sort of iOS based consumption device where we have to stream everything rather than run it locally for our "safety".


Your views are very pessimistic IMHO, 
Free software will never disappear, 
and will always be available for people,
for thoes who wants to use it, of course.


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## kpedersen (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> Your views are very pessimistic IMHO,
> Free software will never disappear,
> and will always be available for people,
> for thoes who wants to use it, of course.



Heh, I agree and I said it half tongue in cheek. However ultimately it isn't the software I am worried about, it is obtaining hardware that can run open-source / free software. For example, even today it is extremely hard to get hold of a free (as in freedom) processor. Most of us are stuck with Intel and all the extremely cruel and mad things that they have planned for us! The world is also going towards locked down tablets so I do feel the future is in some way, quite bleak! :/


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## xchris (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> they need people to buy their crap



crap h/ware + support services as well, its more than than 5 years ago since I completely stopped using any crApple products:
display issues on a mac mini covered with Apple care : I had to wait 2 weeks in order to visit their tech support at the local Apple store.
the same year my Dell laptop (covered by Dell support care pack) developed some issues with the HDD:  Dell technician at HOME on the next day


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## ralphbsz (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> While it is clear why Apple do not support bunch of hardware, because they do not want people to use their proprietary OS on some "hackintoshs", they need people to buy their crap or they'll lose money.


Nonsense.  Clearly, you don't understand what Apple is trying to do.  I would suggest that you read about how Apple "works", and then go talk to a whole bunch of Apple employees in leading positions in the company to understand it.  I'm sorry to be so harsh, but you live in a fantasy world of your own conspiracy theories.

Apply tries to make money.  They deliberately do not try to make money by pushing hardware alone.  In particular, they don't try to push "crap", if one understands that to mean cheaply made hardware being sold at high prices.  Instead, Apple is about selling more, and more high-priced, stuff by selling an experience, which "delights" their users (they deliberately use that specific word!) by the smooth usability, seamless integration and perfectionism of the complete experience.  I know that the preceding sentence contains many long words, so you probably need to read it several times.  What it comes down to is Apple's theory of the "walled garden": If you use all Apple devices for your computing needs (laptops, desktops, phones, tables, and accessories such as earphones), then things are easy and consistent, everyday tasks work smoothly, and data and information can seamlessly follow you.  One example is using mail programs that look and work very similar on a laptop/desktop environment, and tables and phones.  Another example is: once you have all your music imported into iTunes (or even purchased through iTunes), then consuming that media becomes easy and universal.

That's the theory behind Apple: They don't sell a Mac here and there; they try to sell the components of a lifestyle, one in which information and data (I used the examples of mail and music above) is easily consumable.  This actually works really well for those people who wish to live in that universe, or "walled garden" in Apple language.

The reason that Apple refuses to support Mac OS (or any of their other operating systems, like iOS) on non-Apple hardware is the premise of their relationship with customers: If you buy something from Apple, you expect a high level of perfection and integration.  With hardware that they don't control, Apple has a much harder time guaranteeing that this level of integration works.  In order to preserve their reputation as a perfectionist high-quality company, they simply refuse to participate in that market.  Apple knows that it is better off (both in terms of customer satisfaction and profit) to play in a smaller market, but play well in it.

Now, that doesn't imply that Apple gear is utterly useless for people who don't want to or can't have all their data in the walled garden.  For example, the Mac on my lap right now has X installed, and I display graphics from programs running on Linux on its screen all the time.  My personal music collection is actually created, organized and stored on a FreeBSD machine (using only CLI tools), and then imported to iTunes manually.  I don't use an Apple phone, and the mail program on my cellphone works fine with my non-Apple ISP and the Apple mail program on my Mac.  I also develop personal software that runs on FreeBSD, using the Mac as a development platform (in both C++ and Python).  While Apple's universe is a "walled garden", it is not a hermetically enclosed prison, and you can get data in and out, although that's not always frictionless.

By the way, I know lots of people who run Windows or Linux on their MacBooks.  It turns out that the MacBook hardware is actually pretty good (not necessarily in having the hottest chips or best specs, but in fit and finish, durability and sensible compromise between weight, size and performance); for its quality and performance, it is actually quite cost-effective (a similar machine from HPs or Lenovo's high-end line is not significantly cheaper, and Microsoft Surface products are actually more expensive).



> ... FreeBSD, which will only win if its community will grow, ...
> ... and still pretends to be a Linux competitor.



Three very nasty comments.

First, is FreeBSD an entity with a single central management, which can have a single goal?  No.  While there is a very coherent organization (foundation with staff and board, development core team, and various technical teams like release engineering) the overall FreeBSD community also has a large set of developers and users, which are not under control of the foundation or core team.  All three entities (core, developers, users) together decide which direction FreeBSD goes in.  I don't see FreeBSD as a whole being willing or able to say "we will do X", for some single value of X (such as in your mindset, better support for GUIs on laptops, such as GPU integration and suspend resume).

Second, you implicitly define FreeBSD's "win" (the goal) as "grow".  It isn't at all clear to me that growing FreeBSD's market share is necessarily a good thing, nor that it is the thing the FreeBSD is aiming for.  Just like Apple, it might be better to serve a smaller set of users and problems, and serve them well.

Third, competing with Linux is not the purpose of life.  If you look at non-commercial operating systems, Linux has won, by a huge margin.  I keep bringing up its 100%  share of the top500 as the starkest example of Linux' domination in certain markets.  The goal of FreeBSD can not be to damage Linux, since that will simply fail.  Not everything in life is a race, where winning or at least coming in second is the only goal.  Often, it is more pleasant and more productive to take a stroll through the meadows and mountains, and sniff the flowers, while the runners in the marathon are going by, seeing nothing but the back of the runner in front of then.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 27, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> Is it actually Linux that supports Raspberry Pi? Or is it third parties?


When you say "Linux" here, what do you mean?  Is there actually an organization that has control of Linux?  I claim there is not.

There is a Linux foundation (headquartered here in Silicon Valley), which has a board and staff, and which has Linus Torvalds as a fellow (they pay his salary).  In times past, Linus' salary has been paid by various employers (Transmeta, the OSDL which was mostly funded by IBM, Intel and HP, in that order).  But Linus himself and the foundation pale in size compared to the large commercial Linux integrators, foremost RedHat and Suse.  And the large Linux users (IBM, Oracle, HP, Intel) all have large staff and huge investments in Linux, probably larger than the RedHat/Suse/... integrators.  There is no single organization that can determine where Linux goes and what it does.

The Raspberry Pi Linux distribution in heaviest use is Raspbian, which is derived from Debian.  One should probably refer to Raspbian as the "official" distribution, since it is pretty much guaranteed to work reasonably well by the people who design the boards.  The adaptation of Debian to the Pi is done by the Raspberry Foundation, which is a non-profit corporation.  I know they have a (small) budget, but I don't know where their revenue comes from, nor whether they pay the developers who put together Raspbian.  Debian in turn is a very small organization; I think the developers who assemble it are unpaid.  I remember reading recently that the only budget Debian has is to pay for their domain name registration and central server, and the budget comes only from voluntary donations, mostly from companies that still sell Debian on CDs.

From this viewpoint, Linux consists entirely of "third parties", which vary in size from behemoths like RedHat and IBM down to near-zero-budget entities like Debian, and everything inbetween.

In general, the Open and Free Software movement is strange, in that it is a bizarre blend of commercialism and the opposite.  If you want to get an object lessen, read about the Wikimedia Foundation, which controls (in a fashion) Wikipedia.  The foundation is an entity with a $50-$100M annual budget, which can pay its executive director more than a quarter million per year salary (I happen to know the recently fired ED).  The foundation is a god-awful mess, which regularly fires executives (see above), pays a few dozen developers for the core functionality of the Mediawiki software, and otherwise wastes millions of dollars of foolishness.  In the meantime, the people who do the real work (the contributors who write and edit the articles for Wikipedia) get exactly nothing other than regular kicks in the behind from the foundation.  All very strange.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 27, 2018)

It is clearly my view of situation, how you can see I write everywhere "IMHO",
if you don't agree with with me, it is Ok, but, please, do not tell me what to do,
and I won't tell you where to go  (joke)
Also, this topic is not Apple related at all, it's about FreeBSD,
*IMO FreeBSD will only win if it will support GPU-s better and its features*,
and if its team will ignore such features, far less new users will start to use FreeBSD,
and as a result, FreeBSD will got much smaller amount of users on server market also,
because anyone will never start to use something that he never saw, never tried to use,
especially if there are some good alternatives, like GNU/Linux (non systemd distros, for example)
unfortunately this is the realities of life (IMO).


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 27, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> When you say "Linux" here, what do you mean?


I was responding to you saying you don't blame FreeBSD for not supporting Raspberry Pi. This makes me question whether you are saying it is Linux, whatever you wish that to represent, supports the Raspberry Pi by supplying code in some fashion. I do not believe that is true. I believe all Raspberry Pi code is supplied by other third parties.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> *IMO FreeBSD will only win if it will support GPU-s better and its features*,


This is an error in your thinking. You think FreeBSD is in some sort of contest to win something. That is not the goal of a technologist. That is the goal of one playing a game. The FreeBSD organization does not exist to play games or compete against other technologies. This whole thread has turned into a game and it bores me. If I want to play such games, I'd be on reddit, and I don't play such games so I'll quit this thread now.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 27, 2018)

No games, just obvious logic. Every piece of software will only win,
ok, not "win", if you don't like this word, 
(it is hard to speak for me with you guys, because english is not my native language)
it will be better for every open source project if it will got more users,
it is the known fact.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 27, 2018)

As I said, I think that the most-commonly-used and nearly official OS for the Raspberry Pi comes from Debian via the Raspberry Pi Foundation, in the form of Raspbian.  Other OSes for the Pi exist (including FreeBSD, which I ran for a few weeks at home), but they seem to be either on a "best effort" basis, or have significant flaws, or both.

And to be 100% clear: I don't blame FreeBSD for their distribution for the Pi not being perfect, or not being completely functional.  It's wonderful that the FreeBSD community tries to support the Pi, but there is still some ways to go.  Getting a system to work flawlessly is a terribly large amount of work, and with a small group of volunteers, it's hard to get to perfection and completeness.  It's very interesting to read the "Mythical Man-Month" (also known as the tar pit book, from the disillusioning illustration on the front cover): Fred Brooks claimed (50 years ago!) that if it takes 1 unit of time to write a program that does a task, it will take 3 units of time to write a system program (which runs on hardware), or 3 units of time to write a program system (a set of cooperating programs that do a task together), and finally 9 units of time to write a system of system programs (what we today call an OS, namely the kernel that runs on bare metal, plus the set of programs that make it useful).  That factor of 9 is hard to overcome for volunteer projects.

My problem is that you use the term "third party", which implies that there is a "first party".  I don't think there is a single entity which can be described by the word "Linux", and the content of Linux is not controlled by any one thing.  Using your term, every copy of Linux that runs on a computer comes from a "third party".


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## ralphbsz (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> No games, just obvious logic. Every piece of software will only win, ok, not "win",
> (it is hard to speak for me with you guys, because english is not my native language)
> if you don't like this word, it will be better for every open source project if it will got many users.


And even that I disagree with as a generalization.  The reason I brought up the Apple example in detail: It may be better to serve fewer users, but serve them better.  The same applies to open and free operating systems such as FreeBSD: It may want to make a deliberate choice to focus on a particular use case, and a particular set of users.  You claim that the what it should seriously focus on is GPUs and suspend/resume.  You are free to have that opinion; it does not seem to be shared widely.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 27, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> You claim that the what it should seriously focus on is GPUs and suspend/resume


No "serious focusing", just fixing, to make it work, thats all,
and then FreeBSD will be really a fully working desktop solution.


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## hukadan (Feb 27, 2018)

I have tried to follow this thread and I have to admit I got lost. But for the ones complaining about the bad support of NVidia GPU, I think you are posting on the wrong forum. I would go here if I were you : https://forums.geforce.com/ (but do not expect too much from them).


ILUXA said:


> it will be better for every open source project if it will got many users.


I am not sure about that. Here is a paragraph extracted from a recent discussion on openbsd-misc that I really liked (and that could be applied to FreeBSD with some modifications) :


> It is most definitely not the goal of OpenBSD to have as many users as possible.  Some goals are to be as simple, functional, and secure as possible.  That's a quite different thing!  The normal goal of marketing is to get as many people as possible to buy or use something, even among those who would actually be happier with or better served by something else.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 27, 2018)

hukadan said:


> I would go here if I were you : https://forums.geforce.com/ (but do not expect too much from them).


It seems that Nvidia is not interesting in FreeBSD,
so may be it is a good idea to adopt open source nvidia drivers — nouveau? 

About "users as much as possible", of course it is not FreeBSD goal,
but it will be only better IMO, if some current Linux users will switch to FreeBSD,
because many new apps will appear in ports tree, and many orphaned ports will be maintained,
for example.


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## drhowarddrfine (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> It seems that Nvidia is not interesting in FreeBSD



Current Nvidia drivers for FreeBSD

FreeBSD DevTalk on Nvidia website

Current Nvidia driver installation guide for FreeBSD on Nvidia web site


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## Snurg (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> About "users as much as possible", of course it is not FreeBSD goal,
> but it will be only better IMO, if some current Linux users will switch to FreeBSD,
> because many new apps will appear in ports tree, and many orphaned ports will be maintained,
> for example.


Actually Nvidia still supports FreeBSD, but they do not support KMS, and this alone would be a reason to port Nouveau.

The ports situation actually has become worse, because of the NoN thing now hundreds of ports have lost their maintainers, who returned their commit bits in protest against the NoN thing.


----------



## Snurg (Feb 27, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> No "serious focusing", just fixing, to make it work, thats all,
> and then FreeBSD will be really a fully working desktop solution.


To fix these issues with vesa.ko is just a few SLOC. Easily done by anyone who has a bit of kernel knowledge.
That this isn't been done (unless the foundation or somebody else pays sponsors) is telltale.

In addition, they are mostly American, and you know the American have some blind spots in their perception.
Notice their non-understanding of energy saving. Look at how their fuel-guzzling cars lost international market share, look how GM went down, for example.
Their energy prices are subventioned, so they pay little for wasting energy.

For my part, I'd prefer to swallow the systemd toad than to stay with FreeBSD, as I do not want to waste more than €1000/year for not turning off my electric heaters computers when not using them.

ILUXA, face it... you'll have to swallow the toad too, if you want a good desktop/laptop system.

*Of course, there might be another solution:
If all FreeBSD loving systemd haters would gather together and put up a bounty to have some kernel-skilled people make S3+S4 suspend (sleep+hibernate) work on FreeBSD (which necessarily includes porting Nouveau to have KMS with Nvidia cards), maybe it would become possible?

I'd start with putting €250 into the bounty pot.*


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 27, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> Current Nvidia drivers for FreeBSD
> 
> FreeBSD DevTalk on Nvidia website
> 
> Current Nvidia driver installation guide for FreeBSD on Nvidia web site


That all is very good, but suspend on Nvidia GPU-s still is not working for quite a lot of time
(for 2 years, as far as I remember, since 10.3-RELEASE).


----------



## Snurg (Feb 28, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> That all is very good, but suspend on Nvidia GPU-s still is not working for quite a lot of time
> (for 2 years, as far as I remember, since 10.3-RELEASE).


Again, the reason for this is that vesa.ko (pulled in by the `newcons` module) uses a BIOS call which is not supported by Nvidia cards.

The developer who did the suspend/resume code (jkim) himself confirmed that the restore-after-suspend problem could be easily fixed by not calling this BIOS function.
It would just need simple checks like this: Is nvidia card installed? Then skip this BIOS state save/restore call!

So, in other words, my impression is FreeBSD core devs have, by not doing so, knowingly *p!ssed into Nvidia's boots*, while promoting usage of Intel and AMD/ATI video instead.

Isn't it a big wonder that Nvidia now with driver 390 has apparently stopped to care about keeping the resume-after-suspend functional?
As the decline of FreeBSD suitability as desktop OS gains momentum, accelerated by the cocdown fallout, I won't be amazed if Nvidia just drops FreeBSD support some day soon.


----------



## gnath (Feb 28, 2018)

Maelstorm said:


> Back in 2012, I offered to start a project to get a working suspend, resume, and full power management capabilities working on FreeBSD


Thumbs up. We will be with you, if core team & foundation have no issues in principal.
IMHO Freebsd as OS & third party maintainers are need to be co-ordinated.



Snurg said:


> Of course, there might be another solution:
> If all FreeBSD loving systemd haters would gather together and put up a bounty to have some kernel-skilled people make S3+S4 suspend (sleep+hibernate) work on FreeBSD (which necessarily includes porting Nouveau to have KMS with Nvidia cards), maybe it would become possible?
> 
> I'd start with putting €250 into the bounty pot.


+1 . Actually thinking for same proposal. But was not sure about takers. Would try to contribute my two cent if foundation create a head/project in this type of third party project.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Feb 28, 2018)

Snurg said:


> ILUXA said:
> 
> 
> > for 2 years, as far as I remember, since 10.3-RELEASE
> ...


Makes sense, because 10.2-RELEASE still used syscons by default, and newcons was introduced in 10.3-RELEASE.


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## ralphbsz (Feb 28, 2018)

Snurg said:


> ...
> In addition, they are mostly American, and you know the American have some blind spots in their perception.
> Notice their non-understanding of energy saving. Look at how their fuel-guzzling cars lost international market share, look how GM went down, for example.
> Their energy prices are subventioned, so they pay little for wasting energy.
> ...


I'm sorry, but that argument is complete nonsense, and your numbers are off by nearly an order of magnitude.

The marginal electricity price we pay here in California (which last I checked was in America, although with Trump in the White House there have been some moves towards seceding and joining Canada or Mexico, which are also in America but at least not in the United States of Trumpolandia) is $0.40 per kWh for our household; it will go up to $0.43 per kWh next month.  The reason it is so high is that our very green system here in California allocates a certain amount of electricity at discounted prices to households (I think about $0.20 per kWh), but that allocation is very low, and is calculated to allow for basic survival: lighting, cooking, heating (with gas, not with electricity).  Most households then end up paying the penalty rate for using electricity for "comfort", such as running computers.  Given that our household uses more electricity than average (we are too far from a public water source, and have to use our own well, pumps and filtration system, which uses quite a bit of power), we are always in that "comfort use" penalty zone.

In comparison, the electrical rates in the EU are on average 0.121 Euro per kWh; Germany is considerably more expensive, at 0.152 Euro (source: Eurostat).  Now, the Euro is a bit higher than the Dollar, so one has to multiply those by about 1.2, but that is still nowhere near the prices we pay.

The claim that energy prices are subventioned in America is laughably wrong.  On the contrary, our energy is highly taxed, with the exception of gasoline and diesel, which is indeed somewhat cheaper than in European countries: we are now typically paying US-$ 3.10 per gallon, which is equivalent to Euro 0.67 per liter.

At German electrical rates, the cost for running a 100W computer for a whole year is Euro 133; at California prices, it is $377, nowhere near the Euro 1000 you claim.  But even that estimate is a bit high, since typical laptops don't use anywhere near 100W sustained; most of them have only ~80W power supplies.  My home server (with 4 disk drives, but a power-efficient processor) uses only 35W (yes, I have measured it, given our cost of electricity we try to manage it carefully).

Now, I'm not saying that suspend/resume is useless because electricity is cheap.  Compared to the purchase price of a computer, either $377 or even $50 or $100 per year is still significant money.  And the real purpose of suspend/resume is for when your laptop is not near an electrical outlet, and you need it to not drain the battery.


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## p3rj (Feb 28, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> Germany is considerably more expensive, at 0.152 Euro (source: Eurostat)


I'm not trying to judge your arguments, just saying these numbers are somewhat off, at least for Germany. If you look at this image from the German Wikipedia which shows how various factors influence the cost, you'll see that the price per kWh in Germany last year was almost 0.30 EUR for private clients. This of course includes various taxes, but is more like what we actually pay.


----------



## ralphbsz (Feb 28, 2018)

I apologize.  I got my information from here, which is up-to-date to 2017:
http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Electricity_price_statistics
Although various taxes and fees on the electrical bill can easily change these rates significantly.


----------



## p3rj (Feb 28, 2018)

No worries. While I don't think our prices are particularly low, they certainly don't stop me from running a Xeon-based home server and currently an i7 workstation 24/7, so it can't be too bad, right? Though with the option of using newer Intel graphics with drm-next-kmod on 11-stable, I might give that a try sometimes in the future to see if it would allow suspend/resume to function on the workstation.


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## shkhln (Mar 2, 2018)

Snurg said:


> I won't be amazed if Nvidia just drops FreeBSD support some day soon.



They did not bother to compile Vulkan support in the FreeBSD driver (specifically, no vk_icdGetInstanceProcAddr in libGL.so.1), so it's already treated as a legacy in a way.


----------



## k.jacker (Mar 3, 2018)

I think we're a nice community here, but honestly some of you focus to much on what FreeBSD's can't do.
Keep in mind that FreeBSD does not cost you a single penny and that hundrets or thousands of people you don't know have contributed their code for free over the last 20 years. We have a full blown OS that, let's be honest, can do almost anything you want it to do. In addition, FreeBSD doesn't want your money or your personal data, it's secure, tidy, unbloated, customizable, hackable and fun. What other OS can offer that besides other BSDs and none of those is perfect either....

There are always more that one way to look at things related to FreeBSD, so your view is most likeley not the only possible point of view. One could think, that using standards is easy and efficient and reinventing the wheel and ignoring standards on purpose is bad practice. Another person prefers progress and thinks new features are so important that it's ok to support less polite business practices.
Personally I don't like supporting the "bad" guys and avoid doing so if it's doable somehow.
That's the reason why I only use FreeBSD and would never spend a single coin on a Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Google or Volkswagen products. I don't like their politics, attitude or whatever you want to call it. I can accept shortcomings and discomfort that come with that decision.

My somewhat "rare ability" to accept that not everything is going the way I want and knowing I'm not entitled to demand from others to create a world around me how I want it to be, helps to accept the flaws of FreeBSD.
What FreeBSD represents for me is the best I can imagine and comes closest to what my ideas of a worthy project is.

Having grown up very poor as a kid, I know how it feels to be hungry and cold in winter times when there was no money for food or clothes. I lived in an abondend car for years as a teenager and didn't get on my feet before I was allmost 30 years old.
I have been taught that life can, and will be hard sometimes and things just go some way anyway. Not neccessarily the way one would feel comfortable with. It helps to accept that fact.
I don't claim everybody should experience the same as me and many people in the world had or have it much much worth then I did. This, though, is beeing more and more overlooked in our western world where life has become so easy to be honest. Most of us haven't any real problem so we create them out of nothing. We simply don't struggle enough to see that life, in reality has it's ups and downs. It's normal and nobody is entitled to demand from others to be wrapped in satin and protected from all discomfort that could possibly arise. This includes lack of functionality in a free OS.

I'm sorry for taking  a big swing here, but ask your grand grandparents or even young people that have been through a war or two. Those people have suffered way beyond the imagination of most of us, but suffering is part of reality, even today. Lack of comfort and functionality is, too. Just take a short brake sometimes and think about what you actually have - and not what you want. I think it's not fair to demand from others, they should finally give FreeBSD the functionality YOU want. Not you, not me or anybody of us is so special that it/she/he can claim such things.

This is not meant to match anyone in person here, just a little wakeup call to everyone who feels ok with a wakeup call. Feel free to ignore my post if you think I'm an idiot


----------



## Nolli9 (Mar 3, 2018)

I am just getting to learn FreeBSD coming from Apple and a fan of Apple since 1989. I have the desktop version KDE on VirtualBox and the command line version on an Hp tower. My interesting in FreeBSD is really because it's the foundation of MacOS; however, the command line has a steep learning curve and often hurts my head. Here is my desktop:


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## rigoletto@ (Mar 3, 2018)

The problem of "desktop" subject is what is a Desktop? There is no understanding of what is a desktop OS is, or what it should have. There is no formula.

When people say desktop, I think about the average Joe computer user, who want to do just what everyone does. So Apple-Windows and at some extend (usually with support from someone) some Linux distros are the way to go.

FreeBSD users (and also most of the Linux ones) are not the average Joe computer user, and I think when most people here talk about desktop the concepts are more towards to workstation than desktop - ever if it is not actually used to ---> work.

I run my "desktop" (or should I call it workstation?) 24/7, I do not need or care about resume/suspend/hibernation. However, I can understand the value of those features for some people.

Currently I do not have a laptop anymore but ever when I used to have I never used resume/suspend/hibernation features (Linux on that time). I just used to turn it ON, do what was/were needed to be done and when finished switch OFF and move on. While in house I just kept it ON 24/7 as I do with my desktop.

In this meaning there are some very few features I hard miss on FreeBSD, what are not really related only with non-server usage: the lack of inotiy/fsevents equivalent; and an advanced ports searcher (ports-mgmt/psearch work well but it is not ever close of what the Gentoo EIX can do).

*IMHO*, the best move FreeBSD could actually do in the Desktop domain would be to create two WMs (one tilling and other not) and the basic utilities (like bar, file manager, compositor) totally integrated with the system (see the Lumina-fm with integrated ZFS snapshot history support - I think the idea came from Solaris), and simply drop everything else: Gnome, KDE, XFCE, Openbox etc.

Wants KDE (or anything)? Port it and maintain, and if become poor maintained --> drop.

See the Gnome situation, it is poorly maintained and the situation cannot be really improved (due to Gnome) but get worse, and will be even worse when Gtk4 come out.

Why not drop it already instead of wait for the last second when it will really not be possible to be kept? The amount of work to maintain something (including handling bug reports) everyone knows will not work anymore sooner or later?

Cheers! 

EDIT: SirDice  I posted it in the wrong topic. Would you mind to move it to Thread 57329?

Thanks!


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## Snurg (Mar 3, 2018)

k.jacker said:


> Personally I don't like supporting the "bad" guys and avoid doing so if it's doable somehow.
> (...) I don't like their politics, attitude or whatever you want to call it. I can accept shortcomings and discomfort that come with that decision.


The reason why I am whining so much about suspend/resume things is that _I was used_ to have these.

When I found out FreeBSD got suspend/resume, I went back to it from Linux.
I was even accepting that I would have only sleep, but no hibernate.
But even sleep is now broken... *whine*

(Linux 4.9 accidentally broke hibernate, look how quickly this was fixed... And when I see in contrast the attitude of the responsible FreeBSD devs about _not_ fixing their things that broke sleep... this does not make one happy...)


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## knightjp (Mar 3, 2018)

I am gonna try installing FreeBSD again. Will report my progress soon. 
I would say that in comparison with Linux, I prefer FreeBSD, this is for technical reason. However it seems the Linux guys are laughing at you guys for the 'banning of virtual hugs'.


----------



## kpedersen (Mar 3, 2018)

k.jacker said:


> My somewhat "rare ability" to accept that not everything is going the way I want and knowing I'm not entitled to demand from others to create a world around me how I want it to be, helps to accept the flaws of FreeBSD.



I agree with your post. Especially regarding your views on free operating systems such as FreeBSD. However, I believe as "customers" for companies such as Intel and Microsoft we should actually learn to demand more. It isn't our fault that they have placed themselves as the "standard in computing". If they cannot take our demands, then they need to move over and let a more useful company take their place.

For example, I believe we should all demand a spyware free processor from Intel. We should also demand a spyware free desktop OS from Microsoft (which has made sure Windows is the standard).

But yes, because we are not "customers" of FreeBSD, I can't see how anyone justifies demanding stuff. Especially something as low priority as "desktop experience".


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## k.jacker (Mar 3, 2018)

kpedersen said:


> However, I believe as "customers" for companies such as Intel and Microsoft we should actually learn to demand more.


Absolutely true, I agree with everthing you say. Most big companies get paid well for their products, but the quality does not allways match the price paid.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 3, 2018)

I just bought a Thinkpad T400 for $55, and a battery for it since it didn't come with one, for a total of $67.70 delivered. And not a shiny key or spot on the spacebar.

Intel Core2 Duo T8600 @ 2.40GHz, 4GB RAM (upgradable to 8GB), 160GB HDD (that will be replaced), and 14.1" screen.  I'm not sure if it has Intel or Intel/ATI integrated graphics but it will work.

This makes my 6th Thinkpad (first T400), 8th laptop and I know with 100% certainty it will run FreeBSD or OpenBSD, though it might run Solaris. I use my laptops as desktops and leave them plugged in when in use, so suspend/resume/ hibernate are a non-issue for me. I always used to disable hibernate on Windows anyway.

I don't have a problem at all using FreeBSD as a desktop OS and prefer it over all others.


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## kpedersen (Mar 3, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> This makes my 6th Thinkpad (first T400), 8th laptop and I know with 100% certainty it will run FreeBSD or OpenBSD, though it might run Solaris.


Haha, same. We should stockpile these things whilst we can. Afterall, 10 Years from now, we will only be able to obtain "regulated" locked down and tracked consumer tablets.*

Though in the future, all "open" computer hardware will be classed as illegal contraband and we will have to smuggle them between ourselves to get any (meaningful) work done .*

* I don't know this for a fact. But I certainly imagine Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook, Intel, NSA and all other big and "cloud" corporations will love this prospect. And unfortunately they are the ones that get to make the decisions these days.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 3, 2018)

I hadn't planned on buying another and thought 7 was plenty, but how could I afford Not to buy it? $55 plus a $12 battery? Who knows when one of these will go to heaven and I love getting a good deal on something.

My sisters hubby dropped can of freholes or something on the plamrest of my Gateway and borked the HDD. He was going to throw it away till my sister said I might like ito have it. It's my OpenIndiana box now, I told him but he doesn't care. Wouldn't have happened on a Thinkpad. 

Yes, you're right. Someday it will probably all be regulated. In USA TV already watch you.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 4, 2018)

My FreeBSD install went really well. But predictably.. I returned to MacOS as soon as my computer could get it running. I like Fluxbox. It had pretty much the look that I was going for. But I think that I need a good list of apps that I need to install to get Fluxbox up to the level of the standard DEs like Mate or Gnome. 

Apart from Fluxbox, I need a Login Manager and settled on xdm. I like it. 
What do I use as a file manager? 
What is the best email client? ( I need something that can handle Exchange server)
How does it handle notifications? 
I need a app launcher like D-menu or MacOS' Spotlight. 

Is there a chance of getting Compiz working on Fluxbox?


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## xchris (Mar 4, 2018)

knightjp said:


> What do I use as a file manager?



my favorites are caja, rox filer, xfe, mc I like caja because the installation does not bring a lot of deps, has optlion like "open terminal here", extensions and a descent find files feature
xfe is nice, but does not follow the system (gtk or qt) theming, has its own, I install "mc"  (midnight commander) by default to any lx/ux installation, just is a "must" utility


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## Crivens (Mar 4, 2018)

For  mail, look at "claws".


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## rigoletto@ (Mar 4, 2018)

File Manager: x11-fm/pcmanfm or x11-fm/pcmanfm-qt
Notifications: sysutils/dunst
App Launcher: x11/rofi

There are several years I do not use Compiz but should work fine. An alternative is x11-wm/compton.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Mar 4, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I returned to MacOS as soon as my computer could get it running.


So this thread has ended.


----------



## topcat (Mar 4, 2018)

Despite the binary blob, I vastly prefer nvidia to ati (and intel). I sure hope that nvidia support isn't dropped, because then I'll have to switch all my FreeBSD machines to Linux (one reason I no longer run OpenBSD). A very disturbing thought!

Linux really has gotten this suspend/hibernate thing down! I use it on my laptop and it works more reliably than windows!

Hope I'm not necrobumping


----------



## shkhln (Mar 4, 2018)

Amdgpu actually seems to be quite decent. As for the Nvidia's blob, at least for gaming, without Vulkan it would be pretty much useless in a couple of years.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 5, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> So this thread has ended.


I returned because for one reason. I could not find a single easy to understand article on Fluxbox and setting up a working DE using it. 
I had fluxbox up and running just fine. Everything was going well. But all I had were the base setup. Nothing more. I installed FireFox, but I just could not launch it. I installed a bunch of other apps like LibreOffice and just could not launch them either. I was wondering where I would go to do it.


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 5, 2018)

Some Fluxbox info.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 5, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I returned because for one reason. I could not find a single easy to understand article on Fluxbox and setting up a working DE using it.
> I had fluxbox up and running just fine. Everything was going well. But all I had were the base setup. Nothing more. I installed FireFox, but I just could not launch it. I installed a bunch of other apps like LibreOffice and just could not launch them either. I was wondering where I would go to do it.



knightjp, programs you install need to be added to the /usr/home/username/.fluxbox/menu manually in plain text with a text editor.

The period before fluxbox indicates it is a hidden directory that you need to make visible through your file manager. From there it is as simple as adding them with a text editor. There are already default programs listed you can use as an example of how to do so.

Had you asked I would have been more than happy to tell you how.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Mar 5, 2018)

Trihexagonal Are you sure that needs to be manually created? I've never had to do that with any WM before.

knightjp Well, you said you left so I'm just going by what you said. That you are having so many problems starting up every day programs most of us use every day ... I don't know what to tell you.


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 5, 2018)

IIRC, Fluxbox and Openbox have some cli tool to create/update the menus. At least for Openbox some extra tool can be installed to make it automatically.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 5, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> Trihexagonal Are you sure that needs to be manually created? I've never had to do that with any WM before.



Yes, drhowarddrfine, I am absolutely positive.

I always build all my programs before booting to the desktop and invoke editors/leafpad from the commandline to do it, as it is not included with the default programs.

balanga asked much the same question not too long ago.

There is an menu icon generator of some sort but I've never used it as I like a plain menu.


----------



## CraigHB (Mar 5, 2018)

The fvwm window manager is the same way.  Everything has to be done from within a text file.  I don't have any problem with it since the manager is highly flexible and can be customized in just about any way.  It's kind of the Unix way to configure things using text files so it shouldn't be a point of contention.  Though in the case of fvwm it does take a little reading to understand how the configuration file works.  I did try Fluxbox, but didn't see any big advantage there so I went back to fvwm.  Fluxbox offers some point and click configuration, but it's not as flexible and there's still some text editing involved.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 5, 2018)

lebarondemerde said:


> IIRC, Fluxbox and Openbox have some cli tool to create/update the menus. At least for Openbox some extra tool can be installed to make it automatically.


Perhaps the same tool will work for fluxbox.


----------



## Maxnix (Mar 5, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Perhaps the same tool will work for fluxbox.


Probably, not. Openbox's menu is written in XML, Fluxbox's one no. Unless that tool is explicitly written for both.


----------



## scottro (Mar 5, 2018)

I have an ancient page on fluxbox that decribes some basic key shortcuts. It involves creating a text file.  If that's a deal-breaker, then don't bother but othewise http://srobb.net/fluxbox.html 

Haven't even looked at that article in years, but much of it should still be valid, including setting up keyboard shortcuts to launch programs.


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## knightjp (Mar 5, 2018)

what is the tool that helps Openbox setup the menus automatically?


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 5, 2018)

There are some info in HERE. I do not use Openbox nor Fluxbox. For Fluxbox, in HERE. 

EDIT: it seems you can use deskutils/menumaker for several environments. Anyway, had you tried x11/rofi?


----------



## gnath (Mar 6, 2018)

Snurg said:


> When I found out FreeBSD got suspend/resume, I went back to it from Linux


After installing `xf86-video-intel` & `xf86-video-ati` for laptop & ati GPU for box, suspend is working like a charm.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 6, 2018)

lebarondemerde said:


> For Fluxbox, in HERE.



I renamed my x11-wm/fluxbox menu and ran the command referenced in the relevant link to generate a new menu:


```
$ fluxbox-generate_menu
/usr/local/bin/fluxbox-generate_menu: convert: not found
Menu successfully generated: /home/jitte/.fluxbox/menu
Use fluxbox-generate_menu -h to read about all the latest features.
$
```

It did generate a menu of sorts, but did not include all the programs I have installed, editors/leafpad for instance, and listed quite a few I didn't have installed.

So a menu can be generated automagically, of how much use it is somewhat in question. I have a standard menu that cuts out all the submenus I keep for use since I always install the same programs.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 6, 2018)

lebarondemerde said:


> There are some info in HERE. I do not use Openbox nor Fluxbox. For Fluxbox, in HERE.
> 
> EDIT: it seems you can use deskutils/menumaker for several environments. Anyway, had you tried x11/rofi?


What DE do you use?


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 6, 2018)

None. I do use x11-wm/bspwm + x11/polybar.


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## Snurg (Mar 6, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> It did generate a menu of sorts, but did not include all the programs I have installed, editors/leafpad for instance, and listed quite a few I didn't have installed.


Reason might be a weak point of FreeBSD as desktop OS: many packages do not install the .desktop files in /usr/local/share/applications, so they do not appear in WM/DM menus.


----------



## ronaldlees (Mar 6, 2018)

kpedersen said:


> Haha, same. We should stockpile these things whilst we can. Afterall, 10 Years from now, we will only be able to obtain "regulated" locked down and tracked consumer tablets.*
> 
> Though in the future, all "open" computer hardware will be classed as illegal contraband and we will have to smuggle them between ourselves to get any (meaningful) work done .*
> 
> * I don't know this for a fact. But I certainly imagine Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook, Intel, NSA and all other big and "cloud" corporations will love this prospect. And unfortunately they are the ones that get to make the decisions these days.



We'll all be running RISC-V, but even for that we'll need to apply for special dispensation to use it for "educational purposes". Of course many things can be educational.  It'll be illegal to use these boxes for posting to the internet, so we'll all have to become pen pals again.   Good news for the post office.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 8, 2018)

Snurg said:


> Reason might be a weak point of FreeBSD as desktop OS: many packages do not install the .desktop files in /usr/local/share/applications, so they do not appear in WM/DM menus.



There's still going to be some text editing done either way you do it, and in this instance I'd still have to call editors/leafpad from the terminal since it's not included in either menu.

I don't see that as a problem though. It's just one of many files that need to be edited when I boot to the desktop the first time and SOP. If that alone keeps someone from using x11-wm/fluxbox as a WM I respectfully can't help but question their dedication to using FreeBSD as a desktop OS. Red Pill/Blue Pill.



Snurg said:


> For my part, I'd prefer to swallow the systemd toad than to stay with FreeBSD..*.*



I'll have a double order of frog legs and a side order of Solaris and OpenBSD, please.


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## Snurg (Mar 8, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> There's still going to be some text editing done either way you do it, and in this instance I'd still have to call editors/leafpad from the terminal since it's not included in either menu.
> 
> I don't see that as a problem though. It's just one of many files that need to be edited when I boot to the desktop the first time and SOP. If that alone keeps someone from using x11-wm/fluxbox as a WM I respectfully can't help but question their dedication to using FreeBSD as a desktop OS. Red Pill/Blue Pill.


I don't like fluxbox because it looks and feels so much like Windows. 

Using the same FVWM config with 3 desktops 16 screens each for years now...
New computer, copy ~/.fvwm,  "desktop configuration" done...
With FreeBSD I find myself calling many programs from the terminal, without actual need.
If the .desktop files were complete, I'd get a full bouquet of applications to open files with.
For example:





files menu->recently opened files by extension->.pl->browse directory meow->file meow.pl->OpenWith...

(I recently deleted file history, so it is small window)
If the .desktop files were complete, I'd see much more apps, like gedit, leafpad, sublime, ... [Edit, corrected, see my next post]
You see why I would love if the .desktop files were there like they are with Linux?

I am even so lazy that my script even remembers which application I opened a file with last time...
You see, being so insane to write 3000 lines Perl to get acceptable menus for FVWM, I think I am beyond Windows or Fluxbox medication


----------



## BSDAppentic3 (Mar 8, 2018)

herrbischoff said:


> Nice, that looks promising. If I ever get a working system together, I’m going to write a how-to myself, from start to finish. Funny how WM’s or developers assume the user is not going to do simple things like accessing network shares. In a company of any size, people would be unable to work if this did not work.
> 
> FreeBSD is rather exceptional as a server platform, as a desktop it’s “meh”.



So, do you know how to mount a server here?


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 8, 2018)

Snurg said:


> I don't like fluxbox because it looks and feels so much like Windows.
> *snip*
> Using the same FVWM config with 3 desktops 16 screens each for years now...



LOL you lost me there, Snurg. Could you please point out one of my screenshots that looks anything remotely like a Windows desktop? I fail to see any comparison in look or feel.

Icons remind me of Windows, and personally, I cut out all the 2nd level and beyond sub-menus from my menu. It looks neater to me that way.

I have heard at least 2 people comment they didn't care for my style of desktop, but can't remember anyone ever saying they liked the configuration of terminals, file manager, etc. I keep. Some of my wallpaper are just to show I have made a new one available and I'm using the daemons in my head bg now.

I had a Gateway Solo 1450 with 1.2GHz Celeron and 250MB RAM for my first FreeBSD 7 install so I went with x11-wm/fluxbox and stuck with it. It does everything I want it to and I have things set up just the way I like it. My OpenBSD boxen look just the same.


----------



## tobik@ (Mar 8, 2018)

Snurg said:


> (I recently deleted file history, so it is small window)
> If the .desktop files were complete, I'd see much more apps, like gedit, leafpad, atom, ...
> You see why I would love if the .desktop files were there like they are with Linux?


So editors/leafpad actually installs a desktop file, as does editors/gedit. After installation they appear automatically in Xfce's app menu without me doing anything. You should be way more concrete here. Which applications do not install one or only install incomplete ones? Then start filing bugs. Just repeating the same thing over and over again here will change nothing.


----------



## Snurg (Mar 8, 2018)

tobik@
You are right, I forgot I deleted gnome and xfce for some reason. So the .desktop files are gone.
However, for example, sublime has no .desktop file.
But it is sublime2, as sublime3 does not work (nothing shows up). (Edit: PR done now)

So I have to say, the situation apparently has improved.
A few years ago even some KDE apps like K3b had no desktop file iirc.

Anyway, I am still working on a releasable version of the microcode updater.
(After that I'll swallow the systemd toad to hibernate on desktop. I hope it doesn't get stuck in my throat  )

Trihexagonal
Well, if you cut the second level menus, could this be why leafpad is gone?


----------



## Snurg (Mar 8, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> LOL you lost me there, Snurg. Could you please point out one of my screenshots that looks anything remotely like a Windows desktop? I fail to see any comparison in look or feel.






It is these crosses which make me feel uneasy 
If I mis-click, it makes a loud BANG and that shocks me 


Trihexagonal said:


> Icons remind me of Windows, and personally, I cut out all the 2nd level and beyond sub-menus from my menu. It looks neater to me that way.





I don't like nesting too.
Solved this by having the most recent started apps in the first level. The second level you see offers the most recently opened files for that app in addition of starting the app only.
This way the menu adapts to my workflow.


tobik@ said:


> So editors/leafpad actually installs a desktop file, as does editors/gedit. After installation they appear automatically in Xfce's app menu without me doing anything. You should be way more concrete here. Which applications do not install one or only install incomplete ones? Then start filing bugs. Just repeating the same thing over and over again here will change nothing.


 My bad.
I removed Gnome and XFCE because after I installed both a login manager appeared and that freaked me out.
And* big kudos to you* how fast you fixed the sublime PR!
*FreeBSD does imho very well as desktop OS.*
It's just that suspend stopped working with Nvidia on the desktops. And the laptop's battery bleeds empty if I sleep it and forget to plug it into mains.
This is the reason why I am going to eat toad, as I do not like apples.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 8, 2018)

Snurg said:


> Trihexagonal
> Well, if you cut the second level menus, could this be why leafpad is gone?



Snurg, if it was ever present on the default menu from the time I first booted to the desktop there wouldn't be a need to summon it from the terminal. I cut the sub-menus from my custom menu.

This is the menu I had it generate the other night. I posted my custom menu in the link I provided to the last time the menu question was asked.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Mar 9, 2018)

lebarondemerde said:


> *IMHO*, the best move FreeBSD could actually do in the Desktop domain would be to create two WMs (one tilling and other not) and the basic utilities (like bar, file manager, compositor) totally integrated with the system (see the Lumina-fm with integrated ZFS snapshot history support - I think the idea came from Solaris), and simply drop everything else: Gnome, KDE, XFCE, Openbox etc.
> 
> Wants KDE (or anything)? Port it and maintain, and if become poor maintained --> drop.


TOTAL madness, IMHO. lumina is crap, or, if you want — "shit". It is very good that FreeBSD comes without GUI. You're able to install it easily.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Mar 9, 2018)

But, as said before, it is good that such OS-es like Шindow$ and Macos®© are exist,
more than 90% of people are idiots IMHO, they need it, they are easily manipulated by everything,
like TV, ads, radio, etc, they need something stupid to make it work.


----------



## BSDAppentic3 (Mar 9, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> But, as said before, it is good that such OS-es like Шindow$ and Macos®© are exist,
> more than 90% of people are idiots IMHO, they need it, they are easily manipulated by everything,
> like TV, ads, radio, etc, they need something stupid to make it work.


Lol wtf?


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Mar 9, 2018)

BSDAppentic3 said:


> Lol wtf?


Wtf, lol?


----------



## BSDAppentic3 (Mar 9, 2018)

Excuse me if I get into other people's talk, but i want to say something: why use a specific type of system makes you more fool or more intelligent? What does it have to do the OS with the user?
I came from using Windows, and Linux. That makes me an idiot, or i can't understand your *strange* kind of sarcasm?


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Mar 9, 2018)

BSDAppentic3 said:


> i can't understand your *strange* kind of sarcasm?



All, that I write — is jokes.


----------



## BSDAppentic3 (Mar 9, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> All, that I write — is jokes.


All right. When i saw it, i thought, "this is obviously a joke".
Thanks for the clarification.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Mar 9, 2018)

BSDAppentic3 said:


> All right. When i saw it, i thought, "this is obviously a joke".
> Thanks for the clarification.



BTW, how it is BETTER to say
1. All, that I write — is jokes.
or
2. All, that I write — are jokes.
I got problems with english, I don't understand this kind of language very well.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 9, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> BTW, how it is BETTER to say
> 1. All, that I write — is jokes.
> or
> 2. All, that I write — are jokes.
> I got problems with english, I don't understand this kind of language very well.



Everything that I write is a joke.

All that I write can be considered a joke

Jokes are all I write.


----------



## BSDAppentic3 (Mar 9, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> BTW, how it is BETTER to say
> 1. All, that I write — is jokes.
> or
> 2. All, that I write — are jokes.
> I got problems with english, I don't understand this kind of language very well.


Really? Aren't you speaking English now? Then you don't have so problems.
Don't worry. Just try to make an effort, use google translator if you want, and read some books of this language. At the end, this is like mathematics, or even like informatics: it is a language.


----------



## BSDAppentic3 (Mar 9, 2018)

ILUXA 

Or, I see it like that.

Edit: what i mean when i told that you're speaking this language, it is because for understand some kind of language (whatever it is) you need to think of that way.

Do you understand informatics languages? Then you must have the kind of logic implicit in the understanding of mathematics and/or informatics.

I'm not so good in that aspect. But remember that i said: it is a language, and i'm no bad in languages, even in Spanish. And recently, I'm bettering in mathematics (god, finally i can).

So, my conclusion, it's that if you want to be better speaking in English, you have already do the first step: you're actually speaking it. The second you need to do it's deepen on it. But before that, you can be slow and go at your own rythm. Because (i think it) that really there's no person idiot, everyone has its own rythm for understand something. Some people catch it almost in the moment, others can take even years. But if you put hands on it, someday you'll success on understand it.

So, don't worry. Take the time you need to.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Mar 9, 2018)

BSDAppentic3 said:


> there's no person idiot, everyone has its own rythm for understand something


Too many persons have very slow "rhythm", some haven't no rhythm at all.


----------



## BSDAppentic3 (Mar 9, 2018)

ILUXA said:


> Too many persons have very slow "rhythm", some haven't no rhythm at all.



You see what i mean?
You're not so wrong.


----------



## krisb (Mar 9, 2018)

ralphbsz said:


> I apologize.  I got my information from here, which is up-to-date to 2017:
> http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Electricity_price_statistics
> Although various taxes and fees on the electrical bill can easily change these rates significantly.



I checked these figures for my country (PL) and they are quite accurate. Of course there is no single price plan that gives this amount (for instance I have cheaper energy at weekends, nights and national bank holidays, and more expensive than that in remaining periods, but on average it is gives something like those give in the table)
And in the article, taxes are included for households, they stated


> Note that prices presented in this article include taxes, levies and VAT for household consumers, but exclude refundable taxes and levies and VAT for non-household consumers.


----------



## krisb (Mar 9, 2018)

knightjp said:


> My FreeBSD install went really well. But predictably.. I returned to MacOS as soon as my computer could get it running. I like Fluxbox. It had pretty much the look that I was going for. But I think that I need a good list of apps that I need to install to get Fluxbox up to the level of the standard DEs like Mate or Gnome.
> 
> Apart from Fluxbox, I need a Login Manager and settled on xdm. I like it.
> What do I use as a file manager?
> ...


Don't go back to MacOS.... it's not worth doing so? 

I have (mostly) completed transition from XFCE to Fluxbox.
- For login manager I use slim `x11/slim` - far less dependencies and switching between Fluxbox and XFCE (or others) is just a key stoke
- For file manager I use DoubleCommander `x11-fm/doublecmd`. It is two plane file manager so might not be natural if you come from MacOS but it is also very configurable so probably you can make it appear the way you like
- email - I use Thunderbird, I think it has some add-on for MS Exchange but I have not tested that
- How does it handle notifications - if you think of Bubble Messages coming from System Tray area then not well... At least I could not trigger such notification from Tray
- Application lanucher: you may want to add to to your 
	
	



```
~/.fluxbox/keys
```


```
# F12 runs a command
None F12 :exec fbrun
```
or have Root menu pop-up and then you can just start typing and fluxbox will highlight those mathing
In my case I have (Left-Win + Right_Menu) key binding, also in keys file

```
Mod4 117 :RootMenu
```
 so that you can have RootMenu wherever you are without going to Desktop, like below while editing this post


----------



## tankist02 (Mar 9, 2018)

How's fonts rendering under FluxBox? Some people don't care that the fonts are ugly and hard on the eyes, but I'm not one of them.


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 10, 2018)

Thread 61501


----------



## knightjp (Mar 20, 2018)

Tried a FreeBSD installation yesterday. I could not get it to work beyond the installation of xorg. 
I tried it about 4 times.
Then on the 5th attempt, I took ti slow and methodically, but I could not get it to work. I decided that I wanted OpenBox as the environment, but the moment that I created the ~/.xinitrc file with "exec openbox-session" and it just does not work. I just get a black screen which shows a mouse, but even the mouse does not move or anything...
I know I did everything.. followed all the steps in the following links. 
http://blog.ataboydesign.com/2013/12/28/freebsd-10-rc4-installation-and-configuration-for-openbox/

My system has a nvidia GTX1050 as well. Maybe that was the issue. Everything worked when I was trying to install fluxbox. I am just not certain what I am doing wrong for Openbox.


----------



## krisb (Mar 20, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Tried a FreeBSD installation yesterday. I could not get it to work beyond the installation of xorg.
> I tried it about 4 times.
> Then on the 5th attempt, I took ti slow and methodically, but I could not get it to work. I decided that I wanted OpenBox as the environment, but the moment that I created the ~/.xinitrc file with "exec openbox-session" and it just does not work. I just get a black screen which shows a mouse, but even the mouse does not move or anything...
> I know I did everything.. followed all the steps in the following links.
> ...


What happens when you just start X? (remove openbox from .xinitrc) and do 
	
	



```
startx
```
 from the console. It should start X with xclock and terminal emulator windows. Then you know that X is installed correctly and works.
And try to avoid generating xorg.conf, I found it not necessary and sometimes even a bad idea. 
The instruction you refer to suggests installing a lot of additional components. Do one at a time, check it works, do the next.
Consult chapter 5 in Handbook


----------



## knightjp (Mar 20, 2018)

After I install Xorg, I am able to "startx" and I see the 3 Xterm windows and the clock.. I use that to install OpenBox after edit the "rc.conf" file. I install the nvidia-drivers and after installing nvidia-xconfig I run it and generate the xorg.conf file. After that I create the "~/.xinitrc" file. Then I reboot and then try "startx" again.
That is when I'm stuck as it seems like the whole system freezes into a black screen with the mouse pointer. Try moving the pointer and nothing happens. It is frozen.

The last attempt was to do everything except install the nvidia-drivers and still the same result.


----------



## MarcoB (Mar 20, 2018)

Did you put `nvidia_load="YES"` and `nvidia-modeset="YES"` in /boot/loader.conf?


----------



## shkhln (Mar 20, 2018)

knightjp said:


> That is when I'm stuck as it seems like the whole system freezes into a black screen with the mouse pointer. Try moving the pointer and nothing happens. It is frozen.



390.25? Try switching to the non-X terminal (ctrl+alt+f1) and back (alt+f9).


----------



## knightjp (Mar 20, 2018)

MarcoB said:


> Did you put `nvidia_load="YES"` and `nvidia-modeset="YES"` in /boot/loader.conf?


I did put `nvidia_load="YES"` in the file, but not the other one. You think that was my issue? I never had to put that in before for fluxbox.


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 20, 2018)

knightjp said:


> n it and generate the xorg.conf file.



Why? A xorg.conf file should no be necessary anymore.

Remove that file and create a new one in xorg.conf.d with this content (you can call the file 20-nvidia.conf or something like that):

```
Section "Device"
   Identifier     "nVidia Card"
   Driver         "nvidia"
   VendorName     "nVidia Corporation"
   BoardName     "GeForce GT 1050"
EndSection
```


----------



## achix (Mar 21, 2018)

nvidia-xconfig should take care of that.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 21, 2018)

achix said:


> nvidia-xconfig should take care of that.


I already did that. After that it is the same result. This has me baffled. I can't understand it. The instructions are clear and I followed them explicitly.


----------



## MarcoB (Mar 21, 2018)

lebarondemerde said:


> Why? A xorg.conf file should no be necessary anymore.


The propietary Nvidia driver needs it and should be created by nvidia-xconfig.


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 21, 2018)

MarcoB  I use a nvidia card and I do not have a xorg.conf, just the one setting the driver to be used.


----------



## MarcoB (Mar 21, 2018)

Strange, I also have a Nvidia card (Quadro 600) but that doesn't work without an xorg.conf.


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 21, 2018)

Mine is a GT 630. I just need to have the "Device" section in xorg.conf.d and this `nvidia-modeset_load="YES"` on /boot/loader.conf to have it running. However, I also add `hw.vga.textmode="1"` to /boot/loader.conf otherwise I can't switch from X to console.

There may have just a few parameters you actually need to have the card working instead of a entire xonf.conf file.


----------



## MarcoB (Mar 21, 2018)

Ok but I don't have a xorg.conf.d file. So it doesn't matter much I guess.
I also have the textmode set in loader.conf. This is because of a bug in the driver.


----------



## rigoletto@ (Mar 21, 2018)

xorg.conf.d is a directory [/usr/local/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d] what can just be created.


----------



## MarcoB (Mar 21, 2018)

Sorry, said it wrong. I do have the directory of course, but no file in it.


----------



## scottro (Mar 21, 2018)

In the old days, xorg.conf, usually a pretty long file, was put into /etc/X11.  Nowadays, (VERY generally speaking) that xorg.conf usually isn't necessary (though with NVidia, on both Linux and FreeBSD, I use it.  But, on say, a laptop with a supported Intel card, (meaning a fairly old laptop by now, unless you use CURRENT), there won't be the /etc/X11/xorg.conf
file.

Still, you might want to add a little part of a xorg.conf file to, say, support a synaptics touchpad. In such a case, you can now use /usr/local/etc/xorg.conf.d and create say, a file with a name like 50-synaptics.conf.  (The most important part is the .conf at the end.)  That will be a really short file with something like

```
Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier      "Mouse0"
    Driver          "mouse"
    Option          "Protocol"      "auto"
    Option          "Device"        "/dev/sysmouse"
    Option          "ZAxisMapping"  "4 5 6 7"
EndSection
```

TL;DR
Sometimes you just need a few lines from a standard xorg.conf file in which case, you can use /usr/local/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/<number>something.conf


----------



## knightjp (Mar 22, 2018)

OK... I think I found the issue. its nvidia-xconfig..

After the initial install I did the following in the same order.

```
pkg install nano sudo xorg
```


```
nano /etc/rc.conf
insert 
hald_enable="YES"
dbus_enable="YES"
linux_enable="YES"
```
then reboot

```
pkg install nvidia-driver nvidia-settings
nano /boot/loader.conf
insert--
nvidia_load="YES"
```
Reboot

```
startx (to check everything works)
pkg install openbox menumaker
nano ~/.xinitrc
add 
exec openbox-session
```
Reboot

```
startx (to check if everything is working well)
```
Everything was working with the exception of my second monitor. 
So I thought that nvidia-xconfig would be the issue and I never created any xorg.conf file.. 
With that, I installed nvidia-xconfig and after the reboot, I ran it and then "startx"..
I got a error and xorg failed to start. 
I then did a reboot and it was the same result. 

Any ideas?


----------



## MarcoB (Mar 22, 2018)

Did you place the /.root/xorg.conf.new file, that nvidia-xconfig created, in /etc/x11?


----------



## achix (Mar 22, 2018)

lebarondemerde said:


> Mine is a GT 630. I just need to have the "Device" section in xorg.conf.d and this `nvidia-modeset_load="YES"` on /boot/loader.conf to have it running. However, I also add `hw.vga.textmode="1"` to /boot/loader.conf otherwise I can't switch from X to console.
> 
> There may have just a few parameters you actually need to have the card working instead of a entire xonf.conf file.



thanks for the pointer to `hw.vga.textmode="1"` . I was scratching my head why can't I have some meaningful text display in 1-8 screens, but got some cryptic garbled text in return.


----------



## MarcoB (Mar 22, 2018)

Yeah this bug is there since quite some time. It's a Nvidia bug or a vt bug but since the driver is closed source the FreeBSD camp probably has a hard time solving it.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 22, 2018)

MarcoB said:


> Did you place the /.root/xorg.conf.new file, that nvidia-xconfig created, in /etc/x11?


No.... I didn't do that. Maybe that is the thing that I forgot.. Interestingly enough, I didn't have to do that for Fluxbox. Both monitors worked perfectly after doing the nvidia-xconfig command.


----------



## Beno Kurniawan (Mar 22, 2018)

Dear knightjp , as mentioned by lebarondemerde , if you installing nvidia-driver, this means your card is supported by recent nvidia driver (not legacy). Shouldn't you use nvidia-modeset_load="YES" instead of nvidia_load="YES" on /boot/loader.conf? Then you also would need hw.vga.textmode="1" to switch between x and console.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 23, 2018)

Beno Kurniawan said:


> Dear knightjp , as mentioned by lebarondemerde , if you installing nvidia-driver, this means your card is supported by recent nvidia driver (not legacy). Shouldn't you use nvidia-modeset_load="YES" instead of nvidia_load="YES" on /boot/loader.conf? Then you also would need hw.vga.textmode="1" to switch between x and console.


Thanks for the reply. I'm no expert - just an amateur at best. So all of this is actually new to me.


----------



## Beno Kurniawan (Mar 23, 2018)

Hi knightjp ,

Same here, I also not an expert. I start to learn in a hardway, get up as often as my falls. Install on my daily production laptop, blank screen, unable to solve problem, unable to take important docs on external ntfs drive, uninstall. Switch to another OS, experimenting on VM. Gaining more confidence, install again and so on.
All in all, handbook, faqs and forums are my best friend and source of knowledge. There were lots of developers, moderators, and members which actively helping each other and we could learn together here.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 23, 2018)

Beno Kurniawan I take that you succeeded and you are using FreeBSD as a primary desktop now.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 27, 2018)

I have 2 Thinkpad T61 running FreeBSD 11.1-RELEASE-p8 that both use the Nvidia Quadro NVS 140M and the x11/nvidia-driver-304. I'm using one now. To get mine up and running using ports and ports-mgmt/portmaster:

I compile the driver and linux emulation. ports-mgmt/portmaster wants to install linux emulation with the build IIRC.

Have x11/nvidia-xconfig generate an /etc/x11/xorg.conf file. There shouldn't be a need to post mine.

Use this in my /boot/loader.conf:

```
linux_load="YES"
nvidia_load="YES"
nvidia-modeset_load="YES"
```

And this in my /etc/rc.conf:

```
linux_enable="YES"
```

Whether or not all these are deemed as necessary it's what I do to get mine running and works every time.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Mar 27, 2018)

I'm using x11/nvidia-driver-340 on a GeForce 9600GT for several years. I haven't touched it except for upgrading since I built this workstation four(?) years ago. It's the only not-brand-new component in the system.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Mar 27, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> I'm using x11/nvidia-driver-340 on a GeForce 9600GT for several years.



I'm also a happy GeForce 9600GT owner  I use it on my PC. 
It is also possible to use x11/nvidia-driver-304 with that GPU,
but it won't make much difference in terms of usage.


----------



## knightjp (Sep 12, 2018)

When talking about Desktop environments, KDE has always been one of my favorites. I like Gnome3, but it has never really caught my eye...
Having seen this video - Why I love Unity, I wonder if anyone has been able to port the Unity project to FreeBSD. I know that its not a favorite, but it seems to have some pretty cool features.


----------



## ronaldlees (Sep 12, 2018)

AFAIK Unity is a shell for Gnome 3, which itself could be an issue.  Also - it's huge, having around 250 MB of binary packages to install on Ubuntu.  The latest versions are intended to run on hardware accelerated platforms, although I think there may be a fallback (or was at one point).  Officially the project's been halted by Conical, although I think it's still getting updates.  Anyway - it seems that it'd be a lot of work for somebody.  Go for it!


----------



## kpedersen (Sep 12, 2018)

ronaldlees said:


> AFAIK Unity is a shell for Gnome 3


It didn't start out this way. It used to be very separate. What they have now is basically a Unity "theme" for Gnome 3 with a couple of tweaks to make it work differently.

I have heard that Unity itself is pretty unportable to other platforms (i.e dependence on Mir, etc). This was probably by design from Canonical to ensure that Ubuntu had something "different" to offer as they attempted to monetize it. For example, Unity isn't available on many other Linux distros AFAIK.

At this point it might be easier (and perhaps more useful) to port the Win32 GUI shell from ReactOS to FreeBSD


----------



## Crivens (Sep 12, 2018)

kpedersen said:


> At this point it might be easier (and perhaps more useful) to port the Win32 GUI shell from ReactOS to FreeBSD


I'm happy someone already ported the DOS ASCII shell to Unix... err, wait a second.


----------



## fryshke (Sep 13, 2018)

So, even Electron doesn't run on FreeBSD? And you still have to have Linux installed, so why even bother using FreeBSD? It's getting more obscure and niche (it's niche being zfs and netflix networking?), it's sad. 12 years ago I loved BSD, but now nothing new even bothers with FreeBSD support (personally said bye bye to FreeBSD when .NET Core didn't run on FreeBSD...). Just let it go to niche server grave and stop trying to make FreeBSD what it isn't - desktop OS.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Sep 13, 2018)

fryshke said:


> So, even Electron doesn't run on FreeBSD?


You can run electron on FreeBSD. Obviously you are clueless on how these things work or you wouldn't have said that.


fryshke said:


> And you still have to have Linux installed


No you don't.


fryshke said:


> (it's niche being zfs and netflix networking?)


And WhatsApp and Juniper Networks and handling more internet traffic than anyone else but reddit trolls like you don't know that. Did you get booted from reddit? Is that why you're here?


fryshke said:


> personally said bye bye to FreeBSD when .NET Core didn't run on FreeBSD


Imagine that. FreeBSD doesn't natively run Windows and Microsoft frameworks.


fryshke said:


> Just let it go to niche server grave and stop trying to make FreeBSD what it isn't - desktop OS.


Most of us are using FreeBSD as a desktop OS as I, and everyone developer in my company, has for 15 years but childish reddit trolls don't know that's possible either.

FreeBSD is a professional operating system for professionals and enthusiasts who use their time to learn and not troll internet forums.


----------



## kpedersen (Sep 13, 2018)

fryshke said:


> Personally said bye bye to FreeBSD when .NET Core didn't run on FreeBSD...).


https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc749640.aspx

.NET was first implemented on FreeBSD by Microsoft Research 
One might even say it was a first class citizen!

As for .NET *Core*... I hate to say but no-one uses it. It is just Microsoft's way of saying that they don't intend to maintain .NET for much longer and are gradually trying to cut it down in size until it fizzles out. This is exactly how large companies do product disposal without losing face.


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 3, 2018)

Would recommend KDE plasma5 , currently running it on FreeBSD 11.1 , loving it  no big problems yet.


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## SirDice (Oct 3, 2018)

Lars Skogstad said:


> currently running it on FreeBSD 11.1


Make sure to update some time soon. Support for 11.1 ended last Sunday. 


```
releng/11.1 	11.1-RELEASE 	n/a 	July 26, 2017 	September 30, 2018
```
https://www.freebsd.org/security/unsupported.html


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 3, 2018)

SirDice said:


> Make sure to update some time soon. Support for 11.1 ended last Sunday.
> 
> 
> ```
> ...




Yeah been reading all day about upgrading. not too sure if I want to yet. I noticed the support and security updates..
All post just leads to "upgraded to 11.2 cant load zfs , cant boot kernel , cant boot" 

Suggestion what to do? Want to get on 11.2-current but dont feel like using an evening configuring and trying to fix everything. =/

  Not feeling like going through all this hazzle to get the desktop working flawless again hehe. 
( im a newcomer to bsd, at least for desktop usage )


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## SirDice (Oct 3, 2018)

Lars Skogstad said:


> All post just leads to "upgraded to 11.2 cant load zfs , cant boot kernel , cant boot"


That's a bit skewed. If you go to a bakery you'll notice all customers ordering bread related products, if you go to a butcher everyone will be ordering meat products. Same for support forums, everybody posts problems. People that don't have problems generally don't post on support forums 


Lars Skogstad said:


> Suggestion what to do? Want to get on 11.2-current but dont feel like using an evening configuring and trying to fix everything. =/


Careful with the naming. There is no 11.2-current. The moniker -CURRENT is reserved for a very specific developer version, the current -CURRENT will soon be released as 12.0-RELEASE and -CURRENT will be the next 13.0. 

But what to do is up to you, upgrading now to 11.2 will be the least amount of changes or issue. It should be a walk in the park. The new to release (maybe some time next month) 12.0-RELEASE will be a lot bigger change. It's also a .0 version, which hasn't been tested quite that extensively yet and could still have some serious bugs.


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## drhowarddrfine (Oct 4, 2018)

To ditto what SirDice said, all of our workstations and servers are upgraded on minor versions as soon as possible while major versions may be held off to a more convenient time. We have never had any issues since freebsd-update has existed.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Oct 4, 2018)

fryshke said:


> Just let it go to niche server grave and stop trying to make FreeBSD what it isn't - desktop OS.



Wow... I am so embarrassed...

Here I sit with 6 laptops running FreeBSD as a desktop OS and all this time I thought it was the greatest thing since the abacus as far as a desktop OS. Makes a darn fine .mp3 player, too. One of those machines sits by my recliner and does nothing but play music for me, day in day out, and has been non-stop for 146 days now and counting.

Harley isn't embarrassed though, she's always insanely happy and why I only use the wallpaper I made for her on this machine. Like them all, her T400 is a fully functionally desktop I use every day, could not run more smoothly, be more stable or dependable and everything I could ask, want or need from a desktop OS. And that makes me happy.


FreeBSD - It just works...for some of us.


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 4, 2018)

SirDice said:


> That's a bit skewed. If you go to a bakery you'll notice all customers ordering bread related products, if you go to a butcher everyone will be ordering meat products. Same for support forums, everybody posts problems. People that don't have problems generally don't post on support forums
> 
> Careful with the naming. There is no 11.2-current. The moniker -CURRENT is reserved for a very specific developer version, the current -CURRENT will soon be released as 12.0-RELEASE and -CURRENT will be the next 13.0.
> 
> But what to do is up to you, upgrading now to 11.2 will be the least amount of changes or issue. It should be a walk in the park. The new to release (maybe some time next month) 12.0-RELEASE will be a lot bigger change. It's also a .0 version, which hasn't been tested quite that extensively yet and could still have some serious bugs.



No need to be sazzy  

Okay okay, I will try it now. sorry, 11.2-RELEASE then.


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 4, 2018)

So. Now nvidia module crashed. Great. Red that would happen.. So Now i have to make it myself instead of pkg?


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## riberto (Oct 4, 2018)

gofer_touch said:


> Here is another one for you:
> 
> https://cooltrainer.org/a-freebsd-desktop-howto/
> 
> There is also the script `desktop-installer` in the package repository and the ports tree. You simply do `pkg install desktop-installer` in a new install and follow the instructions. You can have a basic FreeBSD desktop up and running literally within about 15 minutes.




AMAZING!!!      

Live and learn,  I've been attracted to and looking at FreeBSD for years now.
I finally decided to install it on one of my Linux laptops, but I wanted it with a (gui) desktop.
Using the Handbook and several You-tube videos, as reference, I had it installed and working, almost right, in a week.
Now I came across your post.   OF COURSE, I should have come here first.
THANK YOU so much!.
Rr

PS. there are a couple of things I need to adjust on my 11.2 install, so you know I'll be reading these post intensively.
Thanks.


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 4, 2018)

So screwed up everything with the 11.2, tried making it from ports aswell(nvidia driver) , tried that one and the 340, nothing. And since I currently only have one pc atm no laptop ill just reinstall another version for now.


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## gnath (Oct 5, 2018)

Lars Skogstad said:


> So screwed up everything with the 11.2, tried making it from ports aswell


Now it is time to start from base. First ensure your upgrade to 11.2-RELEASE smooth. Then try to build from desktop only with default driver (not nvidia).
Find the problem & try to solve. Problem for nvidia may be solved from users here. Package system is fast and good for trial purpose. Once settled may start port system with other ports.


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 5, 2018)

Haven got it to work. Config ed xorg. Startx worked. Installer nvidia and nothin. Vern eliminating error and more error. Can it be something wrong with bus? 
Ive installer 11.2-stable. Let me guess.. Nvidia dosent work in 11.2 stable?


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## scottro (Oct 5, 2018)

Yes, lately, with 11.2, at least, NVidia has been iffy for me. One machine, I had to manually add the PCI Bus ID, then, when that disk went bad, I decided to do a reinstall on another disk, and it didn't work, while Fedora Linux worked out of the box.

I used the port, but I _think_ that the package now works, now that 11.1 is EOL, but didn't try it. (With the package, you also need Linux, with the port,  not necessarily, haven't retried with Linux support yet and won't get to it till Sunday).  
I suspect you mean RELEASE, rather than STABLE.  In FreeBSD, STABLE is sort of in between RELEASE and CURRENT.  Fred Cash wrote a very good explanation during the time of 4, 5, and 6, I think, that's still accurate, that can be seen here.  NVidia's package was NOT working on 11.2, you had to use the port, and it wasn't documented anywhere.  Did you use the package or the port?  If the package, try with the port. It DOES work, at least most of the time (the box I'm using has always been a bit iffy, and as I said, I did have to add the PCI Bus ID, which I didn't have to do on any other machines.


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 5, 2018)

scottro said:


> Yes, lately, with 11.2, at least, NVidia has been iffy for me. One machine, I had to manually add the PCI Bus ID, then, when that disk went bad, I decided to do a reinstall on another disk, and it didn't work, while Fedora Linux worked out of the box.
> 
> I used the port, but I _think_ that the package now works, now that 11.1 is EOL, but didn't try it. (With the package, you also need Linux, with the port,  not necessarily, haven't retried with Linux support yet and won't get to it till Sunday).
> I suspect you mean RELEASE, rather than STABLE.  In FreeBSD, STABLE is sort of in between RELEASE and CURRENT.  Fred Cash wrote a very good explanation during the time of 4, 5, and 6, I think, that's still accurate, that can be seen here.  NVidia's package was NOT working on 11.2, you had to use the port, and it wasn't documented anywhere.  Did you use the package or the port?  If the package, try with the port. It DOES work, at least most of the time (the box I'm using has always been a bit iffy, and as I said, I did have to add the PCI Bus ID, which I didn't have to do on any other machines.



I tried from pkg install nvidia-driver, was hopping it was ficed. 

Ive installer FreeBSD 11.2-Stable from The download page


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 5, 2018)

Failed to init The nvidia gpu at pci 1:0:0.

Screens fond but none usable config. 

Rynning nvidia 390.77 from pkg install.  (geforce gtx 970)


----------



## Lars Skogstad (Oct 5, 2018)

So, managed to get it work. Reinstalled everything, everything except printer is now alive.
Did not have to change bus setting, but I had to make it from outside ports..  Had to compile it. 
Seems to work good now.


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 12, 2018)

Regarding Ubuntu's Unity shell. You can get something very similar on FreeBSD by installing KDE Plasma 5 and then going to "Look and feel" and searching for the "United" theme. This is what I just did last night. Actually so far it seems _better_ than the new Unity which is just a mocked up GNOME Shell. You can have wobbly windows at the same time (impossible with Ubuntu). Here is a shot of my desktop:


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## ronaldlees (Oct 12, 2018)

Thanks for the pic of wobbly windows.  But - you actually _want_ that?!  Go fer it then, I guess.  As a guy who has never owned a smart phone (and probably never will) - these smart-phonized gui devices are things I'd prefer to leave sitting on the store shelves.   But, the good thing about FreeBSD is that you can have it your way - like burgers with cucumber.  So, carry on, carry on ...


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 12, 2018)

I am decidedly shallow when it comes to GUIs.  You’ll notice also my terminal is green-on-black, because it makes me feel that I’m doing something important even when I’m not.


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## drhowarddrfine (Oct 12, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> You’ll notice also my terminal is green-on-black


I'll never forget, decades ago, a salesman coming to work and pushing that as a feature for us to buy terminals from him.


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## yuripv (Oct 12, 2018)

Sorry for the stupid question, but what exactly "wobbly" means in this context?


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## Crivens (Oct 12, 2018)

The artist drawing the GUI artwork had one too many 

No, it is a fade-in and fade-out animation.


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## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 12, 2018)

Hi yuripv,
“Wobbly” means that when you move a window with the mouse pointer, it temporarily deforms (loses its shape). I believe the wobbly windows on KDE are implemented by mapping the image of the window onto three springs using differential equations.
Drhowarddrfine, LOL.


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## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 12, 2018)

Wobbly windows as demonstrated by someone who sounds kinda scary:


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## Deleted member 30996 (Oct 12, 2018)

That's exactly what I've been missing in x11-wm/fluxbox.

Damn you, Ubuntu...


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## knightjp (Oct 12, 2018)

I'm seriously thinking of moving over to FreeBSD from MacOS as my primary. However after trying Gnome, KDE as well as fluxbox & openbox, I'm not finding anything with the similar polish and feel as MacOS. I'm not talking about the technical features. I'm sure that most of the features of MacOS can be replicated and even more better ones as well. I wish that I could put it into words..


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## kpedersen (Oct 12, 2018)

Is it just me or are window managers these days jumping a little bit too much on the thin border bandwagon?
Normally I would like that but I just tried OpenBox running on one of my student's laptops and even though it looks great (very modern), it is almost impossible to actually grab a border haha.

Now Windows (10?) has very thin borders but it has a subtle difference. Even if the mouse is not exactly on that 1 single pixel, i.e if it is just over or just under it still grabs! Is this a limitation of X11 not sending through this event? I could understand that and accept that is why in the world of X11 we need thicker borders.

My students solution was "Oh, I just hold alt if I want to resize a window".

Seems... annoying


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## kpedersen (Oct 12, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I'm not finding anything with the similar polish and feel as MacOS.


Unfortunately you probably wont either. The cutting edge (Gnome 3) is a mess and once it becomes perfect, it will be replaced by Gnome 4 which will be entirely broken again. This happened with Gnome 2 -> Gnome 3 and was quite disappointing.

That said, you will not find polish but you *will* find consistency. Once you find something you can "deal with", it will never change. Compare this to macOS and you will see that Apple are quite happy to remove functionality in the name of "progress". I personally hate change (only in the world of computers) because in the world of computers, 99% of the time it only means additional regression, restriction and regret.


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## Crivens (Oct 12, 2018)

MacOS has one thing: a style guide.
"Ok" and "cancel" are _always_ at the same place. You can't simply cancel a requester in X11 by glancing at it. Sometimes these are diverging inside the same app!

That is a huuuuuge bonus.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Oct 12, 2018)

Never had any "ok" - "cancel" confusions while using any of xorg applications, also there is no need to click something most of times, because pushing escape key is enough in most situations. Also, in GTK applications such buttons are located at the same place, most of times, while it is possible to configure position and sequence of such buttons in Qt applications. Also such buttons are common only in GUI configuration utilities and in some application settings... and if you use minimal WM-s, you won't see many of them, I cannot even remember where I can see such buttons while using my desktop with FVWM WM .
Also, probably, that's because you get used to such buttons, and you're trying to find similar experience elsewhere. Besides, "Yes", "OK" and "Cancel" buttons reminds me windows® world much more... You'll find countless windows with such buttons there


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## Peter2121 (Oct 12, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I'm seriously thinking of moving over to FreeBSD from MacOS as my primary. However after trying Gnome, KDE as well as fluxbox & openbox, I'm not finding anything with the similar polish and feel as MacOS.



I'm using Enlightenment (not the ports version - it is buggy, but built from Git some month ago) on my primary FreeBSD laptop and Mac OS X on the secondary one. I can state that there are many things impossible in Mac OS X that I can do with E. Finally I fill more comfortable working on E now. But it takes time to manually install it and configure everything.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Oct 13, 2018)

IMO, the best option to try, when choosing what WM to use, is x11-wm/fvwm2, If you'll manage to find out how its configuration file is working, then you'll never be limited in anything, because practically, it is possible to recreate almost any other WM functionality...
Also, of course it is obvious, that nonfree desktops are extremely limited and its design or functionality cannot be changed or improved (because it is optimized for "housewives" aka idiots "average users", in other words), including any "ok" button position, or titles, menus... colors, etc. Here is my fvwm config, it is commented well, also fvwm got good documentation, start from `% man fvwm` and you'll find almost anything you need.


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## Sensucht94 (Oct 13, 2018)

Peter2121 said:


> I'm using Enlightenment (not the ports version - it is buggy, but built from Git some month ago) on my primary FreeBSD laptop and Mac OS X on the secondary one. I can state that there are many things impossible in Mac OS X that I can do with E. Finally I fill more comfortable working on E now. But it takes time to manually install it and configure everything.



+1 for Enlightenment built from scratch, recently attempted the same on OpenIndiana: E22 runs smooth,  a very intuitive DE in its Unixish approach, and EFL is  a less bloated API than Qt5 or GTK3+. Enlightenment_FM , Terminology,  Rage, Ephoto are good to have applications, though I'm still preferring mc, xterm and mpv to the first 3.
Here's a recent shot of my E22 desktop with SciFi theme






As for *BSD for the moment I'm staying on  fvwm2 and fluxbox which are my favourite, plus a bit of vtwm, icewm, cwm, Lumina, flwm, notion, olvwm, wmaker from time to time. Yes all very weird stuff, like the weirdo I am.

I think ILUXA is right in telling fvwm is the best UI ever created: at least, it's the most powerful and hackable WM ever created, capable of returning a fully-customized complete DE out of relatively simple config written in plain text


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## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 13, 2018)

sensucht94 that is a seriously cool screenshot. Ever since about 2008 when I first used Linux I’ve preferred docks full of icons over the Microsoft taskbar paradigm. I actually used Bodhi Linux briefly until I realised they were withholding source code in violation of the GPL; some user asked for the code on their forum and just got a tirade of abuse from a dev. I wonder what they were hiding.  Last time I checked they didn’t have a forum at all...
I just installed macOS Mojave on my 12 inch MacBook and the dark mode is very appealing to look at. It’s an exciting time to experiment with different OSs.


----------



## knightjp (Oct 13, 2018)

TBH I've never found MacOS interface limiting in any way; in terms of usage. And I really like the layout. I know the stock window management needs a quite a bit of work, but I have solved that using an app called  Moom. Other aspects work the way I would want them too. I'm completely comfortable with the OS and the only thing I find limiting is that, I can't make my system into dark mode. I'm still on High Sierra. I haven't been able to move to Mohave, because I run MacOS on a Hackintosh and a certain Nvidia driver isn't available yet. It seems Nvidia are taking their own sweet time with this one. 
I've tried a whole bunch of Linux distros with various degrees of Desktop Environments. So I'm well aware of Enlightenment, i3wm, fluxbox, openbox, Gnome, KDE. I like KDE and Openbox, I sort of feel they lack something that I can't really put into words. I would like to find a way to combine Openbox and Compiz. I'm not a developer. I'm just an average user.  

If I have to move to another OS, FreeBSD is my choice rather than Linux. That is for sure...


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## Peter2121 (Oct 13, 2018)

Sensucht94 said:


> Enlightenment_FM , Terminology, Rage, Ephoto are good to have applications, though I'm still preferring mc, xterm and mpv to the first 3.


Correctly configured Terminology is genial. XFE is really good to replace mc (but I'm using mc too).


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Oct 13, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> Ever since about 2008 when I first used Linux I’ve preferred docks full of icons over the Microsoft taskbar paradigm.



Personally, I can't stand icons or docks with them on my desktop. I like plain text and minimalism. I do have a taskbar but hide it till my mouse hits the bottom of the screen. This is how I like mine to look and best suits the way I work:


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## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 13, 2018)

Trihexagonal, that is a power user desktop if I ever saw one. I like the clock and the moon phase thing. Useful for werewolves/lunatics etc. What’s the lil music player called in the bottom right?
I have a Thinkpad too. I got it refurbished ex business for £130, I’m so happy with it. Great sturdy/rugged machine. I tried TrueOS on it but it couldn’t suspend/hibernate so now it has Ubuntu.


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## Deleted member 48958 (Oct 13, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> I like the clock and the moon phase thing. Useful for werewolves/lunatics etc.


It's not useful for lunatics and werewolves only,
because moon phases affects everything in nature,
including humanity, which is the part of nature too.
It affects on all earth existence. Personally I'm using
astro/wmmoonclock dockapp, nice and useful
dockapp, that shows moon phases, it shows also some
other info, when you click it, like Rise and Set time, see `% man wmmoonclock`.


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 13, 2018)

Just to clarify, I was joking, it wasn’t meant maliciously (hard to convey in plain text). I knew the moon affected things like tides and possibly women’s menstruation too (?) and if I had stayed in school I would probably know several other uses for the moon...


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Oct 13, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> Just to clarify, I was joking


I noticed. I just wanted to admit moon power more precise


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## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 13, 2018)

As we’re on the subject of macOS generally, I can’t recommend the 12 inch MacBook highly enough. You don’t realise the value of an ultra portable until you’ve owned one. I wish I could install something more Unixy on it, that’s the only thing. But the display is beautiful, the battery lasts about 8 hours, it’s almost silent, and so easy to carry around. I use it for writing and web browsing and some light coding.
I know macOS isn’t “free as in freedom”, but you end up forgiving it because it’s just so good.
I sometimes think how Richard Stallman of GNU, has philosophised himself into a corner. As a geek he must be _desperate_ to get his hands on some Apple tech but he’s just not allowed cos of the ideology. What’s the probability he has an iPad hidden somewhere?


----------



## Beastie (Oct 13, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> What’s the lil music player called in the bottom right?


Probably multimedia/xmms as you can see in the output of top(1)



AlexanderProphet said:


> Just to clarify, I was joking, it wasn’t meant maliciously (hard to convey in plain text). I knew the moon affected things like tides and possibly women’s menstruation too (?) and if I had stayed in school I would probably know several other uses for the moon...


Some religions also rely on the Moon.


----------



## rufwoof (Oct 13, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> Personally, I can't stand icons or docks with them on my desktop. I like plain text and minimalism. I do have a taskbar but hide it till my mouse hits the bottom of the screen.


Mine is a black screen with a mouse cursor. i.e. cwm. No icons, no window borders/titles, no taskbar ...etc. Exec key and first couple of letters to identify a program and Enter to launch it. Most windows maximised and alt-tab between them. 1 pixel gap at the top of screen to left mouse click on (desktop) to show/switch to any from a list of active windows. Alt left mouse to move a window, alt-right mouse to resize. Mostly browse, so in effect full screened browser + its tabs is pretty much my desktop. I have a calculator (html) tab, text editor (html) tab. Use the browser to play mp4's, online email tab ...etc. Otherwise mostly mc/cli (tmux). Looks bland, but works well.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Oct 13, 2018)

Beastie said:


> Some religions also rely on the Moon.


Sun is father, moon is mother.



AlexanderProphet said:


> As we’re on the subject of macOS generally


Some people loves windows also very much, so it is just a matter of advertising tastes.


----------



## rufwoof (Oct 13, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> That's exactly what I've been missing in x11-wm/fluxbox.
> Damn you, Ubuntu...


For equal effect, I either just shake my head around as I move a window, or drink a lot of alcohol. Of the two I personally prefer the latter.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Oct 13, 2018)

rufwoof said:


> I either just shake my head around as I move a window, or drink a lot of alcohol. Of the two I personally prefer the latter.


It is also a good idea to smoke some weed, visual effect will be a little different, but also very interesting.
Also soundtrack is very important.


----------



## yuripv (Oct 13, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> As we’re on the subject of macOS generally, I can’t recommend the 12 inch MacBook highly enough. You don’t realise the value of an ultra portable until you’ve owned one. I wish I could install something more Unixy on it, that’s the only thing. But the display is beautiful, the battery lasts about 8 hours, it’s almost silent, and so easy to carry around. I use it for writing and web browsing and some light coding.
> I know macOS isn’t “free as in freedom”, but you end up forgiving it because it’s just so good.
> I sometimes think how Richard Stallman of GNU, has philosophised himself into a corner. As a geek he must be _desperate_ to get his hands on some Apple tech but he’s just not allowed cos of the ideology. What’s the probability he has an iPad hidden somewhere?



I just sold my MacBook Pro 2017.  Yes, initially everything looks great, the integration with iPhone is awesome, I miss that a bit, it's just those little things which make using it not worth the price.  Bluetooth simply disconnects (restarts?) in ~30 minutes, interwebs are full of similar reports and nothing is being done about it; you can't use the keyboard volume keys for external output (monitor, tv); (the list can go on, but it's pointless).  I guess it's just not that stable (I hate to admit it, but Windows 10 is running much more stable for me), not unixy enough (I just bought Lenovo laptop instead and installed FreeBSD) for me.  Just my experience, I'm really glad someone doesn't hit those (or any other) issues.


----------



## Beastie7 (Oct 14, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I sort of feel they lack something that I can't really put into words. I would like to find a way to combine Openbox and Compiz. I'm not a developer. I'm just an average user.



I suspect the polish you're talking about is the Quartz compositor and Core Animation (as well as Aqua) - as that what drives the UI rendering in macOS. Yes, this is miles ahead of Xorg + (whatever window manager) in open source desktops. Even in KDE i've experienced consistent tearing and glitching. Yuck.

Xorg in an abominable piece of garbage to say the least.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 14, 2018)

yuripv said:


> I hate to admit it, but Windows 10 is running much more stable for me


My wife struggles daily with Windows 10. Now that we sold our restaurants--she needs Quickbooks for that--I told her I was putting FreeBSD on it and she'll never have problems again.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Oct 14, 2018)

Beastie7 said:


> Xorg in an abominable piece of garbage to say the least.


Xorg is working, and it's working pretty well and stable for me
(no tearing, fast, etc), it is much faster than every Crapple or M$ OS,
also it is pretty lightweight. Also personally I don't need any "wobbly windows"
or any other stupid shit, as said before, if someone need such effects, he should use drugs,
and not windows or macos (there is no big difference what popular garbage to use,
experience will be similar, you'll see glitches, pop design and big lack of any customization ability).


----------



## Crivens (Oct 14, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> My wife struggles daily with Windows 10. Now that we sold our restaurants--she needs Quickbooks for that--I told her I was putting FreeBSD on it and she'll never have problems again.


Admit it, that was the idea behind the sale all along


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 14, 2018)

It is a bit tragic when someone’s self esteem (or esteem of others) depends on _what OS they use_... worse still how they configure it.
Luckily no-one here is like that.


----------



## Crivens (Oct 14, 2018)

People define themselves by so many stupid things. I recommend watching the "Who are you?" scene from Babylon 5.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 14, 2018)

Crivens said:


> Admit it, that was the idea behind the sale all along


Daily struggles with five Windows POS systems that tech support can't solve, then having to come home and hear about the home office Windows computer struggling can do that to you. That going into my office with FreeBSD is relaxing gives you a whole different perspective--using a system designed for professionals versus one designed for Mom and her kids games.


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## Crivens (Oct 14, 2018)

Both of my parents prefer unix-like systems over windows


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## drhowarddrfine (Oct 14, 2018)

I see where you got your smarts from.


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## Abraham79 (Oct 14, 2018)

How is Lumina desktop for FreeBSD?


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## knightjp (Oct 14, 2018)

Beastie7 said:


> I suspect the polish you're talking about is the Quartz compositor and Core Animation (as well as Aqua) - as that what drives the UI rendering in macOS. Yes, this is miles ahead of Xorg + (whatever window manager) in open source desktops. Even in KDE i've experienced consistent tearing and glitching. Yuck.


yes, there is something about the window transitions and tearing that gets to me as well. I think you may have hit the target on that.. however, I kinda feel that there is a bit more to it. I could easily run FreeBSD on my Hackintosh with ease. I could probably find ways to make everything work well in terms of drivers, etc. I did try that for a while actually a few months ago. However I still kept my MacOS installation USB handy just in case I needed to come back. And it didn't take long for me to come back.
For one, it was the sheer amount of choice in terms of desktop environments that staggered me most of all. I knew I wanted something with a similar feel of MacOS, but with its own flavor. Gnome fit the bill, but it wasn't cutting it for me. I thought that I could go KDE, but at the time only KDE4 was supported which IMO is a nightmare on resources. I tried Mate and was pretty happy with it, but it missed something. Compiz wasn't working well and I hated Slim as a login screen. I would rather use xdm.
And I'm not too clued in on the open source software to build a complete desktop environment from Openbox. 
The best would be me finding something that gives me the window theme of classic MacOS 9.. If I find that, I'd be golden.
FWIW, Apple has done a lot to make their system interface a masterpiece. I mean, there is a reason why there are hundreds of links stating " how to make (insert OS here) look like Mac OS X"



Beastie7 said:


> Xorg in an abominable piece of garbage to say the least.


I'm not sure that Xorg is such a horrible mess. After all, it has brought us this far in terms of open source desktop environments. But what about all the advances in Linux with Wayland, etc.. Is there better out there that we can use?


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Oct 14, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> I like the clock and the moon phase thing. Useful for werewolves/lunatics etc. What’s the lil music player called in the bottom right?



The player is multimedia/xmms and there is a collection of over 600 skins for it in multimedia/xmms-skins-huge.

The monitors are sysutils/gkrellm2. I've used it for years and prefer it over sysutils/conky. There is the astro/gkrellmoon2 moonclock and a misc/gkrellweather2 weather plugin that is nice, too. I like to take my screenshots when it shows the moon as full and am waiting to get another one for a Halloween shot of my X61 .mp3 player:


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## fernandel (Oct 14, 2018)

And here is mine Openbox and I have graphics/gimp, graphics/inkscape...editors/libreoffice and I am still playing game Rocksandiamond .


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## Beastie7 (Oct 15, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I'm not sure that Xorg is such a horrible mess. After all, it has brought us this far in terms of open source desktop environments. But what about all the advances in Linux with Wayland, etc.. Is there better out there that we can use?



The issue is that Xorg wasn't designed for desktop usage; so over the years various hacks were introduced to shoehorn Xorg into the use case. Secure multi-seating, true anti-aliasing, tear-free frame drawing, etc are what lack in it. Of course it "works", but it sucks, and you'd be damned crazy if anyone deploys this mess on any serious network for a corporate office.

Wayland? Wayland is a pipe dream. It's also birthed from the Linux community; i wouldn't touch it. FreeBSD should really design it's own display server - that it controls, just like most things in base.



knightjp said:


> I could go KDE



KDE is doing a lot of things right. I really applaud their work.


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## knightjp (Oct 15, 2018)

Beastie7 said:


> KDE is doing a lot of things right. I really applaud their work.


My issue with KDE on FreeBSD is that it really isn't the latest and greatest. KDE is doing quite a lot of things right these days. For instance, they recognized that their system was becoming far too heavy and if you see the latest release of Kubuntu, it performs far better than stock Gnome on Ubuntu. Kubuntu is also far lighter and better than even Ubuntu Mate. 

However I fail to see how that will help FreeBSD when it gives us only the older versions of its software. I think that it is about the same with Gnome as well.  In fact, this is one thing about the open source that doesn't sit right with me. It takes quite a while to get the latest and greatest. Since it is a community effort, it depends on someone taking the initiative and many times, individuals become complacent in maintaining or just move on to the next great thing.  




Beastie7 said:


> Wayland? Wayland is a pipe dream. It's also birthed from the Linux community; i wouldn't touch it. FreeBSD should really design it's own display server - that it controls, just like most things in base.


I'm not a developer and most likely wouldn't know where to begin to build one. I am wondering why no one else in the FreeBSD development community has seen the need and started work on one yet.


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## drhowarddrfine (Oct 15, 2018)

knightjp said:


> My issue with KDE on FreeBSD is that it really isn't the latest and greatest.


The latest version in ports and packages is 5.12.5.18.08.0. Isn't that the latest?


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## knightjp (Oct 15, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> The latest version in ports and packages is 5.12.5.18.08.0. Isn't that the latest?


The latest version I believe is 5.14.0 on the KDE site.


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## xtremae (Oct 15, 2018)

Latest upstream is Plasma 5.14. Ports might be tracking the LTS branch which is Plasma 5.12.7.


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## Sensucht94 (Oct 15, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Is there better out there that we can use?



For the moment I think only Quartz on macOS


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## Deleted member 48958 (Oct 15, 2018)

IMO KDE or GNOME are both crap for now,
never was a KDE fan, because it is pretty ugly and glitchy IMO,
and GNOME (newer than 3.18) has systemd as a dependency.
It's much better to use some simple WM and other apps,
which you like, than to use any "complete" DE IMO,
because such custom DE will work much faster and more stable.
I use the same applications on Linux as well as on FreeBSD,
and my custom DE works much better, than any "complete" one,
moreover I like it much more, than GNOME, Xfce, KDE, etc.
Possibility to create your own custom DE — is one of biggest pros of free software,
because such DE will work exactly the way you want it to work.
Also such DE will be designed exactly the way you want,
and it won't use any "GNOME team" design, as well as
Crapple or M$ "housewife" design.


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## drhowarddrfine (Oct 15, 2018)

xtremae said:


> Latest upstream is Plasma 5.14. Ports might be tracking the LTS branch which is Plasma 5.12.7.


Or it's been only out a week. Give 'em another day or two.


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## knightjp (Oct 15, 2018)

xtremae said:


> Latest upstream is Plasma 5.14. Ports might be tracking the LTS branch which is Plasma 5.12.7.


I'm no expert on FreeBSD, so what is the difference in between the upstream and the Ports? Is the upstream the same as the pkg binaries?


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## SirDice (Oct 15, 2018)

The "upstream" are the KDE sources in this case. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upstream_(software_development)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porting


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 15, 2018)

I'm enjoying Plasma 5 atm, so far so good  some minor adjustments and it feels snappy.


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## knightjp (Oct 15, 2018)

Plasma, looks pretty good. I wonder if there is a theme for KDE that looks like Classic MacOS


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## Lars Skogstad (Oct 15, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Plasma, looks pretty good. I wonder if there is a theme for KDE that looks like Classic MacOS


Might have a look here, lots of different themes. I just found the "dark breeze" okay  the default one is a bit too light/grey
https://store.kde.org/browse/cat/104/ord/top/ - Arc KDE looks real nice.


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 15, 2018)

yuripv said:


> I just sold my MacBook Pro 2017.  Yes, initially everything looks great, the integration with iPhone is awesome, I miss that a bit, it's just those little things which make using it not worth the price.



Hullo yuri,
Actually I agree with you. I have a MacBook Pro and it’s a completely unremarkable machine. Because it’s a desktop replacement, it is made to accommodate a Radeon Pro graphics card and some large and unnecessary speakers. I don’t like lugging it around. It’s currently serving as a crazily expensive charger for my e-cigarette.
The 12 inch MacBook is totally different, it feels like the future. It’s the thinnest, lightest full size computer I’ve ever used, it’s just a joy to use. Unfortunately I selected the Intel Core m3 CPU to keep the price down and the battery life up... this was a miscalculation because it cannot virtualise another OS on top (well you can but it’s a bit laggy).
I use the Pro for making music. macOS is the only Unix-like OS I’m aware of that has a decent DSP ecosystem. (I tried music production on Linux, the situation there is _dire. _LAME really _AIN’T_ an mp3 encoder, it turns music into mush, as do 90% of Linux plugins).


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## knightjp (Oct 20, 2018)

Today on the flight back from Indonesia, I watched the original Jurassic Park. I was pleasantly surprised at the computer system that they used. The main system was supposed to be "UNIX" and it indeed was. It looked like it has CDE with the classic MacOS title bars on the windows. Also it was running on an Apple workstation.


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## knightjp (Oct 21, 2018)

I found this video and it was interesting...


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## Polyatomic (Oct 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> I found this video and it was interesting...



If my memory serves correct, the bar at the bottom of the screen and frames around
the terminal and browser tell me the desktop is Gnome 2.


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## knightjp (Oct 22, 2018)

Polyatomic said:


> If my memory serves correct, the bar at the bottom of the screen and frames around
> the terminal and browser tell me the desktop is Gnome 2.


Well according to the video description, I believe that it is mentioned that it is. Gnome with Compiz.. I wish that there was a way to get Compiz and OpenBox working together.

I also found this... It looks really interesting. 






However I would be truly content with a system that looks like what was there in the first Iron man.


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## kpedersen (Oct 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> The main system was supposed to be "UNIX" and it indeed was. It looked like it has CDE with the classic MacOS title bars on the windows. Also it was running on an Apple workstation.



Yep, it was IRIX (SGI's UNIX) and the DE was not quite CDE but it did share a modified version of the Motif Widget Toolkit which CDE was also based on. The DE was called IRIX Interactive Desktop (or Indigo Magic Desktop depending on the version).

You can run a fun clone in your browser here: https://www.jurassicsystems.com/


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## Crivens (Oct 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> However I would be truly content with a system that looks like what was there in the first Iron man.


Says "Sorry, am I in your way?" to a robotic arm holding a soldering iron... like a boss.

Great. Now I need not only fight my disgust with this code base, but also my urge to go to the basement and dig up that DVD. Well done!


----------



## knightjp (Oct 22, 2018)

Crivens said:


> Great. Now I need not only fight my disgust with this code base,


You're disgusted with FreeBSD? 

As for Ironman, I already have a glass keyboard - "Bastron Glass Keyboard".. works well.
I just need the rest of the system. Previously I tried to get my glass keyboard to work with FreeBSD, but it wouldn't. I guess there was an issue with the driver. I don't see why considering its just a USB keyboard.

I think that I'm gonna wait until I'm able to upgrade Albert to MacOS Mojave and then decide whether I would like to go FreeBSD or not after that.












While the interface possibilities of FreeBSD are limitless, the functionality also needs to be considered. What will I lose by moving to BSD. There will be something.

For instance, if I move to FreeBSD, would I be able to find a way to use my fav MacOS apps like Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Garageband, Photoshop and Illustrator.
I'm not a youtuber nor a content producer. But there are instances when I do need to create media.. I would like to know that Albert will still be able to do that...


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> if I move to FreeBSD, would I be able to find a way to use my fav MacOS apps like Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Garageband, Photoshop and Illustrator.


You won't be able to use Windows apps either. Why do you think you'd be able to use these proprietary, sometimes Apple specific, products on FreeBSD? Or Linux for that matter.


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## Crivens (Oct 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> You're disgusted with FreeBSD?


No, work@homeoffice.
You know that when you have a constructor X::X(A foo,
         B bar,
... )
having >100 lines in the class definition and double that in the implementation, because some of these things are also objects with long winded constructors, then...
And that is AFTER some serious cleanup...

Well you want to take a shower after touching this. [/rant]


----------



## yuripv (Oct 22, 2018)

drhowarddrfine said:


> You won't be able to use Windows apps either. Why do you think you'd be able to use these proprietary, sometimes Apple specific, products on FreeBSD? Or Linux for that matter.



That's not exactly true, you can use Linux apps, and there's wine for Windows ones; now the question is if there's mine (or how would you call it for Macos).


----------



## knightjp (Oct 22, 2018)

Some people seem to think that moving from one OS to another is rather simple. If you are a basic user who just, surfs the web, use social media like facebook, watches movies, etc., moving to another OS is easy. You just need to know the tiny limitations (if there are any).
Most Linux fanboys don't really get that there are other power users who have other needs that FOSS software won't really cut it.






Tools like Wine are getting better and therefore it is getting easier to port stuff from the Windows side. I had hoped that it would be easier to port stuff from Apple's lineup since their OS is POSIX based.

For me, I know what Albert is capable of right now. I'm just trying to make sure to Albert will be able to doing pretty much all the same stuff on BSD.

This is one of the biggest issues with running something like FreeBSD as a Desktop.


----------



## xtremae (Oct 22, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Some people seem to think that moving from one OS to another is rather simple.


Why would Apple make it easier for their customers to jump ship? The market for creative professionals is rather lucrative and Apple is all about vendor lock-in.



knightjp said:


> Tools like Wine are getting better and therefore it is getting easier to port stuff from the Windows side.


Sure but Logic Pro, FinalCut Pro and Garageband are not available for Windows. If i'm not mistaken, Logic Pro used to be cross-platform but Apple halted development after they acquired Emagic.



knightjp said:


> I had hoped that it would be easier to port stuff from Apple's lineup since their OS is POSIX based.


To be fair, POSIX assumes the intent of portability. Also the platform specific applications you previously mentioned are all closed source.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Oct 22, 2018)

I'm now the not so impressed owner of a mid 2007 Mac Mini 2.

It will never, and could never, be the machine my FreeBSD Thinkpads are. I would have rather had an AppleII.


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 22, 2018)

I spent about a year struggling with malfunctioning Linux “pro” audio software thinking what an enlightened GNUist I was. It’s not worth it. I know the FSF thinks that “no software at all is better than proprietary software”, but that’s just shooting your self in the foot. It’s true, some proprietary software IS exploitative... but some isn’t. The App Store model of selling  in particular is much nicer than the license key model.
No-one is going to write decent digital signal processing software then publish it under the GPL or any other free license. Why? Because DSP requires post-graduate maths (unlike most programming where high school maths is more than enough). Who is going to study that long and that hard to work for free?
When you hear a mix you did on your MacBook Pro you realise you were right to “surrender your freedom” to Apple. IMO.


----------



## unitrunker (Oct 22, 2018)

> No-one is going to write decent digital signal processing software then publish it under the GPL or any other free license.



GNU Radio and FFTW are GPL examples.
Liquid DSP and FFTS are BSD licensed examples..


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## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 22, 2018)

Okay i should probably have said  “few people are going to write” such software and “its development will progress much more slowly”.
I’ve tried to make music on Linux and it’s like riding an angry camel, facing the wrong way, with your hands tied behind your back.


----------



## knightjp (Oct 22, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> No-one is going to write decent digital signal processing software then publish it under the GPL or any other free license. Why? Because DSP requires post-graduate maths (unlike most programming where high school maths is more than enough). Who is going to study that long and that hard to work for free?
> When you hear a mix you did on your MacBook Pro you realise you were right to “surrender your freedom” to Apple. IMO.


That was one of the things that I talked about in my article here... https://julxrp.wordpress.com/2017/07/31/linux-the-mac-man/
I don't know much about Open Source, FOSS, etc., I fail to see the incentive for anyone to spend hours on coding something and releasing everything for free; unless it is a hobby or something he/she really wants and needs. 
I am glad that there some have done so and created spectacular stuff for FreeBSD and Linux. It is amazing what they have done.


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## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 22, 2018)

Hullo again knightjp. I also endorse Linux whilst using macOS. I like the raw power and beautiful design of Linux. But sometimes it’s great to use something polished. You mentioned Apple’s “Pages” word processor in your blog post. That is a great example because when I first used it I was like “Wow, I can create an .epub without using the command line?!” It’s such a relief to just _use_ your software instead of fighting with it.
I came to macOS by accident. I bought a MacBook Air with the intention of installing Ubuntu on it, but I thought “I’ll just play with macOS for a while and see what it’s like”... and I loved it.
Free software purists are like militant vegans inasmuch as they’re imposing something often quite horrible on themselves in pursuit of an impossible goal (being a self-determining computer user vs being harmless to animals).
(Not trying to offend vegans, I am one).
And you’re right, we should thank the Linux and FreeBSD developers... programming is _really hard._


----------



## Beastie7 (Oct 23, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> I like the raw power and *beautiful* *design* of *Linux*.



I don't think these words go together.


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## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 23, 2018)

stupid post edited


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## Phishfry (Oct 23, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> I’ve tried to make music on Linux and it’s like riding an angry camel, facing the wrong way, with your hands tied behind your back.


But what muscian "makes" music on their computer. I have been a musicians helper for over 20 years now and have watched as the gear interface moved from SCSI to MIDI for inputs. Exabyte storage to USB sticks.
The computer makes a great editing suite but I don't consider the computer an instrument.
https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/...d-audio-record-playback-to-my-computer.62993/

Also to counter this silly "I must use Adobe Suite" attitude we have direct replacements for the entire creative chain.
Photoshop=Gimp
Premiere=KDEnlive
Audition=Audacity
Illustrator=Inkscape
InDesign=Scribus


----------



## Beastie7 (Oct 23, 2018)

Phishfry said:


> Also to counter this silly "I must use Adobe Suite" attitude we have direct replacements for the entire creative chain.



Except these aren't replacements; they're half-ass amateur projects that don't provide anywhere near feature parity. One main problem with open source "replacements" is that when shit breaks - you're on your own.

People who marginalize why people must use "X" commercial software - lack foresight of the cost and issues that come with switching. It's not silly.


----------



## Phishfry (Oct 23, 2018)

Oh yea we gots to have our afterglow plugin.

Lord knows how we did it before Adobe came along. Plugings are the equivalent of an the audio autotune.
It just masks how creatively your talents are lacking and need editing or masking.

pablo picasso didn't need a plugin.

That seems to be the only difference to me.
Stienberg VSB or Audacity.
Both use a timeline and what else do they really need to do? Lay down a track?
Back to plugins as the advantage right?

Gimp as a drawing tool. Does it not draw for you??? Can you not hook up a digitizer tablet and make art?
I am tired of this cookie cutter world of plugins.


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 23, 2018)

Phishfry said:


> But what muscian "makes" music on their computer.



‘In 2017, Jonny Greenwood said he saw Radiohead as "just a kind of an arrangement to form songs using whatever technology suits the song. And that technology can be a cello or it can be a laptop. It's all sort of machinery when looked at in the right way."’
From https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiohead
Hi, I don’t mean to be disagreeable but a computer absolutely can be an instrument - it could even be seen as another musician. Computers are merging with people, it’s happening as we speak, they are collaborating with us on everything we do. 
I know that if someone is classically trained they can make music without a computer, but not all of us are. The computer is a massive part of the creative process nowadays and tracks wherein a computer assisted come out sounding nothing like what the artist originally envisaged.


----------



## Phishfry (Oct 23, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> it could even be seen as another musician.


Yes like the looping that Keller Willilams does. But would you consider the device a musician?
Not I. It is a tool the musician is using as an instrument. Like a washboard. It can clean cloths and sound good.

Back to Adobe. Do you realize that Adobe Audition is nothing more than CoolEditPro or CoolEdit 2000.
They just bought it up and changed the name. It used to be shareware.
How creative of them.
Sounds like a 'mergers and aquisitions' shop.


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 23, 2018)

Hmmmmmmmmm...
So, anyway,  I was wondering if this groovy little ultrabook would run FreeBSD...




... this is only academic as I can’t afford one...


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 23, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> they are collaborating with us on everything we do.


But to what price of quality are we losing? I think I've heard some very high end computing machines play as an instrument once but, even then, I could tell the difference. There's a lot of physics at play with musical instruments that computers, so far, do not emulate with music. There is a lot of thinking humans do that computers cannot emulate, too. Just like we haven't been able to make machines that replicate the abilities and mechanisms of some animals.


----------



## Phishfry (Oct 23, 2018)

Beastie7 said:


> Except these aren't replacements; they're half-ass amateur projects that don't provide anywhere near feature parity. One main problem with open source "replacements" is that when shit breaks - you're on your own.


I would call them replacements. Granted not on parity with their commercial counterparts, I feel this 'half assed amateur' and 'created in someones basement' sentiment overblown. Very large companies donate manpower all over the spectrum of open source software..

I do understand the value of support. There is room for everybody.


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 23, 2018)

Drhowarddrfine,
I thanked your post because it was interesting. I don’t think music quality has suffered as a result of technology. It’s not better or worse, it’s just different. But then, I don’t really like any music pre 1960ish so maybe I’m the wrong person to judge. There was a period in the 1980s when synths were embarrassingly unsophisticated-sounding.
When you say computers can’t represent certain phenomena in nature do you mean we’re not throwing enough processing power at the problem yet, or actually they literally _can’t_?
I would love to think that there is a whole class of “beautiful and intellectual things” that computers simply can’t do (_a la _“halting problem”). I’m preparing myself to be disappointed though.  Because, I’ve never played “Go” but I know that the Go community used to say it was impossible for computers to play because it needed intuition. Google proved them wrong.
As for the acoustics thing, there is a program called Pianoteq which claims to use “physical modelling” (I assume that means it bounces imaginary waves against imaginary bits of wood). So this is just starting to be done.
I think computers are fundamentally stupid but they’re becoming increasingly good at hiding this fact.


----------



## Alien72 (Oct 23, 2018)

asifnaz said:


> I know FreeBSD is a very stable OS . I want to use it as Desktop OS (with some GUI) . How do I do that..?


   Reply is 1 of 3
May I suggest you first download and read the Handbook and install the base system by downloading
a suitable *.iso image, check your boot sequence in BIOS and boot from DVD and follow the prompts.


----------



## Alien72 (Oct 23, 2018)

2 of 3. Select Mate, Xfce, Gnome3 or KDE or other and boot up into the basic OS. Then check out several Youtube guides for your preferred Desktop Environment. From the Desktop Gui, you may not be
able to login as root so create a user (yourself) with password BEFORE installing your GUI. Do "visudo" and add yourself to the sudoers file. Ensure you are also in the "wheel" group.Then from the GUI, get into a terminal, login as root and make adjustments and install packages as needed. If you are coming from Linux make a note of your favorite programs and do a $pkg search programname to see it the FreeBSD repository has it. If it does, do a $sudo pkg install program to fetch your program. more>>>


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## Alien72 (Oct 23, 2018)

3 of 3. The desktop is added on top of the basic OS. Then install Xorg, Slim and your desktop. Tweaking info exists on youtube to get everything working desktop-wise.  All in one install with basic OS and Desktop do exist like TruOS, GhostBSD and a couple more. I've tried them but they have their issues and the support community and documentation are sparser than FreeBSD. Good Luck!


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Oct 23, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> There was a period in the 1980s when synths were embarrassingly unsophisticated-sounding.



They tell us that
We lost our tails
Evolving up
From little snails
I say it's all
Just wind in sails

Are we not men?


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Oct 23, 2018)

LOL oh dear.


----------



## knightjp (Oct 23, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> Hullo again knightjp. I also endorse Linux whilst using macOS. I like the raw power and beautiful design of Linux. But sometimes it’s great to use something polished. You mentioned Apple’s “Pages” word processor in your blog post. That is a great example because when I first used it I was like “Wow, I can create an .epub without using the command line?!” It’s such a relief to just _use_ your software instead of fighting with it.
> I came to macOS by accident. I bought a MacBook Air with the intention of installing Ubuntu on it, but I thought “I’ll just play with macOS for a while and see what it’s like”... and I loved it.
> Free software purists are like militant vegans inasmuch as they’re imposing something often quite horrible on themselves in pursuit of an impossible goal (being a self-determining computer user vs being harmless to animals).
> (Not trying to offend vegans, I am one).
> And you’re right, we should thank the Linux and FreeBSD developers... programming is _really hard._



Hello Alexander.. Everyone likes the idea of "free"... I admit.. it's the best price to pay for anything.. 
I am not here to put down the idea of Free Software.. Maybe I am missing the point that Stallman has been trying to make all this time. Listening to Stallman talk about free and open-source software, you get the feeling that companies like RedHat & SUSE shouldn't even exist as they are making a profit of supporting FOSS. If they are making a profit, then it really isn't "free" is it? 

Leaving the political debates of Linux, FOSS, etc.. I'm not a developer and perhaps there is a reason why FOSS philosophy is becoming prominent these days; even to the point that Microsoft gets involved. There should be benefits. Better auditing of the code for example... I just feel that most FOSS developers don't get the recognition and the payment for the hard work. So the idea of someone wanting to keep his/her code proprietary and believe that some form of payment should be made his/her way shouldn't be seen as evil.  

For the most part, those who really would take advantage of  good "free software" would rather enjoy the benefits of it all being free, but none would care to make any form of a contribution to the livelihoods of developers; unless they are compelled to. 
In the Stallman Software Utopia probably they would, but more than likely, human nature says its an impossible dream. [/rant]

I feel that an operating system in the desktop space is only as good as the applications that run on it. You can have the best and most advanced system in the world. But if Windows has the application that will get the work done, you can be sure most people will be using that.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 23, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> When you say computers can’t represent certain phenomena in nature do you mean we’re not throwing enough processing power at the problem yet, or actually they literally _can’t_?


What I mean is computers and the associated hardware have not been able to emulate woodwind or brass instruments to the quality achievable by those musical instruments due to the complex vibrations generated. Maybe there are some things that are close but no cigar and I wouldn't pay to listen at any concert hall. 
Dealing with live theater, as much as I have, I can always tell when the music is live or computer generated.


----------



## knightjp (Oct 23, 2018)

Phishfry said:


> Also to counter this silly "I must use Adobe Suite" attitude we have direct replacements for the entire creative chain.
> Photoshop=Gimp
> Premiere=KDEnlive
> Audition=Audacity
> ...



I agree that computers aren't instruments, and a real musician would use it only as an editing tool. However there are a growing number of "artists" & DJs that like to create digital tracks and re-mixes and often rely on proprietary software to get the best results.
Can similar results be had using FOSS? Probably, Yes, but most of the time, No. I'm not a professional media content creator, but here are a couple of videos that will illustrate my point.










The software you mentioned aren't really replacements (with the exception of KdenLive). They're alternatives that will get most of the tasks done. But for even more advanced features, you will still find yourself wanting. Now amateur level content creators will be able to find ways to get things done using these tools and even some professionals as well. After all a "free" tool is a good tool to use if you can.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 23, 2018)

knightjp I agree with you. Paid, competent developers focused on a project 40 hours a week can produce a better product. The only time that may not be true is when marketing guides it down the wrong path. Such as dumbing it down, marketing it to the masses instead of the specialist or technologist. Like audio production software for a professional versus a hobbyist in his bedroom.


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## knightjp (Nov 18, 2018)

Whenever I see this guy's videos... I keep thinking, "Man! That's a great looking system. Perhaps I should switch."






For the most part, this is what I would like go have as my desktop.. Purely on aesthetics alone, I think that its doable on maybe OpenBox or KDE.


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## knightjp (Nov 25, 2018)

Well.. was completely defeated by FreeBSD yesterday... Tried so hard to get it working using these links... 
https://docs.freebsd.org/doc/7.3-RELEASE/usr/share/doc/en/articles/compiz-fusion/nvidia-setup.html
https://cooltrainer.org/a-freebsd-desktop-howto/
https://vermaden.wordpress.com/2018/03/29/freebsd-desktop-part-1-simplified-boot/
https://antumdeluge.wordpress.com/2014/07/19/how-to-install-freebsd/

The last one was a little bit more legible since I didn't have to use "startx" after it booted to get the GUI. 
But the whole thing was inconsistent. I watched a video where these guys had installed freebsd and gotten fluxbox running within a few minutes. I spent a whole day... couldn't get FreeBSD working with Xorg, Openbox and XDM running. 
By contrast, I had MacOS backup and running (with all my preferences) within 30 mins. 

Another factor was that the system boot up was inconsistent. My system would boot up and then show a whole bunch of errors before loading on FreeBSD. Then it would stall half way. Press the reset button and it would boot up again the same then would stall at a line with the hostname stating that the hostname was too small. OK... I gave the hostname Albert. I call my computer Albert.. Don't tell me FreeBSD has a problem with that. 
Press the reset button again and then it would restart and it would panic again in the middle.. Press reset again, it would boot to the login screen. 
And then when finally I got it to login to OpenBox.. it would not recognize my keyboard. I have a Bastron Glass Keyboard. 

I did this about 3 - 4 times, spending about 5 hours on it. Finally gave up and went back to MacOS.. I wish I had taken screenshots of the whole experience. 
Once I was in OpenBox, I noticed that the default fonts and mouse pointers and I understand that these things are aesthetic.. They can be changed easily.. And there are other things that need to be setup. 
The level control of FreeBSD is great... I just wish that I had a better grasp on it.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Nov 25, 2018)

Not to nitpick but I don't see my link listed. 

https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/...-set-up-a-freebsd-desktop-from-scratch.61659/

You're surely not going to quit now. I don't know why your keyboard isn't being recognized or you're throwing errors but you've been at it too long to give up now.

Is your machine name Albert or albert? It may not make any difference but I've always used lowercase letters. The one I'm on now is onryo, my X61 is unagi and both have fewer letters.


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## Deleted member 55181 (Nov 25, 2018)

I start use (Mint, Ubuntu, Debian PC-BSD and) FreeBSD as desktop at 2013-2014. KDE4 rlz, rest of tool giving VirtualBox, but is no game, and mounting Memstick may be problematic, and data on it may be disapear  but fck the NTFS. That's all.


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## knightjp (Nov 25, 2018)

Maybe I should quit trying to build a GUI and then use KDE instead. I believe its completely configurable and has all the features that I would be looking for.


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## ProphetOfDoom (Nov 26, 2018)

Yeah if you just follow the handbook and Google a few things you can have a working KDE desktop in half an hour. There’s a reason the mainstream GUIs are mainstream: they work!


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## Vull (Nov 27, 2018)

KDE/Plasma/qt5 solved my problem nicely. My problem was finding a GUI frontend for my web app server software, so that any office worker who was casually familiar with computers could access the server console securely (i.e., with a password), for routine info after a networking panic, or for routine maintenance if it was ever necessary. Rather than, y'know, having to write detailed instructions on how to login to a text terminal and type commands that would be like Greek to them, at a command prompt. Writing such documentation is time-consuming and what-I-don't-like. This was easy enough on Debian using the Mate Desktop, which is remarkably Windows-like and familiar enough to most Windows users.

I read here where several users are using the Mate port for FreeBSD successfully, and at first aspired to be one of them, but when I switch over to the main text-based virtual terminal on my console (ttyv0 i.e. CTRL-ALT-F1), after any reasonable period of desktop activity on the graphical terminal at CTRL-ALT-F9, I see gobs of error messages from something like gnome-keyring-daemon (or whatever it's called), and also from Firefox, which shouldn't be there, and which I don't see when using the "kde5" KDE/Plasma/qt5 port for the same purposes.

The gnome-keyring thing seems to be a Linux thing, nobody is doing any kind of social networking password-remembering type of thing on the server console, I can't seem to figure out how to disable it properly (although I have no problem disabling it on Debian or Ubuntu), and I'd like to simply delete it and be done with it, but it can't be removed without taking the whole of the Mate port with it, because of the dependencies. I have no analysis of the Firefox problem and am not pursuing one.

On top of that, on the older hardware I'm using for server development, a simple task like moving a terminal window is unreasonably slow and sluggish, like trying to drag a bit of tissue paper through molasses. I don't know what the problem is here really because I have no such sluggishness using kde5, LXDE, or XFCE on the same hardware.

The kde5 port has solved all these problems for me, and has thus supplanted the mate port on my FreeBSD machines, although I do like the Mate Desktop on Linux, and I'm still using it for the Debian implementation of my web app server software development. My gut impression (without much research to back it up, really) is that Mate is "native" to Linux, whereas KDE aspires to be better, and probably, arguably, succeeds at being better, at cross-platform portability. KDE seems more "native" to FreeBSD to me, moreso, even than it seems native on Linux. I've tried KDE on Debian, Kubuntu, and even on Linux Mint 19, and on all those platforms I still prefer Mate, but for FreeBSD, so far at least, it's definitely gonna be KDE all the way for me.


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## Sevendogsbsd (Nov 27, 2018)

Glad you got that working - KDE was fine for me on Linux but since my switch to FreeBSD, I have gone the opposite direction and gone minimalist. KDE plasma 5 was buggy at the time I tried it on FreeBSD so have gone back to the basics. My desktop now is perfect for me.


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## Vull (Nov 27, 2018)

If I wasn't so enamored of kde5 I'd probably go with LXDE as a more minimalist approach, but admittedly I've been nostalgic about KDE ever since I first discovered it back in the install-freebsd-from-a-series-of-CDs days.


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## Sevendogsbsd (Nov 27, 2018)

I have always been a Gnome user, since v1.0 back in the 90's, but since the 3.0 "upgrade", I dumped it and jumped around, finally settling on KDE. That was on Linux. On FreeBSD I have never used a DE, only window managers, for whatever reason...I don't need all of the functionality a full DE brings - I have the tools I need and I am happy. Currently using x11-wm/windowmaker and x11-fm/xfe for file duties and everything works just fine. I can go even more "minimal" with a tiling wm, or the various other flavors of x11-wm/evilwm that I like. Windowmaker is working well for me so trying to stick with it.

I am just glad we have choices!


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## ProphetOfDoom (Nov 28, 2018)

Gnome 3: it doesn’t work, but behold the elegant ergonomic future-proof way in which it fails to work.


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## knightjp (Dec 1, 2018)

Tried FreeBSD again. This time I took pictures to show the issues.
The first issue is the errors starting just before the FreeBSD screen.
The second is what happens 1/2 way during the boot where it freezes. This happened 5 times. After 5 presses of the reset button, it came to the third.
The third is where it boots up but takes a long time and has issues with the name of my computer.

After which I installed Openbox and xdm. After which my mouse ceased to work. It worked before. I’ve done the hald & dbus adds to /etc/rc.conf

I’m gonna try again, this time with KDE and SDDM.. let’s see what happens.


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## yuripv (Dec 1, 2018)

knightjp could you please rotate those pictures? 

Which version are you trying to install?


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## Phishfry (Dec 1, 2018)

knightjp your first screen looks like you have a ZFS problem. Have you considered trying UFS. ZFS is a very powerful filesystem but I feel it is good to learn on UFS first. It is much simpler.

I see you have 7 hard drives connected. Why not start with just one.


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## knightjp (Dec 1, 2018)

Phishfry said:


> knightjp your first screen looks like you have a ZFS problem. Have you considered trying UFS. ZFS is a very powerful filesystem but I feel it is good to learn on UFS first. It is much simpler.
> 
> I see you have 7 hard drives connected. Why not start with just one.


It is just one HDD.. I chose the auto-ZFS when installing. I only have two hard drives in the system and one is formatted to APFS and isn’t even touched during the install.
I don’t quite understand why it shows 7. Perhaps I should try UFS, but ZFS is a main feature of why people like FreeBSD and I thought that it would be the best choice then.

Right now I’m having an issue installing Xorg. Didn’t have it before. It stalls on fetching llvm60 when using pkg install method.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Dec 1, 2018)

knightjp said:


> Perhaps I should try UFS, but ZFS is a main feature of why people like FreeBSD and I thought that it would be the best choice then..



I prefer UFS over ZFS. It suits my needs and is easy to work with. The attraction for me is the base system, being able to build my own desktop from scratch and get a rock-solid custom desktop every time without fail.


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## drhowarddrfine (Dec 1, 2018)

Hm. I think the first one--maybe two--are hardware errors; the first complaining about the disk drive. The last one is only complaining because it doesn't have a FQDN. In 16 years, I've never had any issues installing FreeBSD on any hardware I've had.


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## Beastie (Dec 1, 2018)

knightjp said:


> It is just one HDD.. I chose the auto-ZFS when installing. I only have two hard drives in the system and one is formatted to APFS and isn’t even touched during the install.
> I don’t quite understand why it shows 7.


Perhaps these are BIOS partitions/BSD slices. Since you have 2 disks, one must have 4 partitions and the other 3.



knightjp said:


> Perhaps I should try UFS, but ZFS is a main feature of why people like FreeBSD and I thought that it would be the best choice then.


Some may staunchly disagree, but IMHO ZFS is overkill for most people. And no, I don't like FreeBSD because of ZFS; in fact I've never used ZFS.


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## yuripv (Dec 1, 2018)

Beastie said:


> Some may staunchly disagree, but IMHO ZFS is overkill for most people. And no, I don't like FreeBSD because of ZFS; in fact I've never used ZFS.



And I'll do just that if we are trading IMHOs as that can possibly affect the choice for knightjp   IMHO, ZFS should be used everywhere unless UFS is strictly required.


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## ProphetOfDoom (Dec 1, 2018)

Call me an end user, but I can’t help thinking if you _notice_ your file system, something has gone seriously wrong. Windows Vista was the only OS I’ve ever used on which the file system was so awful it became noticeable.


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## knightjp (Dec 1, 2018)

Ok... This is getting annoying. 3 hours of trying and pkg install has failed about 30 - 40 times. I’m trying to post the picture of the “Operation Timed Out” error and photos keep being loaded upside down.

I have to keep on typing pkg install kde5 for it continue from the place where it stopped fetching.

It did the same thing for the same amount of time when installing Xorg. 
What is going on? 

I give someone else instructions on installing FreeBSD and KDE and they sail through it. I can get it to even “pkg install” anything without it failing.


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## yuripv (Dec 1, 2018)

I'm seeing the same here at the moment (pkg download timeouts) which could mean it's a general problem with FreeBSD pkg repository, and not your local one.


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## Vull (Dec 1, 2018)

I've also had problems with ZFS, and have gone back to using UFS instead.  I tend to blame it on my hardware, but I don't really know why I had these problems.

I haven't done a 64 bit install for awhile, but I always use at least 3 partitions, one for EFI, one for freebsd-swap, and one for freebsd-ufs with its mount point set to "/". The guided UFS partitioning option has worked for me too, in some of my past installs.

I've had problems with timezones which I didn't really understand, but they went away when I set my hardware clock to UTC (Greenwich Mean Time, or 5-6 hours ahead of my local time zone, which is either Central Standard (UTC-6) or Central Daylight Savings (UTC-5). Every time I ever answered the question "Is your clock set to UTC?"  with "No" instead of "Yes", I've had a botched install.

I've also seen the error where it complains about an unqualified hostname and tries to send me mail, which then fails, because I disabled the Sendmail service in the System Hardening options. Sendmail then fails, but keeps retrying repeatedly. I read vermaden's installation guide the other day and I noticed that he appends ".local" to his hostname, which I'm guessing might be his workaround for that problem. I usually don't append ".local" to my hostname, but I did try doing it once, and had no problems with it. Alternatively, you might try just not disabling Sendmail... it's possible that whatever message it's trying to send you might be informative. Good luck with it, I'm sure you can get it to work eventually. I had a lot of botched installs until I found a formula that works and stuck with it.


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## knightjp (Dec 1, 2018)

I finally got everything installed. On reboot the system stated an uptime of 5 hrs and 38 mins. That’s how long I was at it. The last 30 downloads needed for KDE5 completed in record time; just after I threatened to install Windows 10 if it gave me one more timed out. 
Guess my computer hates Windows as much as I do. 

I seriously like KDE and all its configurable options. I could make it into the desktop I want. 
There is only one issue.. I can’t get my keyboard working with the system now. It will use a generic wireless keyboard I borrowed from my sister, but not my Bastron Glass Keyboard. 
Don’t get it. It detected the keyboard during startup and boot. It just doesn’t work after the OS is completely booted. 

Hence the reason I’m typing this on MacOS right now.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Dec 1, 2018)

Vull said:


> I've also seen the error where it complains about an unqualified hostname and tries to send me mail, which then fails, because I disabled the Sendmail service in the System Hardening options. Sendmail then fails, but keeps retrying repeatedly. I read vermaden's installation guide the other day and I noticed that he appends ".local" to his hostname, which I'm guessing might be his workaround for that problem. I usually don't append ".local" to my hostname, but I did try doing it once, and had no problems with it. Alternatively, you might try just not disabling Sendmail... it's possible that whatever message it's trying to send you might be informative.



With all due respect, disabling Sendmail because you can't fix the problem sounds like a Linuxism to me and not the way we do things in the Land of the FreeBSD.

All have for my local address in /etc/aliases is this. jitte is my username and unmei my machine. I get my daily mail with no problem:


```
root:    jitte@unmei
```

Don't feel bad. It took me a long time to figure out something simple as that. I never read the Handbook back then for some reason other than "refusal to do so when advised" and learned things the hard way.


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## Vull (Dec 1, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> With all due respect, disabling Sendmail because you can't fix the problem sounds like a Linuxism to me and not the way we do things in the Land of the FreeBSD.
> 
> All have for my local address in /etc/aliases is this. jitte is my username and unmei my machine. I get my daily mail with no problem:
> 
> ...


Thanks, but I never disable sendmail to fix any problem, but rather, because it's offered as a System Hardening option. I normally set all the System Hardening options as security measures. What I was actually recommending in the snippet you quoted was to NOT disable sendmail.  I'm not a Linux devotee although I don't dis it, and started using FreeBSD in the late 1990s after reading _The Complete FreeBSD_ by Greg Lehey, before I had even tried Linux.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Dec 2, 2018)

I stand corrected, Sir. I misread what you said.

I don't set all the Hardening Options during setup. These are what I use:


```
Disable process dubugging facilities for unprivledged users
Ramndomize the PID for newly created processes
Insert stack guard page ahead of the growable segments
```

"Disable reading kernel message buffer for unprivledged users" disables your ability as a user to run `dmesg`. I set one other regarding tmp files manually in /etc/rc.conf.

I based my statement of it being a Linuxism on recent discussion of how they dealt with, or opinion of, certain with things on thieir dicso of choice that influenced my opinion as a FreeBSD user.


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## Vull (Dec 2, 2018)

Trihexagonal said:


> I stand corrected, Sir. I misread what you said.
> 
> I don't set all the Hardening Options during setup. These are what I use:
> 
> ...


I prefer FreeBSD myself but I've used GNU/Linux whenever my employers insisted on it, mostly Red Hat in the days before Fedora, and there are still times when I use Debian because the hardware at hand has trouble running FreeBSD. The only OS I really try to avoid is Windows but I'll use whatever people want as long as it gets the job done.


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## kstef (Dec 2, 2018)

Have been using FreeBSD as a daily driver for about a week now. Everything worked out of the box except a couple of things.
I couldn't get x11/nvidia-driver working (I wanna use an external monitor), but solved the problem simply installing  nvidia-driver-340 instead of -390.

And I had to add this line to /etc/login.conf to get character encoding work properly.

```
:charset=UTF-8:\
```

*---EDIT*
*@yuripv* Right, thanks. Seems to work the same, still displays the characters properly, but LC_* have changed, so I'll give you that!


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## yuripv (Dec 2, 2018)

kstef said:


> Have been using FreeBSD as a daily driver for about a week now. Everything worked out of the box except a couple of things.
> I couldn't get x11/nvidia-driver working (I wanna use an external monitor), but solved the problem simply installing  nvidia-driver-340 instead of -390.
> 
> And I had to add this line to /etc/login.conf to get character encoding work properly.
> ...



The charset keyword doesn't really do much except for settting the MM_CHARSET environment variable; what you really need is set the lang keyword to anything UTF-8, e.g. en_US.UTF-8.


----------



## mefizto (Dec 4, 2018)

Hi @Sensucht94,



Sensucht94 said:


> +1 for Enlightenment built from scratch, recently attempted the same on OpenIndiana:



Is it possible to install OpenIndiana without the default DE, or did you just disabled the DE and installed E22?  What package repositories are you using?

Thank you,

M


----------



## Sensucht94 (Dec 8, 2018)

mefizto said:


> Hi @Sensucht94,


Hi !


> Is it possible to install OpenIndiana without the default DE, or did you just disabled the DE and installed E22?


Sure it is, at least last time I tried; in addition, installation can be carried out either manually from CLI (not recommended), or using guided installer, again, either through classical Solaris 'Text Installer', or from X, following the GUI install wizard. In all those cases you should be able to choose to install desktop or not.

I just installed the whole thing with Text installer, then refreshed hipster IPS publisher  (the official repo) and  installed E22 from it (openbox, awesome-wm, notion-3 are available too), keeping MATE as fallback. Obviously if you have LightDM or XDM services enabled, you'll have to add Enlightenement to .xprofile or .xsession respectively.



> What package repositories are you using?


I was using hipster (default), hipster-emcumbered (providing stuff built with libmp3lame support, such as ffmpeg, vlc, audacity, rithmbox, mpd) and localhostoih from the SFE community database, nowadays practically providing Libreoffice and Wine32 only, which is a pity, given that since a couple of years ago  SFE repo crawled with fresh software...I remember thousands of packages built for OpenIndiana and Solaris. If you ever tried OpenSolaris back in its days, you'd know how many packages, including games, were available on the Blastwave community repo, which SFE was forked from.

The only way to achieve a  more diverse software availability on OI, is using Joyent's pkgsrc binaris for Illumos, which  - god  bless pkgsrc - adds tons of more packages (e.g. i3, XFCE, Darktable, Firefox Quantum) and works shamelessly on OI.

Yet, I see OI development is progressively slowing down, to the point they contribution is become clone to insignificant in the Illumos world; and as I mentioned above, SFE repo is dying. That's way I've moved completely to Tribblix meanwhile: simple, lightweight,  old-school distribution, installs automatically in 2 minutes with a sh script, reminds a lot NetBSD and Slackware; uses classic SVR4 packages, grouped in overlays (meta-packages) to easily manage through its zap() utility; supports IA-32, SPARC64 as well as  UFS-root too, all things which are rare nowadays in Illumos. Tribblix software availability is at least 2x than OI; additionally, a pkgsrc bootstrap is pre-configured as a zap overlay. There's also a tool, named ips2svr4, to convert Solaris IPS packages to SVR4 format.

zap is an awesome util, in the way it can perform major system upgrades and can manage zones; oh, and the Tribblix variant named OmniTribblix allows building LX Zones.

Last but not least, the creator wrote several useful managment tools in java (see tribblix-tools overlay)

It's sad to admit that while OI was migrating userland from python 2.7 to 3.5, Tribblix was moving to python3.7 already

Anyway, this is Tribblix 0m20.5 with CDE 2.30_1 running on my Pentium 4 Netburst from 2000, UFS root


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## mefizto (Dec 8, 2018)

Hi Sensucht94,

thank you very much for your detailed answer.  Based on it, I found both the Text Install and the Minimal Install.  I have OnmiOSce running on one of my servers and have been experimenting with OI on my laptop, but would prefer a different WM/DE.

I am rather surprised about your conclusion regarding OI, I have been following it for a while and my impression is that after a long lull when Alasdair Lumsden resigned, the development resumed.

I had also found Triblix, but as I understand it is a one person affair, so I am concerned about a longer term viability. However, based on your recommendation, I will try it.

Since you are knowledgeable about Solaris, do you think that from a long term perspective it might be possible to use OmniOSce as a base and use pkgsrc?  BTW, it seems like John Marino (marino) is also a Solaris fan, but currently his work on (Solaris) ravenports slowed. 

This may already be rather off-topic, so if you agree and would be willing to answer, you may do so _via _pm.

Kindest regards,

M


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## Sensucht94 (Dec 8, 2018)

mefizto said:


> I am rather surprised about your conclusion regarding OI, I have been following it for a while and my impression is that after a long lull when Alasdair Lumsden resigned, the development resumed.



Don't get me wrong, I'm still fond of OpenIndiana: it is the true OpenSolaris spiritual descendant (like probably SmartOS is SXCE's), still keeping it Nimbus UI alive, pushing towards Solaris desktop usage, maintaining SunStudio12.1 in base in spite of Illumos adoption of GCC. OI's devs are very knowledgeable, but also prone to provide entry-level support. Yet it's about ~5 truly active maintainers we're speaking, and they clearly have not much time to spend on OI. I'll admit that some of the recent changes, like KVM zones, GCC8, Rust, KPTI/FPU fixes, MATE 1.2, represented great achievements, but to me it's clear that OI nowadays is out of fashion, and illumos-joyent branch, is where serious development is currently at; Tribblix at least tries to keep up with new additions


PS: you surely know more than me; it's true I've been in and out Solaris for nearly 10 years now, but I'm just an passionate amateur,not even a tech guy


----------



## mefizto (Dec 8, 2018)

Hi Sensucht94,

thank you again for the answer.  Yes, the Joynet appears to be the most active, see pyret rundown.  Alas, it appears to be a RAM based hypervisor.



Sensucht94 said:


> PS: you surely know more than me; it's true I've been in and out Solaris for nearly 10 years now, but I'm just an passionate amateur,not even a tech guy



Ha, ha, you could not be more wrong. ;-)

Kindest regards,

M


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Dec 8, 2018)

This is really interesting. I have two questions:
1) Are Solaris and its descendants likely to support similar hardware to FreeBSD? I’m particularly concerned about my D-Link USB WiFi dongle (i think the driver is called “rum”-something).
2) Do Solaris’ descendants have authoritarian community codes of conduct like the new Linux one? It would be lovely to use an OS that doesn’t have a freaking worldview attached to it.


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## mefizto (Dec 8, 2018)

Hi AlexanderProphet,

I can only speak from my limited experience, perhaps pyret  will be able to provide more details.

Re 1: I have OmniOSce running on a SUPERMICRO MBD-X9SCM-F-O as a headless server, which previously ran FreeBSD. All of the motherboard hardware works.  I switched due to problems with SMB, the in-kernel CIFS/SMB implementation appears to be superior. 
I had previous version of OI installed on ThinkPad R61, where everything except card-reader worked out-of-the-box.

From my search, some drivers are/have been adopted from FreeBSD.

Re 2: I have not read anything like that.

Here are a few interesting links:
https://www.linuxquestions.org/ques...pressions-by-a-bsd-user-4175626757/page2.html
https://geekblood.wordpress.com/2017/10/26/installing-x11-and-a-desktop-environment-on-omnios/

Kindest regards,

M


----------



## Sensucht94 (Dec 9, 2018)

pyret said:


> SmartOS was developed by Joyent and is really a hypervisor only.  A new release is published every 2 weeks and Joyent engineers actively watch the mailing list and provide support via email.  It is excellent and Joyent has moved to FreeBSD's bhyve to replace KVM.  You can run almost any x86-based operating system (I had Plan 9, 9front, OS/2 via eComstation and ArcaOS, running) on SmartOS



SmartOS is such a nice piece of software. I have several Linux distros, including Alpine (musl), bootstrapped on LX Zones on.  SmartOS bhyve VM running on my FreeBSD/amd64 box



> XStreamOS was developed and maintained by Sonicle, an Italian company.  July 1, 2017 was the last release, so I'm uncertain of its status, but appears to have stalled.  I had it installed and it was excellent, and surpassed OI as a desktop OS



I'm very concerned about XStreamOS too, I agree on it faring better than anything else as an Illumos desktop. My first Illumos distribution to tell the truth, and I like the conservative Unixist approach and the xstreamos-illumos branch, compared with illumos-gate and illumos-joyent, which progressively integrated many GNUisms.
As an Italian, I saw Sonicle personally in Milan. As far as I can tell, it's still selling XStreamNAS and their other server products; probably they just lost interest in the desktop development, given the abysmal userbase. IIRC,  last time someone from Sonicle posted on illumos-devel ML, he said they were trying to port Apache OpenOffice



> I still have the original OpenSolaris release on DVD, as well as SXCE (Solaris Express Community Edition aka Project Nevada) which preceded OpenSolaris (codename by Sun was Project Indiana).



I still have OSol 2008.05 CD-ROM too; my first experience ever with *nix, I was 14, bought it preloaded on a Toshiba Tecra M10

I don't know if you ever heard about it, but you forgot to mention another cool Illumos project, with is v9os
, another one-man initiative, small SPARC64-only server-oriented Solaris (no  direct relationship with OpenSXCE AFAIK, unlike Tribblix/sparc)

The there's the very young and experimental Unleashed OS, more or less a R&Dproject with the aim of porting BSD technologies to SunOS 5.11


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## Sensucht94 (Dec 9, 2018)

AlexanderProphet said:


> Are Solaris and its descendants likely to support similar hardware to FreeBSD?



Desktop hardware support hasn't received great updates since Illumos forked. Intel DRM is supported up to Haswell, Nvidia GPUs have binary drivers, no Radeon support. WiFi NICs support is ancient.

That said Illumos runs smoothly on 2 laptops of mine, but you have to stay with ~7 years old hardware at least


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## DutchDaemon (Dec 10, 2018)

I'm gently requesting participants to get back on topic in here. We're not venturing out into a discussion about a wide array of desktop operating systems.


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## knightjp (Jan 18, 2019)

I'm quite impressed with FreeBSD 12. From all the reviews I'm reading, it seems that FreeBSD 12 has become easier to configure and use as a desktop (according to the reviewers). I know I've tried getting FreeBSD 11 running on my computer in attempts to switch to FreeBSD. 
Looking closely at my requirements, at work, I'm forced to use Windows and At home, my preference as always been MacOS. I notice that I should be able to get everything at home on FreeBSD. I'm not tied solely to proprietary software. I use VLC for playing my videos over a network on Linux Server, I use Firefox and Brave browser for web browsing and streaming youtube. 
In my past experiences with FreeBSD installations, I did have issues which I believe could easily be resolved. In the past I attempted to build a desktop using OpenBox. The main issues were trying to do things that I think most of us take for granted like Automounting a USB or External Hard Drive when you plug it in, Notifications, etc.. 
I guessing that by using KDE5 I will have most of these resolved. Don't really know considering the last time I tried to install FreeBSD, there was an issue where all the pkg install was timing out all the time. No clue what was the issue since there was no issue with my internet. In the end, I gave up and went back to my trusty High Sierra installation. 

All in all, I'm looking for a fully featured desktop like what I would get with MacOS. So far MacOS does everything I need with the exception of theming. 

Another thing that I would like to know about before moving over to FreeBSD, how does one get the same functionality of the Apple Ecosystem in FreeBSD? I like the way that data, etc is shared in between my iOS devices and my desktop computer. I know I will loose much of that in the move, but is there a way to recreate it using other alternative apps?


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## Beastie7 (Jan 18, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Another thing that I would like to know about before moving over to FreeBSD, how does one get the same functionality of the Apple Ecosystem in FreeBSD?



I've been tip-toeing my way into a FreeBSD-only environment as well. I do intend on purchasing another new T480 soon as my daily driver + Game Dev machine.

In terms of functionality - are we talking iCloud sync? I've come to find that NextCloud will resolve most (if not all) of my syncing needs - albeit you may have to manage your own servers. If you don't want to manage your own servers - i've read ProtonMail + SpiderOak is a great service combo you can subscribe to. In fact, first party iOS apps (Mail, contacts, calendars, etc) have support for custom IMAP/CardDav/CalDav accounts so you don't re-learn new apps.

In terms of all first party utilities (ie. Disk utility, activity monitor, Time Machine, etc) in macOS - FreeBSD already provides most of those in base - although via CLI so you may want to brush up on your shell-fu. If you prefer GUI alternatives - there's many Qt or GTK (eek!) apps in our 'app store' - ports! 

My only gripe is lack of Netflix support, and a few content creation apps.


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## drhowarddrfine (Jan 18, 2019)

knightjp I've been using FreeBSD as my desktop for 16 years. So do many others. I don't understand the problem.


Beastie7 said:


> My only gripe is lack of Netflix support


That's Netflix' problem, not FreeBSD's. Actually, it's Google's problem for them to fix cause they won't make Vine work.


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## knightjp (Jan 18, 2019)

Beastie7 said:


> My only gripe is lack of Netflix support, and a few content creation apps.


Quite interesting since I heard that Netflix uses FreeBSD as the base for its servers, etc. 



Beastie7 said:


> In terms of functionality - are we talking iCloud sync? I've come to find that NextCloud will resolve most (if not all) of my syncing needs - albeit you may have to manage your own servers. If you don't want to manage your own servers - i've read ProtonMail + SpiderOak is a great service combo you can subscribe to. In fact, first party iOS apps (Mail, contacts, calendars, etc) have support for custom IMAP/CardDav/CalDav accounts so you don't re-learn new apps.
> 
> In terms of all first party utilities (ie. Disk utility, activity monitor, Time Machine, etc) in macOS - FreeBSD already provides most of those in base - although via CLI so you may want to brush up on your shell-fu. If you prefer GUI alternatives - there's many Qt or GTK (eek!) apps in our 'app store' - ports!


Interesting... I will look into those. To be honest, I don't use much of iCloud storage etc.. I only like the features that update contacts, notes, calendars. The trouble with some solutions, we never know when the servers will be shut down, etc.


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## Beastie7 (Jan 18, 2019)

drhowarddrfine said:


> That's Netflix' problem, not FreeBSD's. Actually, it's Google's problem for them to fix cause they won't make Vine work.



No fault to FreeBSD - but the matter that is the problem exists for me. Could you go into detail about the Vine work? 

What about Netflix on Firefox? 



knightjp said:


> Quite interesting since I heard that Netflix uses FreeBSD as the base for its servers, etc.



Yeah. I don't understand. FreeBSD drives most of their business - one would think they'd provide support for it.


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## Spartrekus (Jan 18, 2019)

asifnaz said:


> I know FreeBSD is a very stable OS . I want to use it as Desktop OS (with some GUI) . How do I do that..?



I use FreeBSD for its stability. I used it on Pi since some time, and it is highly stable.
I fear Linux  for its networking layer for professional use, which not as reliable as all *BSD*, incl. FreeBSD. 
Robust = BSD. Years of experience and very stable, reliable, and free as freedom.

Desktop with icewm is cool, nice stable, and never ever clashed a single time. Just positive feedbacks.

For RPI3b, no support yet, but it might happen at some point in several years.


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## knightjp (Jan 18, 2019)

drhowarddrfine said:


> knightjp I've been using FreeBSD as my desktop for 16 years. So do many others. I don't understand the problem.


I'm sure you're well versed with the whole system, but I'm mostly a novice. I was mostly talking about the stuff that we take for granted in modern Operating systems like, auto-mounting external drives, good notifications, fonts aliasing, etc...
I'm pretty sure that I will be able to learn how to do stuff, but it will take some time. 
I would like to know how to build a really good desktop using OpenBox that has all the modern features without me having to use KDE5.


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## Sevendogsbsd (Jan 18, 2019)

Building a desktop that will do all of those things is certainly possible but you hit on the key: will take some time. The OS does not hold your hand like OSX, Windows or Linux, but the things you describe can be achieved. You will not find the level of integration like you see on iOS or OSX, but to be fair, no other OS has this level of integration. Not an Apple fan so not touting them, just stating my experience.

Be patient, ask questions and in the end, you will have a rock solid, stable OS that does what you need, or mostly anyway .


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## Beastie7 (Jan 18, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I'm sure you're well versed with the whole system, but I'm mostly a novice. I was mostly talking about the stuff that we take for granted in modern Operating systems like, auto-mounting external drives, good notifications, fonts aliasing, etc...
> I'm pretty sure that I will be able to learn how to do stuff, but it will take some time.
> I would like to know how to build a really good desktop using OpenBox that has all the modern features without me having to use KDE5.



I cannot recommend vermadens desktop guide enough. It goes over setup and configuration of building your desktop - with brief explanations of what components do. Don't get discouraged by the multitude of steps either - it's crazy simple.

For a WM system notification daemon - have a look at sysutils/dunst.


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## olli@ (Jan 18, 2019)

Beastie7 said:


> My only gripe is lack of Netflix support


Interestingly (and thankfully), the Eurosport Player works fine with FreeBSD + Chromium. So I can watch Snooker tournaments in a window while coding.


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## Ogis (Jan 18, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Automounting a USB or External Hard Drive when you plug it in


I can recommend an ingeniously simple program called dsbmd. Here is official site. You can install it as package, or compile it by yourself. And here is forum thread. 


knightjp said:


> Notifications


Just use Dunst. You can install it as package, or compile it by yourself. Dunst is a highly configurable and lightweight notification-daemon: The only thing it displays is a colored box with unformatted text. The whole notification specification (non-optional parts and the "body" capability) is supported as long as it fits into this look & feel. Dunst is designed to fit nicely into minimalistic windowmanagers.


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## PMc (Jan 18, 2019)

drhowarddrfine said:


> knightjp I've been using FreeBSD as my desktop for 16 years. So do many others. I don't understand the problem.



Maybe You never used a Mac? 

The main feature a Mac provides is that you don't have to configure an OS and tools and applications, you can straightaway start your creative work - graphics, music, whatever. You don't have to know much about a computer and OS; everything you need is on the GUI.
And thats what they charge their price for, and there is a customer base who is willing to pay.

If that weren't the case, there were no market for these machines, because on the OS level they are just Berkeley (well, almost) - actually anybody could have done this by taking e.g. FreeBSD and putting no-brainer GUI and apps onto it, but the Mac guys were the ones who did (and made the money).

So, yes, I understand the problem. The expectations of a typical Mac user, concerning the ease of configuration, are a lot higher than those of a typical FreeBSD user. Many FreeBSD users love to do the configuration, love to adjust the /etc/rc.conf, to look for the proper applications, configure them properly, and have The Power To Serve under their own discrete control. (Some even love to go into the code and hack it.)

For my taste, the things that have changed during the mentioned 16 years are not very significant (and sometimes annoying) - I need the hardware drivers properly working, office-suite, browser and (something like) vlc compileable, and that's it. For a Mac user they are essential (and probably not yet enough).


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## drhowarddrfine (Jan 18, 2019)

PMc said:


> Maybe You never used a Mac?


I have but I thought the question was about whether one can set up FreeBSD as a desktop and I'm saying lots of us have and use it every day.


PMc said:


> And thats what they charge their price for


And a TON of people don't understand that.


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## Sevendogsbsd (Jan 18, 2019)

So...the reason, at least MY reasons I use FreeBSD as a desktop are I have complete control over it and it is open source. This: 





> The main feature a Mac provides is that you don't have to configure an OS and tools and applications, you can straightaway start your creative work - graphics, music, whatever.


 is precisely the reason I do NOT use commercial operating systems, especially OSX. Not that OSX is bad, but I refuse to be sucked into that entire landscape/infrastructure. I always felt like I was forced to work with blinders on when I had a Mac: I could do zilch to it, it had to be the way Apple wanted it to be, not me.

Maybe if I were a professional photographer or musician I would be forced to use either a Mac or (shudder) Windows, but I am not. Everything I need to do for my personal workstation: edit and organize photos, write (documents and LaTeX), manage finances, play games, write code, I can do on my FreeBSD workstation.

I absolutely love that FreeBSD is simple and has not gotten caught up in an extreme technology race like some other OS's. Every piece of hardware I have works perfectly. The only exception is the OS reading my phone, but that is solvable.

I was a Mac user for 3 or 4 years and dropped the platform because I could no longer stand being so confined, nor being forced to do things the way Apple wanted.

I am extremely passionate about open source: it has been my primary means of computing for 20 years and computing is my life. Geeky? Yes, but it's my calling


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## knightjp (Jan 18, 2019)

I'm not scared of the work, steps or time. I'm just wondering if something in the similar functionality of MacOS features is possible. To be honest, I know it is possible. GhostBSD and TrueOS is proof. However following online guides isn't always as simple many claim. Even in Linux circles, what you see online doesn't always work the way they say it will; even if you have the exact same hardware and distro version. A slight variation in the system hardware or if you neglect an important step, you will be run into issues. I've seen many guides.. even this one..
https://cooltrainer.org/a-freebsd-desktop-howto/
I'm guessing that half the steps on there aren't even important and for a novice like me, I sometimes fail to follow if everything mentioned is important or not. Installation videos don't mention much of the steps in the article makes me wonder what this person is on about. Is it because of an older version of FreeBSD or is it really required. How can I recreate something like TrueOS from scratch without using the Lumia Desktop. 

Anyone who has used MacOS or even a popular Linux distro will get what I'm on about with the features. As for the iOS and desktop integration, I get that is something that I will have to figure out along the way or learn to live without.


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## Sevendogsbsd (Jan 18, 2019)

Totally get what you are saying about features - used OSX, and nearly every Linux distro on Distrowatch. I guess, at least for me, I like "roll your own", which is why I used Gentoo for years. I did fall in Love with KDE5 (Plasma) however, it proved to be massively complex and kind of like driving a Ferrari: it is super cool but at some point it is going to break and it's going to be expensive....

As for your quandary, I just saw GhostBSD was released, a new version based on TruOS but I "think" with the Mate` desktop, which was always their default. Not sure if this was just an announcement or if production ready. Might want to check it out.


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## knightjp (Jan 18, 2019)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> I did fall in Love with KDE5 (Plasma) however, it proved to be massively complex and kind of like driving a Ferrari: it is super cool but at some point it is going to break and it's going to be expensive....


My first BSD install back in the day was DesktopBSD and it was using KDE3. I actually loved KDE. I like it configurability. It is probably the most configurable of the Opensource Desktops. I moved over to MacOS because I had just gotten a secondhand iMac and I was a fan of Mac OS X.  I still like MacOS. I guess that is partially why I'm finding "the switch" difficult.


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## Sevendogsbsd (Jan 18, 2019)

I used to dislike KDE because it was so much like Windows so I used Gnome, then they ruined Gnome with version 3 so I used Xfce4 and Mate` when I used a DE, Fluxbox when using a WM. At the end of my Linux "career" I switched to KDE5 and realized how configurable and really awesome it was. Odd thing is on FreeBSD, I prefer minimalism. No clue why, just do. We users are funny creatures 

OSX isn't bad at all and you are right: everything just works with zero effort. This is great for some folks and not so much for others. I don't want to things to break, but I don't mind taking the time to make the configurations myself. I learn that way and it works for me.


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## knightjp (Jan 19, 2019)

MacOS has been pretty much home for me for many years. So there will be things that I will miss about it. I guess the only way is to take the plunge and see if a properly configured KDE system will be a perfect fit. Looking at reviews like this, it shows that KDE has come a long way from the KDE4 days and has gotten far lighter. So if anyone is a novice, or needs something similar to Windows, I would choose KDE over Gnome3.


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## Spartrekus (Jan 19, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I'm not scared of the work, steps or time. I'm just wondering if something in the similar functionality of MacOS features is possible. To be honest, I know it is possible. GhostBSD and TrueOS is proof. However following online guides isn't always as simple many claim. Even in Linux circles, what you see online doesn't always work the way they say it will; even if you have the exact same hardware and distro version. A slight variation in the system hardware or if you neglect an important step, you will be run into issues. I've seen many guides.. even this one..
> https://cooltrainer.org/a-freebsd-desktop-howto/
> I'm guessing that half the steps on there aren't even important and for a novice like me, I sometimes fail to follow if everything mentioned is important or not. Installation videos don't mention much of the steps in the article makes me wonder what this person is on about. Is it because of an older version of FreeBSD or is it really required. How can I recreate something like TrueOS from scratch without using the Lumia Desktop.
> 
> Anyone who has used MacOS or even a popular Linux distro will get what I'm on about with the features. As for the iOS and desktop integration, I get that is something that I will have to figure out along the way or learn to live without.



I don't know why to make a free operating system to look like Mac or Windows. Unix is more than click and a desktop.
Use habits are different, not focus on desktop.

Mac and Windows are both ideal for looking nice, which does not mean that click and desktop is more efficient. Actually, less powerful.


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## PMc (Jan 19, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> I don't know why to make a free operating system to look like Mac or Windows. Unix is more than click and a desktop.



Because it can be done?  I'm not saying that it _must_ or _should_ be, but there is nothing against it either.

There is another, maybe more serious point to it: people.
People (who are not hackers) got accustomed to perceive a computer as something that looks like Mac or Windows. And then, if you want to be taken serious by people, you ought to behave like they expect.

Its the same as with clothing. Certainly there is more to a human than clothing, but nevertheless a lot of effort is taken about that. And once when I was working for business people, I started to wear suit&tie. I for myself don't see much point it that, but it helped a lot for being taken serious. 

So, if other people tend to look on your desktop (or if it actually is a laptop), and if you care about what they think (or do business with them), then, well... Yes, I know that is stupid, but it's how society works.


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## Sevendogsbsd (Jan 19, 2019)

knightjp said:


> MacOS has been pretty much home for me for many years. So there will be things that I will miss about it. I guess the only way is to take the plunge and see if a properly configured KDE system will be a perfect fit. Looking at reviews like this, it shows that KDE has come a long way from the KDE4 days and has gotten far lighter. So if anyone is a novice, or needs something similar to Windows, I would choose KDE over Gnome3.



Why are you giving up on Mac? Not trying to dissuade you from coming to the dark side  but just curious. If Mac works for you, just run and learn FreeBSD in a VM, that way you can learn about it without disrupting your computing tasks.


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## knightjp (Jan 19, 2019)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> Why are you giving up on Mac?


Because it doesn’t look like this... 



Should be motive enough.. 

However I will say that while I have spent the good amount of 6 hours doing 3 different installs of FreeBSD, I’m beginning to think I’m the most useless user on the planet as I can’t even follow a simple set of instructions. 



I’m getting this error all the time..
Secondly I’m getting this as well



The first time KDE kept crashing an going back to the CLI mode.. Second time it wouldn’t start up at all and just showed a blank screen. 
Couldn’t even get user privileges right... even though I added the user to the group “wheel”, I wasn’t able to “Sudo”.. 
Now I’m stuck writing this on my iPhone while I’m attempting 4th installation. Hope this doesn’t ruin my SSD.


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## PMc (Jan 19, 2019)

Oha.
There is one essential advice, and it has nothing to do with the technology, it has to do with thinking and disciplne: *start with the lowest fault*.

The system -any such system- is very complex. So, only checking if the end-product works or does not work, does not give much information, because the end-product (in this case, the KDE) depends on myriads of sub-systems, and the problem may be anywhere, and may be serious or not.

Most people follow some tutorial, build the thing up unto the end-product, check if that works as expected, and if not, they try a new and different approach.
This is wrong.
Instead, we should be watchful all the time, read the messages, check the logfiles, look for anything that might be an error or a warning, and verify if that might concern us or not. That way we will at least notice the lowest (i.e. first) error in the stack of subsystems, and then can tackle to fix that one.
This may not yet lead to success, but it makes certain that the subsystem stack is okay up to a higher watermark, and we can build on that in the next approach.

So, this is about isolating the errors to their specific subsystem, where they can be fixed, one at a time.

In Your case it means, first build up a proper unix installation that works on the command-line, before starting to approach the network, the graphics, etc. It is about slicing the task to smaller pieces that can be approached and properly tested individually.
Obviousely this is of no concern if things run well up to the end-product - but as soon as errors arise, we should switch our mind to the sliced approach, instead of worrying. 

In Your case, the lowest error is that "error 0x31" from the loader. I've never seen that, and searching the internet I find only one discussion mentioning something similar, and that one is about booting from ZFS-root (which I do not use) and having the boot-code (not) at the right place on disk.

It seems this is not harmful, as the system boots nevertheless (if I understand You right). And consequently it will certainly not be harmful to the desktop installation, and could be ignored for now.
But if I would really want to get rid of it, I would consider that after multiple installs (onto the same disk), there might be remaining artifacts from the former installations. And so, without knowing anything more, I might decide to clean my disk (a clean workplace is always a good thing) by writing zero-bytes onto it, and then go for a new approach.


knightjp said:


> Now I’m stuck writing this on my iPhone



*laugh* not so bad. Once, when my ISP had rebuilt the infrastructure, I was stuck with hopping on my bicycle, ride down to the village, where a branch bank has a free wlan active at nighttime, and there search for possible solutions.


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## Sevendogsbsd (Jan 19, 2019)

knightjp said:


> However I will say that while I have spent the good amount of 6 hours doing 3 different installs of FreeBSD, I’m beginning to think I’m the most useless user on the planet as I can’t even follow a simple set of instructions.
> 
> The first time KDE kept crashing an going back to the CLI mode.. Second time it wouldn’t start up at all and just showed a blank screen.
> Couldn’t even get user privileges right... even though I added the user to the group “wheel”, I wasn’t able to “Sudo”..
> Now I’m stuck writing this on my iPhone while I’m attempting 4th installation. Hope this doesn’t ruin my SSD.



One thing you may not be aware of with FreeBSD is that the OS is completely separated from the end user software, to include the display manager and desktop environment. It is not like Linux which shoves all the software together and installs everything under the sink in one fell swoop.
I would strongly suggest you get answers to your error messages first, before installing x11/xorg, x11/sddm or x11/kde5. One looks like a DNS resolution issue, perhaps /etc/resolv.conf, the other I have no idea.

Start slow, get the basic things working first, then progress to KDE. KDE5 is massively complex with a ton of moving parts. It has only been recently (6 months) been available on FreeBSD so there may be bugs, not sure, I don't use it.

Make sense?


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## Spartrekus (Jan 19, 2019)

PMc said:


> Because it can be done?  I'm not saying that it _must_ or _should_ be, but there is nothing against it either.
> 
> There is another, maybe more serious point to it: people.
> People (who are not hackers) got accustomed to perceive a computer as something that looks like Mac or Windows. And then, if you want to be taken serious by people, you ought to behave like they expect.
> ...



Very nice what you wrote. nice.  

So, desktop or not desktop, ugly command line?  Everyone has right.


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## knightjp (Jan 19, 2019)

Ok.. 
I’m not entirely sure what the boot up error is because even the installation USB has the issue and boots up in the same way. 
No matter what setting (MBR / GPT) i choose or filesystem even, it still comes up the same way. Maybe it’s a BIOS setting that I need to look into. 

As far as other errors go, I’m not entirely sure. The hostname issue was resolved by adding a number to it. 
So it boots up just fine. The only thing is that no matter what instructions I follow, it never works the way it says it should. Either it breaks something that it doesn’t boot up or it keeps failing. 

Either FreeBSD just runs very well on a virtual machine or I’m just really crappy at following simple instructions. Because everything step by step does not seem to be working for me.


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## Deleted member 30996 (Jan 19, 2019)

PMc said:


> There is another, maybe more serious point to it: people.
> People (who are not hackers) got accustomed to perceive a computer as something that looks like Mac or Windows. And then, if you want to be taken serious by people, you ought to behave like they expect.



There goes progress... If acceptance of the status quo was the norm there would be no technological advances.

The horse will get me where I want to go, who needs a car? The propeller driven plane doesn't fall from the sky, who needs a jet?

It's when people don't act as they are expected to and think out of the box that we learn what we've got might not be all we thought it to be.


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## PMc (Jan 19, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Ok..
> So it boots up just fine.



Okay then, just move on. Things to be checked at that point: 
do our disks feel well and have enough free space? (df, mount, zpool status, ...) 
do we have some basic network function? Can we resolve hostnames, ping to other systems, and does our localhost correctly resolve 127.0.01?
(At a later point we may fixup the mailer, get network time, and harden the firewall.)

Then we can approach the next step, the graphics screen (aka X server). 
It should be startable by running the command "X" (as user), and it should give a stable blank screen. (End it with Ctrl-Alt-BkSp). 
When that works, go back to the text screen and start xterm. That should appear on the blank screen and mouse and keyboard should also work there. (Switch screens with Ctrl-Alt-Fn)
Then, you can try to get your browser onto the screen in the same way. I think at that point one could also check if the sound is working.
If any of these steps something fails, there will be error messages - on the console or in /var/log.

Then we can add a window manager and put that together so that it starts up graphical at boot.



> Either FreeBSD just runs very well on a virtual machine or I’m just really crappy at following simple instructions. Because everything step by step does not seem to be working for me.



The problem with these step-by-step instructions is: they just tell you what to do, they do not give you the checkpoints and tests after each step to verify it succeeded as expected (or maybe the reader is expected to have enough experience to know these). It's like putting a car together from all the components, and then putting it on the road and driving, without undergoing component tests and inspection first. Should theoretically work, but in reality it doesnt.


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## Spartrekus (Jan 20, 2019)

Trihexagonal said:


> There goes progress... If acceptance of the status quo was the norm there would be no technological advances.
> 
> The horse will get me where I want to go, who needs a car? The propeller driven plane doesn't fall from the sky, who needs a jet?
> 
> It's when people don't act as they are expected to and think out of the box that we learn what we've got might not be all we thought it to be.



The example is good.

Terminal (termcap,...): the horse
Desktop (Wayland,...GTK): the car
Shining desktop (Mac, Ubuntu,...): the aircraft (maybe)

Can you use the horse, because other people use the car?


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## Spartrekus (Jan 20, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Because it doesn’t look like this...
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Actually, this desktop could be achieved. It could be also working with PLAN9 or even EVILWM on top of X11 (with good nvidia drivers). Actually evilwm would be best adapted because you can change easily key bindings and there is a fantastic resulting efficiency and user-desktop interaction. 
Less mouse, key typing is far faster.


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## knightjp (Jan 20, 2019)

My system: Intel Core i5, 24GB Ram, 250GB Single SSD, 2GB Nvidia GTX 1050 Graphics Card, ASUS Gaming motherboard. 



PMc said:


> Okay then, just move on. Things to be checked at that point:
> do our disks feel well and have enough free space? (df, mount, zpool status, ...)
> do we have some basic network function? Can we resolve hostnames, ping to other systems, and does our localhost correctly resolve 127.0.01?
> (At a later point we may fixup the mailer, get network time, and harden the firewall.)


As far as I know, with the exceptions of the errors upon boot, the system boots up fine and I'm able to browse the system though the CLI and I'm able to use "pkg install" so that means that it connects well to the internet just fine. I have no issues there. I would like to find out about the errors. I still think that it has got something to do with the BIOS. 



PMc said:


> Then we can approach the next step, the graphics screen (aka X server).
> It should be startable by running the command "X" (as user), and it should give a stable blank screen. (End it with Ctrl-Alt-BkSp).
> When that works, go back to the text screen and start xterm. That should appear on the blank screen and mouse and keyboard should also work there. (Switch screens with Ctrl-Alt-Fn)
> .


I installed Xorg and I'm able to use "startx" and it starts up just fine. Have no issues there.  I just need to my nvidia graphics sorted. So that it shows up on all three of my monitors. 




PMc said:


> The problem with these step-by-step instructions is: they just tell you what to do, they do not give you the checkpoints and tests after each step to verify it succeeded as expected (or maybe the reader is expected to have enough experience to know these). It's like putting a car together from all the components, and then putting it on the road and driving, without undergoing component tests and inspection first. Should theoretically work, but in reality it doesnt.


I believe I mentioned the same as well. It almost always never the works in the same way as you see in the article or in the video and you wonder, how did he/she do that? I'm having the same system or something much more capable and it does not work. 
What baffles me is that on one installation, I used pkg install xorg.. and then after that "startx".. It didn't work and kept giving me errors. After which, I did a clean installation again and did the same installation command.. "startx", and it works. Same system, same USB for installation, same network connection, the same set of commands.. Everything the same and this just works? How? What was different?


----------



## Spartrekus (Jan 20, 2019)

2 cents. maybe it could help in any case:

pkg install Xorg icewm xterm xinit

echo icewm > ~/.xinitrc

maybe there is a missing .xinitrc ?


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Jan 20, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> Terminal (termcap,...): the horse
> Desktop (Wayland,...GTK): the car
> Shining desktop (Mac, Ubuntu,...): the aircraft (maybe)



Terminal: MAC truck cause you want to get things done and you move big rocks.
Desktop: Pickup truck can do most things you want done.
Shiny desktop: The family van. Great for soccer moms.


----------



## Spartrekus (Jan 20, 2019)

drhowarddrfine said:


> Terminal: MAC truck cause you want to get things done and you move big rocks.
> Desktop: Pickup truck can do most things you want done.
> Shiny desktop: The family van. Great for soccer moms.



Sounds good, terminal is cool.
Maybe, for the desktop, it could be added: slow and heavy to move.

Maybe it is just matter of own vision about ideal, favorite, desktop/terminal/system/environment.
Btw, would it be interesting to have  a post from an administrator using _Microsoft Windows _about it? It could be much different about terminal especially.


----------



## kpedersen (Jan 20, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> Btw, would it be interesting to have  a post from an administrator using _Microsoft Windows _about it?



Actually my colleague (a rare breed of avid Windows fan who is also not a complete incompetent blind idiot) is very chuffed. Microsoft's long neglected child known as the "Command Prompt" application has seen a lot of love recently (presumably due to OpenSSH and WSL becoming adopted by Windows). The command prompt can now be sized arbitrarily (even fullscreen!) and has *tabs*!

Not quite the terminal multiplexor like tmux or GNU/screen but it means you don't need all these separate command prompt windows lying around everywhere 

Also, in those screenshots it looks like Tony Stark has been spending too long faffing around with his desktop environment than actually doing some work haha!


----------



## PMc (Jan 20, 2019)

knightjp said:


> My system: Intel Core i5, 24GB Ram, 250GB Single SSD, 2GB Nvidia GTX 1050 Graphics Card, ASUS Gaming motherboard.
> 
> As far as I know, with the exceptions of the errors upon boot, the system boots up fine and I'm able to browse the system though the CLI and I'm able to use "pkg install" so that means that it connects well to the internet just fine.



Means, it has a living network and (usually) connects to the internet _somehow_. 



> I installed Xorg and I'm able to use "startx" and it starts up just fine. Have no issues there.  I just need to my nvidia graphics sorted. So that it shows up on all three of my monitors.



Well then, You already took many of the more troublesome steps.



> I believe I mentioned the same as well. It almost always never the works in the same way as you see in the article or in the video and you wonder, how did he/she do that? I'm having the same system or something much more capable and it does not work.



All of us are humans and make mistakes. The howtos may have something forgotten, or have put something into /etc/whatever long ago and it makes a difference, some defaults may change between releases, etc.



> What baffles me is that on one installation, I used pkg install xorg.. and then after that "startx".. It didn't work and kept giving me errors. After which, I did a clean installation again and did the same installation command.. "startx", and it works. Same system, same USB for installation, same network connection, the same set of commands.. Everything the same and this just works? How? What was different?



Something was different, that's for certain. 

It's one thing to build a system that does work. It is quite a different thing to build a system in a 100% defined and repeatable way. And with network installation You can't even be 100% sure that the same things come down the network, as new patchlevels may appear anytime. Thats good for security fixes, but bad for debugging.

For single installation, the best approach probably is to read the error messages, figure out whats wrong, and try to fix it.
For compute-center installations which must be repeatable, one might want to build the ports on-site, log the exact versions (and do the builds in a virtual machine that is cleaned before).


----------



## scottro (Jan 20, 2019)

For NVidia and 3 monitors, IMHO, it's much easier to install the nvidia-settings port and use its GUI interface.  Again, IMHO, I'd rather spend time using things than setting it up, and trying to get that working through finding a tutorial for 3 monitors, as opposed to a laptop and external monitor, or tutorials that are outdated or just plain wrong or don't fit your situation, is MY preferred choice. But I'm old and probably don't have that much time left. 

I think we all start with tutorials, and following them, sometimes blindly sometimes trying to figure out what's behind each step, we ask friends, we use forums and so on, but eventually, we either muddle through or use something else.


----------



## Spartrekus (Jan 20, 2019)

kpedersen said:


> Actually my colleague (a rare breed of avid Windows fan who is also not a complete incompetent blind idiot) is very chuffed. Microsoft's long neglected child known as the "Command Prompt" application has seen a lot of love recently (presumably due to OpenSSH and WSL becoming adopted by Windows). The command prompt can now be sized arbitrarily (even fullscreen!) and has *tabs*!
> 
> Not quite the terminal multiplexor like tmux or GNU/screen but it means you don't need all these separate command prompt windows lying around everywhere
> 
> Also, in those screenshots it looks like Tony Stark has been spending too long faffing around with his desktop environment than actually doing some work haha!



Regular admins of MS will be using command line in the future. Sounds good for a revive of term, termcap,... rediscovering.

post on multiple head: https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/xorg-triple-head-nvidia-twin-view.26825/

// xrandr is cool


----------



## knightjp (Jan 20, 2019)

Finally up and running with all the screens. Installed KDE5 and I guess the next step is the customization.
I’ll publish a post later on how I came to this point.
But only after I’ve solved that boot error message. Still no idea how to fix that. All the web searches turn up nothing.

The next priority is getting my Bastron Glass keyboard to work. Sort of hate using my brothers Razor mechanical one.

I would like to have a FreeBSD logo and a progress bar while the system is starting up other than the usual verbose mode.

(Why do the pictures show the correct way up on my phone and the wrong way up on a Desktop computer?)


----------



## tedbell (Jan 20, 2019)

Did you try using the loader from 11.2? That fixed the BTX Halted issues for me.


----------



## Spartrekus (Jan 20, 2019)

tedbell said:


> Did you try using the loader from 11.2? That fixed the BTX Halted issues for me.



Is the loader of 12.0 working to fix btx issue?


----------



## tedbell (Jan 20, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> Is the loader of 12.0 working to fix btx issue?


It appears to have fixed other users BTX issues. I'm using UFS with MBR (BIOS) and it wouldn't boot with the 12.0 loader. It only boots with 11.2 . I can boot with the 13.0 loader but it's slower than 11.2.


----------



## Spartrekus (Jan 20, 2019)

tedbell said:


> It appears to have fixed other users BTX issues. I'm using UFS with MBR (BIOS) and it wouldn't boot with the 12.0 loader. It only boots with 11.2 . I can boot with the 13.0 loader but it's slower than 11.2.



why could it be slower?


----------



## tedbell (Jan 20, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> why could it be slower?



I dunno. It pauses where 12.0 hangs but then continues. with the 11.2 it doesn't pause at all. This could be specific to my machine though.


----------



## knightjp (Jan 21, 2019)

tedbell said:


> Did you try using the loader from 11.2? That fixed the BTX Halted issues for me.


How do I do that? Should bear in mind that I'm a novice and I just got my system up and running.


----------



## tedbell (Jan 21, 2019)

knightjp said:


> How do I do that? Should bear in mind that I'm a novice and I just got my system up and running.



Do you have an 11.2 install medium available? If not make one. I guess find the install archives by browsing the medium and extract the file /boot/loader. I can't remember where those archives are on the install media so maybe someone else here can answer better. I backed mine up from a previous 11.2 install and if you want I can upload the file somewhere for you. Then 

```
cp loader /boot/loader
```

reboot.

I don't know how far along your install is but if you can install 11.2 and then update you can grab and backup the file that way. But the file is located at /boot/loader. They must have changed something in it why it crashes.


----------



## knightjp (Jan 21, 2019)

tedbell said:


> I don't know how far along your install is but if you can install 11.2 and then update you can grab and backup the file that way. But the file is located at /boot/loader. They must have changed something in it why it crashes.


Thanks for the advise, but it doesn't crash. It just makes gives me this annoying error. 




I recall trying to install FreeBSD 11 and coming across the same thing. I believe I mentioned it at that time as well.


----------



## olli@ (Jan 21, 2019)

(Note: I have transcribed the screenshot via OCR, so it can be found by textual searches.)


knightjp said:


> Thanks for the advise, but it doesn't crash. It just makes gives me this annoying error.
> 
> ```
> BTX loader 1.00  BTX version is 1.02
> ...


The BIOS error code 0x31 means “no media in drive”. I guess your drive `I:` (disk6) is a CD / DVD / BD drive, and there's no disk in the drive. You can simply ignore that message, it's completely harmless.


----------



## Ogis (Jan 21, 2019)

olli@ said:


> The BIOS error code 0x31 means “no media in drive”. I guess your drive `I:` (disk6) is a CD / DVD / BD drive, and there's no disk in the drive. You can simply ignore that message, it's completely harmless.


Yes, you are absolutely right. I also see these messages in my system. I searched for the meanings of these messages  and realized that it's completely harmless.


----------



## knightjp (Jan 22, 2019)

I wish there was a way to stop those messages. Now the next step is to get my keyboard and trackball working. Specialized hardware doesn't do well with FreeBSD I think..


----------



## olli@ (Jan 22, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I wish there was a way to stop those messages.


I always wonder why some people want to get rid of messages that are known to be harmless. Does the word “error” hurt your eyes? Well, you've got the source code, so you can change it to “happy” or whatever you like. In fact you can change it directly in the /boot/loader binary with a hex editor because “error” and “happy” have the same length. 
If you seriously decide to change it in the source, it's in the file stand/i386/libi386/biosdisk.c.


> Now the next step is to get my keyboard and trackball working. Specialized hardware doesn't do well with FreeBSD I think..


Well, it depends. I have some specialized hardware that works well with FreeBSD, including two trackballs (a Logitech MX Ergo and a TrackMan Marble FX).
However, most hardware that uses non-standard protocols, requires proprietary drivers and lacks documentation for developers is unlikely to work with FreeBSD out of the box.


----------



## ralphbsz (Jan 22, 2019)

olli@ said:


> I always wonder why some people want to get rid of messages that are known to be harmless.


That's a deeply philosophical question.  And the answer is that in many cases you are correct, and one is better off living with the error message.

Here are two attempts at a counter-argument, both of limited validity:  (1) For an expert who completely understands the error message and knows for sure it's harmless, that's OK.  But an amateur should always worry about errors/warnings they don't understand, because they could be signs of something serious, which might bite you later.  (2) Having too many error messages that one deliberately ignores may eventually cause one to get into the habit of ignoring them.  And then a really important message shows up (like "your disk is about to fail").  This is about crying "wolf" one too many times.

Obvious joke: Mel Brooks Frankenstein:  "Were wolf?"  "There wolf, there castle".  "Why are you talking like this?"


----------



## ekingston (Jan 22, 2019)

ralphbsz said:
			
		

> Here are two attempts at a counter-argument, both of limited validity:  (1) For an expert who completely understands the error message and knows for sure it's harmless, that's OK.  But an amateur should always worry about errors/warnings they don't understand, because they could be signs of something serious, which might bite you later.  (2) Having too many error messages that one deliberately ignores may eventually cause one to get into the habit of ignoring them.  And then a really important message shows up (like "your disk is about to fail").  This is about crying "wolf" one too many times.



I wouldn't say they are of limited validity. They are both very valid. In the case of #1 the expert should be asking if it is nothing to worry about, why is it an error instead of a notice or warning? In the case of the amateur, researching what the errors actually mean is how they become experts. This non-error error is slowing down that learning process.

In the case of #2, many of the reported breaches were the result of monitoring teams getting used to errors being reported that weren't really significant and so ignoring the actual errors that would have alerted them to the bad-guys trying to break in. Too many false-positives hides the real positives from people's eyes. Tuning your systems error messages is important so that you are overloaded.


----------



## olli@ (Jan 22, 2019)

ekingston said:


> I wouldn't say they are of limited validity. They are both very valid. In the case of #1 the expert should be asking if it is nothing to worry about, why is it an error instead of a notice or warning?


In this case it _is_ really a notice. It only contains the word “error” because the loader just quotes the error code that the BIOS reports back. And in case you want to boot from the CD/DVD drive, it _is_ actually an error if there is no disc inserted. If you don't want to boot from it, then it's not an error.

However, I agree that it would be useful if the loader binary contained a list of the few dozen BIOS error codes and translated the numbers to text, so users don't have to guess what 0x31 means.


----------



## PMc (Jan 22, 2019)

olli@ said:


> In this case it _is_ really a notice. It only contains the word “error” because the loader just quotes the error code that the BIOS reports back. And in case you want to boot from the CD/DVD drive, it _is_ actually an error if there is no disc inserted. If you don't want to boot from it, then it's not an error.



If this is indeed a BIOS error (don't know about these, I thought it is a regular errno.h error), then shouldn't it be possible to adjust the bootlist in the BIOS? Anyway, I also have an empty DVD that should be bootable, and never seen such error.

Besides, I'd like to agree to ekingston and ralphbsz - the unix tradition says, correct behaviour is signalled by *no message*, so over time one develops a view "from the corner of one's eye" that instinctively kicks adrenaline if there is some new output.


----------



## shkhln (Jan 22, 2019)

ekingston said:


> yuripv said:
> 
> 
> > Here are two attempts at a counter-argument...



Off-topic, but this misattributed quote really bothers me. Might be a mildly interesting bug.


----------



## knightjp (Jan 23, 2019)

Interesting thing is I did put MacOS back on the main HDD. I did a fresh installation of FreeBSD on a second drive. When booting the system then, it goes to the Clover boot loader and then I choose the FreeBSD installation and when it boots there are no error messages. 
So the question, what is in Clover Bootloader and removes those errors?


----------



## olli@ (Jan 24, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Interesting thing is I did put MacOS back on the main HDD. I did a fresh installation of FreeBSD on a second drive. When booting the system then, it goes to the Clover boot loader and then I choose the FreeBSD installation and when it boots there are no error messages.
> So the question, what is in Clover Bootloader and removes those errors?



FreeBSD's boot loader uses a BIOS service (the so-called software interrupt 0x13, sometimes called “INT 13h”) to access disk drives. The error codes from the above messages (“error 0x31”) comes from that BIOS service. It is not uncommon that chaining boot loaders intercept that software interrupt for various purposes, e.g. to add more functions or to filter devices. According to your description it seems that the Clover Bootloader does that, too.


----------



## knightjp (Jan 24, 2019)

olli@ said:


> FreeBSD's boot loader uses a BIOS service (the so-called software interrupt 0x13, sometimes called “INT 13h”) to access disk drives. The error codes from the above messages (“error 0x31”) comes from that BIOS service. It is not uncommon that chaining boot loaders intercept that software interrupt for various purposes, e.g. to add more functions or to filter devices. According to your description it seems that the Clover Bootloader does that, too.


Perhaps adjusting settings in the BIOS will remove the errors.


----------



## knightjp (Jan 24, 2019)

hafsahanin said:


> its to heavy for my PC is there anything else


FreeBSD? 
As far as my experience goes, it is quite light on system resources.


----------



## fryshke (Feb 19, 2019)

drhowarddrfine said:


> Imagine that. FreeBSD doesn't natively run Windows and Microsoft frameworks.



Imagine that. Linux and macOS does natively run Windows (???) and Microsoft frameworks. It's like people actually care about Linux and macOS.



kpedersen said:


> As for .NET *Core*... I hate to say but no-one uses it. It is just Microsoft's way of saying that they don't intend to maintain .NET for much longer and are gradually trying to cut it down in size until it fizzles out. This is exactly how large companies do product disposal without losing face.







__





						Monster Jobs - Job Search, Career Advice & Hiring Resources | Monster.com | .net-core
					






					www.monster.com
				




Hate to say but you're just poor Microsoft hating sob with huge fucking reality distortion field around you, plenty of .NET Core jobs out there, who knew.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Feb 19, 2019)

fryshke said:


> Imagine that. Linux and macOS does natively run Windows (???) and Microsoft frameworks.


They don't. Your lack of programming and operating system knowledge is showing.


----------



## Crivens (Feb 19, 2019)

I don't care who stole whose toy spade in this sandbox. Stop this kind of personal attacks or go cool your heels. All of you. 

Okay? Now shake hands and be friends.


----------



## unix4you2 (Feb 19, 2019)

Hi everybody,

For those that are interested in a simple way to have a FreeBSD desktop fully functional in less than 20 minutes this is my personal how-to to do it.   It's in my native language (spanish) but I hope it help you.  This have some links to another documents that teach how to install every desktop (Gnome, KDE, XFCE, E17... and even CDE!).









						FreeBSD como sistema de Escritorio
					

FreeBSD como sistema de Escritorio GUÍA RÁPIDA DE INSTALACIÓN Y SUPERVIVENCIA  Objetivo:  Alcance: Tener un compendio de los aspectos clave a tener en cuenta durante la instalación de FreeBSD como un sistema de Escritorio  Sistemas operativos FreeBSD 13.1+  Los procedimientos aquí indic...




					docs.google.com
				




Regards


----------



## kpedersen (Feb 19, 2019)

fryshke said:


> plenty of .NET Core jobs out there, who knew.



I think the conversation has moved on since September 13th! XD

But get back to me in a couple of years and I am pretty sure your opinion will have changed.

Also you should _not_ take offense by technical predictions. The lifespan of a piece of Microsoft software is not a reflection upon VB.NET developers.


----------



## Spartrekus (Feb 19, 2019)

kpedersen said:


> I think the conversation has moved on since September 13th! XD
> 
> But get back to me in a couple of years and I am pretty sure your opinion will have changed.
> 
> Also you should _not_ take offense by technical predictions. The lifespan of a piece of Microsoft software is not a reflection upon VB.NET developers.



Investing time and energy in Microsoft Programming Languages is uncertain, because Microsoft can anytime change radically. Except maybe DOC or DOCX, that might be more stable. Actually, ...  formatting changes.


----------



## freebsdinator (Feb 19, 2019)

unix4you2 said:


> Hi everybody,
> 
> For those that are interested in a simple way to have a FreeBSD desktop fully functional in less than 20 minutes this is my personal how-to to do it.   It's in my native language (spanish) but I hope it help you.  This have some links to another documents that teach how to install every desktop (Gnome, KDE, XFCE, E17... and even CDE!).
> 
> ...



Have you found E17 to stop being responsive to clicking? IE: It will randomly lockup for me if I click the 'start' menu. Sometimes it will shake out whereas others it will just stop working forcing me to kill X.

This has consistently happened to me on two separate systems.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 13, 2019)

My brother got himself a Macbook Air and had no use for his Lenovo laptop. Decided that it would be a great test bench for a FreeBSD install... 
So far I did a great installation and used the KDE5 Plasma desktop. It worked brilliantly. However I was looking at the stuff  like OpenBox and I really wanted to give it a go. So far the installation is going well. 
I'm looking through this link... https://vermaden.wordpress.com/2018/03/29/freebsd-desktop-part-1-simplified-boot/
It's a really comprehensive guide, but kind of over the top for me. Half of the stuff I don't understand what to do. I know that there are scripts that I need to install, etc., but how to get them working, I'm not sure. 
So far I have the basic of Openbox working and I'm trying to install Firefox, but it seems to have disappeared off the repos. 
I don't know of another browser that I could install on FreeBSD.


----------



## longimanus (Mar 13, 2019)

www/firefox
www/chromium/
www/opera/


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Mar 13, 2019)

www/chromium is working very well for me. I know it's the source for chrome so some may have anti-google issues with it but I never sign in, just surf with it.


----------



## tedbell (Mar 13, 2019)

I see firefox in the repos on my end (I'm using the "latest" repository) but I noticed it's been downgraded to version 65 instead of 66. I prefer Chromium because it seems to perform better for me, especially with google services like maps.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Mar 13, 2019)

My experience as well, plus my reading has told me chromium is more secure but again, that is what I read. You know, because everything we read on the Internet is true!


----------



## tedbell (Mar 13, 2019)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> My experience as well, plus my reading has told me chromium is more secure but again, that is what I read. You know, because everything we read on the Internet is true!



LMAO. 

"Google Chrome is the best browser! But use pkg instead of ports due to build times" -Abraham Lincoln


----------



## Crivens (Mar 13, 2019)

tedbell said:


> LMAO.
> 
> "Google Chrome is the best browser! But use pkg instead of ports due to build times" -Abraham Lincoln


You know that 129% of global warming is caused by people who use ports over   packages? I should know, I just made up that number.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Mar 13, 2019)

Good thing I switched back to packages! Gotta do my part for the environment


----------



## tedbell (Mar 13, 2019)

Lmao good thing I uninstalled synth. It's like those old gas guzzling sedans from back in the day.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 13, 2019)

Crivens said:


> You know that 129% of global warming is caused by people who use ports over   packages?



I've got a carbon footprint as big as China.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 13, 2019)

tedbell said:


> I see firefox in the repos on my end (I'm using the "latest" repository) but I noticed it's been downgraded to version 65 instead of 66. I prefer Chromium because it seems to perform better for me, especially with google services like maps.


I used `pkg update` to get the latest. It still doesn't show up for me. I'm using amd64 version. Does that make a difference?


----------



## knightjp (Mar 13, 2019)

With regards to setting up open box.. 
What is another good panel that I can use instead of tint2 and xfce4 panel?

I'm trying to increase the screen resolution for the boot up sequence. Any ideas how I can do that?


----------



## tedbell (Mar 13, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I used `pkg update` to get the latest. It still doesn't show up for me. I'm using amd64 version. Does that make a difference?



No I meant I'm using the "latest" repo instead of "quarterly" by editing /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf. Seeing as they downgraded maybe there's something wrong with the new builds.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Mar 13, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I used `pkg update` to get the latest. It still doesn't show up for me. I'm using amd64 version. Does that make a difference?



Interesting - doesn't show for me either - SirDice mentioned in another thread Thread 69969 that it may have failed to build in one of the repos so isn't available.  I use whatever the out of the box repo is. I only show:


```
firefox-esr-60.5.2,1           Web browser based on the browser portion of Mozilla
firefox-esr-i18n-60.5.2        Localized interface for Firefox
xpi-firefox-showcase-0.9.5.6   Easily locate and select any open browser window
```


----------



## Vull (Mar 13, 2019)

knightjp said:


> With regards to setting up open box..
> What is another good panel that I can use instead of tint2 and xfce4 panel?
> 
> I'm trying to increase the screen resolution for the boot up sequence. Any ideas how I can do that?


Do you want the same resolution that you have in openbox, and, if so, what resolution is that?


Sevendogsbsd said:


> Interesting - doesn't show for me either - SirDice mentioned in another thread Thread 420642 that it may have failed to build in one of the repos so isn't available.  I use whatever the out of the box repo is. I only show:
> 
> 
> ```
> ...


I also use the out of the box repo and it says "quarterly" in my /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf. I just changed it to "latest" and now I'm getting:
	
	



```
(del@dellfp10 /home/del)# pkg search firefox
pkg: Repository FreeBSD has a wrong packagesite, need to re-create database
firefox-66.0_1,1               Web browser based on the browser portion of Mozilla
firefox-esr-60.5.2_1,1         Web browser based on the browser portion of Mozilla
firefox-esr-i18n-60.5.2        Localized interface for Firefox
firefox-i18n-66.0              Localized interface for Firefox
xpi-firefox-showcase-0.9.5.6   Easily locate and select any open browser window
(del@dellfp10 /home/del)#
```
... so I learned how to do something useful today thanks to tedbell. It hung for about a minute while it re-created the database.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Mar 13, 2019)

Oh nice - so, does "latest" in any way infer "unstable" or is it more closely aligned with the update frequency of ports?


----------



## Vull (Mar 13, 2019)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> Oh nice - so, does "latest" in any way infer "unstable" or is it more closely aligned with the update frequency of ports?


I changed it back; I'll stick with the default configuration for now, but it's nice to know I'd be able to install it if I wanted or needed to do so.


----------



## Vull (Mar 13, 2019)

In pursuit of a more direct answer to that question, I'm now reading these two threads:









						"Latest" vs "Quarterly" on pkg.freebsd.org
					

I thought I'd do some digging on https://pkg.freebsd.org to see why I never got offered any package updates.  For reference, here is my /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf.  (I do not have a local copy in /usr/local/etc.) # $FreeBSD: stable/11/etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf 263937 2014-03-30 15:24:17Z bdrewery $ # # To...




					forums.freebsd.org
				












						A mini-FAQ on pkg
					

WOW!  Great thread!  To summarize I learned not only what I learned here but: - Ports with the default options gets you the same options as a binary package - poudriere is port-based and creates packages for distribution, so it is a massive time saver if you have multiple similarly configured...




					forums.freebsd.org


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Mar 13, 2019)

Updated to "latest", will run for a few days to see how she does.


----------



## Vull (Mar 13, 2019)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> Updated to "latest", will run for a few days to see how she does.


Some of the information in those threads may or may not be outdated, but I took SirDice's advice from this post, where he says (paraphasing) Don't edit [/etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf], instead create a [new] /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos/FreeBSD.conf and use it to overrule the default settings. So I tried it that way too, and it works the same. It was necessary to run `mkdir /usr/local/etc/pkg; mkdir /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos`, also as per SirDice's instructions, before I could save the file, because those directories didn't exist before I created them. In the newly created FreeBSD.conf file, I copied and pasted:
	
	



```
FreeBSD: {
  url: "pkg+http://pkg.FreeBSD.org/${ABI}/quarterly",
  mirror_type: "srv",
  signature_type: "fingerprints",
  fingerprints: "/usr/share/keys/pkg",
  enabled: yes
}
```
... from /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf into /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos/FreeBSD.conf and then edited it to say "latest" instead of "quarterly" before saving it. I used `vi` as my editor because I'm old skool like that.


----------



## tedbell (Mar 13, 2019)

knightjp said:


> With regards to setting up open box..
> What is another good panel that I can use instead of tint2 and xfce4 panel?
> 
> I'm trying to increase the screen resolution for the boot up sequence. Any ideas how I can do that?



Polybar is a pretty good panel.


Sevendogsbsd said:


> Oh nice - so, does "latest" in any way infer "unstable" or is it more closely aligned with the update frequency of ports?


I think the latter. I switched to get the latest software.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 14, 2019)

Vull said:


> Do you want the same resolution that you have in openbox, and, if so, what resolution is that?


How do I find that out? It would be great for me to know. Because I notice that the resolution is just perfect when I'm using xterm. But everything seems a bit oversized when I'm using another terminal app or another application like a file manager, etc. 

tedbell Thanks for the suggestion.


----------



## Vull (Mar 14, 2019)

I don't use openbox I use KDE. I could tell you how to check it in KDE.  If I load a graphics driver like drm-kmod's i915kms driver, it changes my resolution to a higher setting during the boot up process, but that all depends on what kind of graphics driver your system has.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 14, 2019)

Vull said:


> I don't use openbox I use KDE. I could tell you how to check it in KDE.  If I load a graphics driver like drm-kmod's i915kms driver, it changes my resolution to a higher setting during the boot up process, but that all depends on what kind of graphics driver your system has.


I have huge respect for KDE. It's my fav opensource desktop.
The trouble is that I'm install FreeBSD on an old Lenovo T420 laptop which has only 8GB of Ram and I felt KDE a bit sluggish after the first install and I partially configured it to my liking.
When I saw this link "https://vermaden.wordpress.com/2018/03/29/freebsd-desktop-part-1-simplified-boot/" and the guy was using a similar Lenovo machine, with Openbox, made me think about light weight desktops and building one from scratch.
I will have to check the specs properly of the laptop. So far I guess I'm just using whatever resolution that comes as standard with the install.

I'm looking at certain elements of the desktop environment that needs addressing. 
how do you get change the preferences for Xterm? I would like black background and white text, but so far I'm only having the white background with black text. 
A suitable panel for my liking. 
I've tried XFE and Thunar for the file manager. I'm thinking of moving over to Nemo instead. It seems to have everything that I need. Otherwise, I'll just install Dolphin and work with that. 
Obmenu gives me an error every time I run it. It says that I'm missing the `menu.xml` file in the `home/user/.config/openbox`
So I'm not sure what to do there. If it is missing. How is it that I can still use a menu when I start Openbox to run Xterm? Where is that menu located? 
How do we give Openbox the feature of snapping windows side by side as we do in Windows?


----------



## tedbell (Mar 14, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I have huge respect for KDE. It's my fav opensource desktop.
> The trouble is that I'm install FreeBSD on an old Lenovo T420 laptop which has only 8GB of Ram and I felt KDE a bit sluggish after the first install and I partially configured it to my liking.
> When I saw this link "https://vermaden.wordpress.com/2018/03/29/freebsd-desktop-part-1-simplified-boot/" and the guy was using a similar Lenovo machine, with Openbox, made me think about light weight desktops and building one from scratch.
> I will have to check the specs properly of the laptop. So far I guess I'm just using whatever resolution that comes as standard with the install.
> ...



Interesting. I was using FreeBSD on a Core 2 Duo 1.86 Ghz with 3GB of ram and KDE5 worked surprisingly well. I remember it ran good back in the day when it was version 3.5 or 4 on my Pentium 4, 2.0Ghz with 640MB of ram! Just as a sidenote, you can install KDE without the bloatware by installing the x11/plasma5-plasma meta package.

Xterm and its close cousin Rxvt/URxvt both take their settings from your .Xresources file in your home directory. Look up some configs online. Here's some themes to get you started: https://github.com/AntSunrise/URxvt-themes. I suggested polybar but I haven't used it in a while because I no longer use panels so I can't comment on the choices out there. For a long time I just used dzen and piped some conky stuff into that. PCmanFM is my file manager of choice for GUI. Otherwise I use ranger which is a console file manager. I can't help with the openbox stuff as I havent used that WM in 7 years lol.


----------



## Spartrekus (Mar 14, 2019)

tedbell said:


> Interesting. I was using FreeBSD on a Core 2 Duo 1.86 Ghz with 3GB of ram and KDE5 worked surprisingly well. I remember it ran good back in the day when it was version 3.5 or 4 on my Pentium 4, 2.0Ghz with 640MB of ram! Just as a sidenote, you can install KDE without the bloatware by installing the x11/plasma5-plasma meta package.
> 
> Xterm and its close cousin Rxvt/URxvt both take their settings from your .Xresources file in your home directory. Look up some configs online. Here's some themes to get you started: https://github.com/AntSunrise/URxvt-themes. I suggested polybar but I haven't used it in a while because I no longer use panels so I can't comment on the choices out there. For a long time I just used dzen and piped some conky stuff into that. PCmanFM is my file manager of choice for GUI. Otherwise I use ranger which is a console file manager. I can't help with the openbox stuff as I havent used that WM in 7 years lol.



Does ranger run fast over distant connection?

mc performs relatively quite slow over fuse sshfs.


----------



## tedbell (Mar 14, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> Does ranger run fast over distant connection?
> 
> mc performs relatively quite slow over fuse sshfs.



Not sure. I don't have any servers or any use for ssh at the moment so I wouldn't know. Ranger gets slow when "preview files" is enabled. Give it a try but YMMV.


----------



## Spartrekus (Mar 15, 2019)

tedbell said:


> Not sure. I don't have any servers or any use for ssh at the moment so I wouldn't know. Ranger gets slow when "preview files" is enabled. Give it a try but YMMV.



This means that it is likely not optimized for ssh.

It depends what comes after opendir(), and what kind of sort method, which is employed. Previews means also to proceed to read the file - and it can do lot of stuffs to get the prev.


----------



## tedbell (Mar 15, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> This means that it is likely not optimized for ssh.
> 
> It depends what comes after opendir(), and what kind of sort method, which is employed. Previews means also to proceed to read the file - and it can do lot of stuffs to get the prev.



Yeah. Ranger frequently hangs when previewing large files like archives. Photo previews are done through w3m-img.


----------



## Spartrekus (Mar 15, 2019)

tedbell said:


> Yeah. Ranger frequently hangs when previewing large files like archives. Photo previews are done through w3m-img.



so I don't know why it is so popular. Likely because there aren't more alternatives, mc or ranger.

Give a try to lkm what you think?


----------



## fernandel (Mar 15, 2019)

25 years of Midnight Commander and on my computer the same .


----------



## Spartrekus (Mar 15, 2019)

fernandel said:


> 25 years of Midnight Commander and on my computer the same .



I cannot use mc because it runs too slow over long distance (ssh) connections. 
+ it has no default hjkl, for prehistoric older unix users.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 16, 2019)

After my installation going pretty smoothly, after doing a reboot, I got this. 





How do I fix this?


----------



## tedbell (Mar 16, 2019)

What window manager/desktop environment did you install?


----------



## knightjp (Mar 16, 2019)

[QUOTE="tedbell, post: 420944, member: 5622
What window manager/desktop environment did you install?
[/QUOTE]
`pkg install xorg openbox xdm obconf obmenu nitrogen wifimgr`


----------



## tedbell (Mar 16, 2019)

knightjp said:


> [QUOTE="tedbell, post: 420944, member: 5622
> What window manager/desktop environment did you install?


`pkg install xorg openbox xdm obconf obmenu nitrogen wifimgr`
[/QUOTE]

Hmmm looks like something is the matter with your display manager. Try disabling it and launching openbox with xinit.


----------



## D-FENS (Mar 16, 2019)

knightjp said:


> `pkg install xorg openbox xdm obconf obmenu nitrogen wifimgr`


You could install and try other display managers. For example, slim or sddm.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Mar 17, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I have huge respect for KDE. It's my fav opensource desktop.The trouble is that I'm install FreeBSD on an old Lenovo T420 laptop which has only 8GB of Ram and I felt KDE a bit sluggish after the first install and I partially configured it to my liking.
> When I saw this link "https://vermaden.wordpress.com/2018/03/29/freebsd-desktop-part-1-simplified-boot/" and the guy was using a similar Lenovo machine, with Openbox, made me think about light weight desktops and building one from scratch.



I have a great deal of respect for many things, software not among them. Confidence and satisfaction are what I take into consideration when thinking of software. I'm more interested in if it works like it should and the way I want it to. Good or bad.

I have no respect whatsoever for x11-wm/fluxbox but am confident it will work the way I want it to and satisfied that it does. It's what I use on all my machines.

Here's a screenshot of my FreeBSD 11.2-RELEASE-p9 Thinkpad T400 with Intel Core2 Duo P8600 @ 2.4GHz, 8GB RAM and 200GB Scorpio Black HDD @ 7200RPM using x11-wm/fluxbox as a WM, x11-fm/xfe for a file manager, x11/rxvt-unicode as a terminal, sysutils/gkrellm2 for system info and multimedia/xmms for tunes:



I use an ~/.Xdefaults for terminal transparency and font style. It has 1280x800 resolution which doesn't leave a lot of screen space but the machine I use most out of several even though it is not the most powerful. I have a W520 with Intel  Core i7-2760QM @ 2.4GHz, 8GB RAM, 500GB Hitachi Travelstar HDD @ 7200RPM and 1920x1080 resolution sitting to my left but prefer to use this.

Works for me and it can you, too. And still respect you in the morning.


----------



## knightjp (Mar 17, 2019)

Trihexagonal when talking about respect, I was mostly referring to the work done by the developers. 
Despite the awful KDE4 (just my opinion; I know there are those who like it), the KDE development has really improved.
I liked KDE for its immense customization and number of features. I would use KDE, but I feel that KDE comes rather bundled with a whole load of software that I don't even use like kmail, Konqueror, kwrite, etc. They take up quite a bit of space and for the most part, I will be using other programs on my system or that's where openbox seem like a good idea.

However now having spent some time with openbox, I'm finding it hard to get it looking and themed the way I want. I'm quite new with it.




This is what it looks like now.
I would like to get a dark mode theme on openbox and I’m currently using xfce4-panel. But I’m trying to find a way to have the background of the panel black with white text.
I also would like to have xterm in a similar way with black background and white text.

I’m guessing I would need to be editing a lot of text files.

I did a couple of changes. I’m using tint2 as a panel. 





I would like to know how to edit xterm.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 6, 2019)

I've tried using Slim and SDDM for the display manager with Openbox. Doesn't seem to work.
Slim just refused to login at all... Sddm refused to start, even though I made all the correct settings in 
	
	



```
/etc/rc.conf
```
I'm currently using xdm and I like it. But I would like to know how to get something more modern looking. 
I wish that xenodm from OpenBSD was available. It looks really good.


----------



## twllnbrck (Apr 6, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I'm currently using xdm and I like it. But I would like to know how to get something more modern looking.
> I wish that xenodm from OpenBSD was available. It looks really good.


I dont use a DM on FreeBSD, only xinit(1) to start the X server. But if I am not mistaken, I think you can change the look of x11/xdm the way you like although it is limited. The background and geometry settings are stored in /usr/local/etc/X11/xdm/Xsetup_0 and the rest of modification is kept in /usr/local/etc/X11/xdm/Xresources.


----------



## Minbari (Apr 7, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I'm currently using xdm and I like it. But I would like to know how to get something more modern looking.
> I wish that xenodm from OpenBSD was available. It looks really good.


I don't understand why you don't use x11/lightdm; has a modern look can be easy customized, etc. As for xterm "edit" although the correct word is config, you need to add or config .Xresources.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Apr 7, 2019)

Lanakus said:


> I dont use a DM on FreeBSD, only xinit(1) to start the X server.



That's what I do.

I don't know why you're making it so hard on yourself. x11-wm/fluxbox is easy to start, config and I use the same font on apps to get symmetry. Though admittedly not everyone cares for my style of desktop.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 7, 2019)

Minbari said:


> I don't understand why you don't use x11/lightdm; has a modern look can be easy customized, etc. As for xterm "edit" although the correct word is config, you need to add or config .Xresources.


To be fair, I came across lightdm already.. I followed the instruction on this thread. https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/lightdm.59101/
I added the "lightdm_enable="YES" to the /etc/rc.conf file. I didn't work. Just came across the console. Maybe I need to edit the /etc/ttys? 
I tried Sddm the same way... it didn't work. Slim worked but wouldn't let me in.. I had to go back to the console to log into the machine. 
xdm is the only one that works reliably I would say. It just looks really dated compared to the Openbox setup.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Apr 7, 2019)

Since we are on the subject of display managers: don't display managers run as root since they are invoked using /etc/rc.conf? No idea if there are any security implications to that. I always boot to a command line and run `startx`. I feel boxed in when I run a display manager for some reason. That's just me, everyone has their own way of doing this.


----------



## herrbischoff (Apr 7, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> so I don't know why it is so popular. Likely because there aren't more alternatives, mc or ranger.



Alternative: misc/vifm

Have used it for ages — very customizable, very fast.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 7, 2019)

herrbischoff said:


> Alternative: misc/vifm
> 
> Have used it for ages — very customizable, very fast.


OK..  how do we set it up? Just a line in etc/rc.conf?


----------



## herrbischoff (Apr 7, 2019)

I was responding to the file managers. vifm is an alternative to mc, ranger and the lot, not a window manager.


----------



## Minbari (Apr 7, 2019)

knightjp said:


> To be fair, I came across lightdm already.. I followed the instruction on this thread. https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/lightdm.59101/
> I added the "lightdm_enable="YES" to the /etc/rc.conf file. I didn't work. Just came across the console. Maybe I need to edit the /etc/ttys?
> I tried Sddm the same way... it didn't work. Slim worked but wouldn't let me in.. I had to go back to the console to log into the machine.
> xdm is the only one that works reliably I would say. It just looks really dated compared to the Openbox setup.


I've tested it on my vbox test machine and x11/lightdm started ok. The only thing I had to do was to add a .desktop entry for that DE/WM. On my main pc I don't have any display manager, just login and Xorg starts automatically.


```
# Automatically start Xorg after login

if [ $( /usr/bin/tty ) = "/dev/ttyv0" ]; then
    startx
    logout
fi
```


----------



## shepper (Apr 7, 2019)

Minbari said:


> xdm is the only one that works reliably I would say. It just looks really dated compared to the Openbox setup.


xdm is very configurable.

Xenodm (xdm fork) Customization

Arch linux xdm

I'm thinking about making an alternative xenodm customization OpenBSD port.  No reason it could not be done in FreeBSD.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 7, 2019)

I've just tried lightdm.. and using the very same commands it worked. I'm staggered. What was the matter the last time? Who really knows. I like the way that lightdm looks and works. 
Thanks for this.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 9, 2019)

Ok... I figured out why lightdm is working now. I installed lightdm and lightdm-gtk-greeter. If you do not install the greeter, it will not work.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Apr 9, 2019)

How odd: the greeter depends on x11/lightdm but not the other way around. Seems backwards.


----------



## hukadan (Apr 9, 2019)

I suppose it's for users to install the greeter they want (even if it seems that there is just one for the moment). That being said, the message following the install is pretty clear :

```
--% pkg info -D x11/lightdm
lightdm-1.28.0_1:
Always:
For LightDM to function, it requires one of the available greeters to be
installed, which are available in the ports tree at x11/lightdm-*greeter*
```


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Apr 9, 2019)

Ah ok, that makes sense: since multiple greeters are available, not possible to make one or all of them as a dependency to x11/lightdm.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 9, 2019)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> How odd: the greeter depends on x11/lightdm but not the other way around. Seems backwards.


That is what I was thinking. I can't figure out why lightdm doesn't install the greeter by default if the greeter is actually required to make it work. You'd think that it should be installed as a dependency.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Apr 9, 2019)

There are multiple greeters, that's why they put that message at the end of the pkg install. They can't install all the greeters so at that point you have to make a choice.


----------



## Spartrekus (Apr 10, 2019)

Minbari said:


> I don't understand why you don't use x11/lightdm; has a modern look can be easy customized, etc. As for xterm "edit" although the correct word is config, you need to add or config .Xresources.



lightdm takes resource.

what about startx ?

echo icewm > .xinitrc


----------



## knightjp (Apr 10, 2019)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> There are multiple greeters, that's why they put that message at the end of the pkg install. They can't install all the greeters so at that point you have to make a choice.


Multiple greeters? hmm... So you can use other greeters than lightdm's? 
Sounds interesting.. I'll look into that. Thank you.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 10, 2019)

OK.. what about networking. I installed samba. But I still can't seem to find a way to connect or mount the shares from the server.


----------



## Minbari (Apr 10, 2019)

Spartrekus said:


> lightdm takes resource.
> 
> what about startx ?
> 
> echo icewm > .xinitrc


Sometimes I have the impression that you are on this forum only to make trolling or to read what you like from a thread. See #post-423338



knightjp said:


> OK.. what about networking. I installed samba. But I still can't seem to find a way to connect or mount the shares from the server.


Did you configure it? Without a config file it won't work.  

File and Print Services for Microsoft® Windows® Clients (Samba)
Samba fileserver on FreeBSD (Update FreeBSD 12)


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Apr 10, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Multiple greeters? hmm... So you can use other greeters than lightdm's?
> Sounds interesting.. I'll look into that. Thank you.



Well that's interesting: I just looked in FreshPorts and there is one greeter for x11/lightdm: a gtk greeter. I thought there used to be a qt one and another as well. Maybe look at the message from the port/package installation and see what it suggested.


----------



## tedbell (Apr 10, 2019)

Just be forewarned. Some display managers cause d-bus issues. That's why I only use xinit.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Apr 10, 2019)

tedbell said:


> Just be forewarned. Some display managers cause d-bus issues. That's why I only use xinit.



Same here, plus if I am not mistaken, don't display managers run as root because they are invoked in rc.conf ? May not matter, I don't know.


----------



## tedbell (Apr 10, 2019)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> Same here, plus if I am not mistaken, don't display managers run as root because they are invoked in rc.conf ? May not matter, I don't know.



Ah, that probably explains it.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 13, 2019)

OK.. Right now in all the experimentation with desktop enivornments, display managers, etc., I seem to have stumbled on a gem with XFCE. I've never really used it before and it seems impressive, fast and light weight. I'm not certain as to how light compared with openbox since openbox isn't really a desktop environment.
I did build one, but I wasn't too convinced on tint2 panel. Didn't really like that much.
I tried fluxbox, and dwm, but I couldn't find much in terms of theming it to my likes.

Does anyone know of any other light weight desktop / window manager that I could try?

I know that this is a rather controversial thing to say... probably more subjective than anything, but I haven't found a desktop environment that I like more than MacOS. 
Probably stands to reason why there are so many links with the title "make your computer look like Mac".
I really like KDE, but for the specs of the laptop that I'm running, its going to be too heavy. Gnome would be even heavier.


----------



## blackhaz (Apr 13, 2019)

You can make your FreeBSD and Xfce look and feel like a Mac with plank and the right set of icons:


			Mac-like FreeBSD Laptop – M. Usatov


----------



## knightjp (Apr 13, 2019)

blackhaz said:


> You can make your FreeBSD and Xfce look and feel like a Mac with plank and the right set of icons:
> 
> 
> Mac-like FreeBSD Laptop – M. Usatov


I admit that it is a good idea. But for me if I want MacOS, I'd put in MacOS. The idea isn't to make it look like a mac. I'm looking for a desktop environment that I would like about the same way. KDE is there, but it isn't as light weight as I'd like. XFCE is good, but it isn't as configurable as KDE. Fluxbox and Openbox are great, but I would need to find a great panel to use with them. Tint2 doesn't do it for me.


----------



## mickey (Apr 13, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Does anyone know of any other light weight desktop / window manager that I could try?


x11-wm/enlightenment could be worth a try. Unfortunately when I wanted to test it like two months ago the port seemed to have some issues.


----------



## twllnbrck (Apr 13, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Fluxbox and Openbox are great, but I would need to find a great panel to use with them. Tint2 doesn't do it for me.


You could try x11/polybar as status bar with openbox.
And x11-wm/plank as dock/lancher. Its very easy to configure.


----------



## azathoth (Apr 13, 2019)

asifnaz said:


> I know FreeBSD is a very stable OS . I want to use it as Desktop OS (with some GUI) . How do I do that..?




```
as root: pkg install -y icewm chromium xorg
as user:  echo 'exec icewm' > .xinitrc
startx
click little box icon bottom left to start xterm
chrome&
surf net for more info
```


----------



## knightjp (Apr 13, 2019)

mickey said:


> x11-wm/enlightenment could be worth a try. Unfortunately when I wanted to test it like two months ago the port seemed to have some issues.


Just tried Enlightenment... Sorry.. not impressed at all. Even CDE would probably be better. 
I'm currently trying Mate..


----------



## knightjp (Apr 13, 2019)

Lanakus said:


> You could try x11/polybar as status bar with openbox.
> And x11-wm/plank as dock/lancher. Its very easy to configure.


How do I get the polybar to start at login.. I tried "polybar &" in the autostart.sh file and it doesn't work.


----------



## azathoth (Apr 13, 2019)

xfe great file manager, deluge great for torrents


----------



## ProphetOfDoom (Apr 13, 2019)

Surely at some point one has to stop customising one's OS and start _using _it? The OS isn't an end in itself.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 13, 2019)

AlexanderProphet said:


> Surely at some point one has to stop customising one's OS and start _using _it? The OS isn't an end in itself.


Quite true but part of setting up the desktop, tinkering and customizing is actually serving the purpose to get me acquainted with the OS.


----------



## twllnbrck (Apr 13, 2019)

knightjp said:


> How do I get the polybar to start at login.. I tried "polybar &" in the autostart.sh file and it doesn't work.


Polybar needs to start a predefinded bar. I dont know if polybar on freebsd comes with a sample config somewhere. If so you can copy that to ~/.config/polybar/.
Otherwise create the config directory and files on your own

```
$ mkdir -p ~/.config/polybar
$ touch ~/.config/polybar/config
$ touch ~/.config/polybar/launch.sh
```
You can search the web for editing ~/.config/polybar/config but remember that not all modules will work on FreeBSD actually.
For testing you can simply start with the date module on the right, so add this to the config

```
[bar/yourbar]
font-0 = YourPreferredFont:size=10;0
background = #1d1f21
foreground = #707880
width = 100%
height = 30

modules-right = date

[module/date]
type = internal/date
date = %Y-%m-%d%
```
To start _yourbar _add this to your launch.sh

```
#!/bin/sh

# Terminate already running bar instances
killall -q polybar

# Wait until the processes have been shut down
while pgrep -x polybar >/dev/null; do sleep 1; done

# Launch Polybar, using default config location ~/.config/polybar/config
polybar yourbar &

echo "Polybar launched..."
```
Make sure the launch script is executable. Finally add this line to your_ openbox autostart_ or something comparable for your wm/de of choice

```
$HOME/.config/polybar/launch.sh &
```

I should note that the above comes without guarantee to work cause I dont use polybar just now (not yet) cause I have no time for desktop tweaking at the moment. Use it as starting point.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Apr 13, 2019)

knightjp said:


> Quite true but part of setting up the desktop, tinkering and customizing is actually serving the purpose to get me acquainted with the OS.



What OS did you use to post?

Do you actually have a functional FreeBSD desktop at this point? I don't mean something you can look at and say "I've got a FreeBSD machine" while you work at customizing it in hopes of eventually getting it set up like you want. One that you can and do use.

If I could offer one piece of advise to new users it would be to get a functional desktop set up and leave well enough alone while you learn more about the OS before you start customizing or tweaking settings.

Most of the problems new people have are from tweaking and customizing things they don't yet have the basic knowledge to fix. That's all good and well in its own right. Learning on your own is encouraged, but learning how to fix the things you break is part of it. Actually using it the best way to learn.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Apr 14, 2019)

knightjp said:


> ...part of setting up the desktop, tinkering and customizing is actually serving the purpose to get me acquainted with the OS.


When I start a new job, I sit at the desk given to me and put things where I want them to be in the drawers and the desktop and get to work. Over time, I may rearrange things but it's not something I dwell on. While eating lunch, I might move papers from the top drawer to the bottom but that's all. Rearranging things doesn't interfere with my work.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 18, 2019)

I've pretty much settled on Xfce.. I would say that I like the way that it looks and operates right about now. 









I would like to use conky rather than htop. However I'm not quite sure how it set it up to look like the screenshot below.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Apr 18, 2019)

Now that's what I'm talking about and wanted to see. 

I prefer sysutils/gkrellm2 over Conky as it's more compact and has a wide variety of sensors. It's in all my screenshots and have use it since I first used Linux. I use the moonclock and a weather widget whatever with it.

I've tried Conky too and have a plain config file somewhere. They are available on the web and you should be able to find one you like.

Given screenspace, I usually keep a terminal open running `top` at the bottom of the screen and one at the top of the screen to work from. It comes in handy having two open if I run as root in my work terminal to do file transfer and need to do something like `df -h` to see how much space I have left on the stick. 
I like to keep an eye on what processes are running too.


----------



## knightjp (Apr 22, 2019)

I'm still not able to get the sound working on this FreeBSD installation. Its a Lenovo X201... Would be great to get a touch working as well if I could. But for now I would settle for sound.. Any ideas? 
I did the usual entry into /boot/loader.conf 

```
hw.snd.default_unit=1
```
It doesn't work


----------



## rsronin (Apr 22, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I'm still not able to get the sound working on this FreeBSD installation. Its a Lenovo X201... Would be great to get a touch working as well if I could. But for now I would settle for sound.. Any ideas?
> I did the usual entry into /boot/loader.conf
> 
> ```
> ...


Put it in /etc/sysctl.conf
check mixer vol and mixer pcm (set it to 100)
more clues: https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/...ing-station-headphone-jack.59386/#post-412185


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## srlemke (Apr 24, 2019)

knightjp said:


> I'm still not able to get the sound working on this FreeBSD installation. Its a Lenovo X201... Would be great to get a touch working as well if I could. But for now I would settle for sound.. Any ideas?
> I did the usual entry into /boot/loader.conf
> 
> ```
> ...



unit=1 may not be yout main audio output.

You can see the detected audio devices this way:


```
slemke@besta:/home/slemke 1001 $ -> cat /dev/sndstat
Installed devices:
pcm0: <Realtek ALC298 (Internal Analog)> (play/rec) default
pcm1: <Realtek ALC298 (Left Analog Headphones)> (play)
slemke@besta:/home/slemke 1002 $ ->
```

In my case right now my sound plays from the onboard audio (default).
If I want to switch the audio to my headphone I switch it like this(as user):


```
slemke@besta:/home/slemke 1003 $ -> sysctl hw.snd.default_unit=1
hw.snd.default_unit: 0 -> 1

slemke@besta:/home/slemke 1004 $ -> cat /dev/sndstat
Installed devices:
pcm0: <Realtek ALC298 (Internal Analog)> (play/rec)
pcm1: <Realtek ALC298 (Left Analog Headphones)> (play) default
slemke@besta:/home/slemke 1005 $ ->
```


----------



## knightjp (Apr 24, 2019)

rsronin said:


> Put it in /etc/sysctl.conf
> check mixer vol and mixer pcm (set it to 100)
> more clues: https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/...ing-station-headphone-jack.59386/#post-412185


This worked.. thank you.


----------



## coyote_zed (May 24, 2019)

Is there any info on getting conky working with the conkyrc files one could find online? It seems that when I try to get it working I get error messages regarding the formatting of the conkyrc. I tried to google an answer, but the only answer I found was downgrading to an older version. Is there a way to keep with the current version?


----------



## twllnbrck (May 24, 2019)

coyote_trackz said:


> Is there a way to keep with the current version


I think the newer conky versions (since 1.10) use conky.conf instead of conkyrc and Lua syntax for the configuration file. So downgrading might be the only solution to use your old conkyrc.


----------



## fernandel (Aug 18, 2019)

Trihexagonal said:


> Now that's what I'm talking about and wanted to see.
> 
> I prefer sysutils/gkrellm2 over Conky as it's more compact and has a wide variety of sensors.



Do you use a transparent plugin or something else, please?


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Aug 24, 2019)

fernandel said:


> Do you use a transparent plugin or something else, please?



It's the "Glass" skin for sysutils/gkrellm2. There is a skin repository with 191 skins you can download all at once. Invisible, CoplandOS, HiFi and Operational are a few others I have installed. Extract them individually to /home/username/.gkrellm2/themes and choose the skin from the program GUI. Here is the Invisible skin:





There are plugins for it in the ports tree. Something recently changed so the weather plugin doesn't work anymore but it has a nice astro/gkrellmoon2 MoonClock if you like that kind of thing.


----------



## knightjp (Jul 14, 2020)

I've been running MacOS on a Hackintosh as my preferred Desktop OS for a long time. However, now that Apple is going to their own processors, it is prompting me to think that about moving to FreeBSD as my OS of choice; because I really like using my own hardware. I find it more flexible and easy to upgrade, etc. I really like FreeBSD and prefer it to any Linux distro out there, but there are certain things about MacOS that I will miss.
Like the features of Handover, the way that it syncs with my iPhone, etc. I basically like the ecosystem.

The one great thing about running FreeBSD would be the ability to use whatever Desktop that like. KDE has been making great strides in becoming more optimized and less bloated that people are comparing it to XFCE in the Linux space.
With that being said it means that I can have a Desktop with infinite possibilities of customization.


----------



## Mjölnir (Jul 14, 2020)

I like & use KDE, but it definitely could need some downsizing of options or at least a separation of basic & advanced settings, like some programs already have.  KDE is in urgent need to have that throughout the whole DE.  IMHO currently the only reasonable alternative is XfCE.  But Gtk developers made some weird decisions in the past (e.g. concerning handling of screen resolution), so IMHO any Qt-based desktop is preferable.  Besides that, it's good that any user can take his own decision, and FreeBSD's clean separation of base OS & ports is a big plus compared to Linux.


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## phalange (Jul 14, 2020)

knightjp said:


> I've been running MacOS



I made that same transition many years ago, and what I found was that although there's no way to perfectly recreate that ecosystem from open source parts, the vast majority of integration was doable and ultimately MUCH more flexible once I broke the chains. The things I couldn't replicate I simply don't miss. And the benefits of moving are impossible to fully quantify. Happiness being a prime example.


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## 20-100-2fe (Jul 14, 2020)

I've recently switched from MATE to KDE. I had always stayed away from it in the past because it was too complex and too heavy, but version 5 is really impressive performance-wise. Besides speed, the user experience is smooth and seamless, a real pleasure.

Like mjollnir, the only negative point I find in KDE 5 is the complexity of its configuration - too many options, scattered across too many places. Fortunately, the default configuration needed very few changes to suit my taste. 

It is also important for me to be able to easily customize the user interface in a secure an reproducible way for easy deployment of VM or workstations. KDE uses text files to store its configuration, so it meets this requirement. MATE uses a different method, still very easy and convenient, but XFCE is really no good at this.


----------



## knightjp (Jul 14, 2020)

I tried to move to FreeBSD some time ago with a test made on an old Lenovo laptop. But the one thing that I felt that I liked about MacOS was the fact that I could install and uninstall an app by just dragging and dropping a file (a file that contained everything that it needed to run). 
MacOS also has the best keyboard layout that I liked. I use the Dvorak layout and but the one thing about Dvorak is that its standard shortcuts are not as great as one would like. MacOS remedies this with the Dvorak+QWERTYCmd. It allows me to have the standard keyboard shortcuts and use the Dvorak layout. So far, I have not seen it on any other system as standard. 



phalange said:


> there's no way to perfectly recreate that ecosystem from open source parts, the vast majority of integration was doable and ultimately MUCH more flexible once I broke the chains. The things I couldn't replicate I simply don't miss.


Could you elaborate on this?


----------



## phalange (Jul 14, 2020)

knightjp said:


> Could you elaborate on this?



Sure, for examples:

iTunes -- easily replaced by Spotify, which is (IMO) superior to Apple's product since it has a web client. Also, many previously missing artists are now added.
iTunes Match -- money wasted, since most of my music is available in the cloud these days, and lower cost drives make it more realistic to store songs on my local drives anyway.
Photos -- I now use an Android phone, and there are many cloud-based photo sharing options (including Nextcloud or even Dropbox) that allow photos to sync across devices.
Texting -- I enjoyed texting via a Mac laptop, but this loss was not catastrophic. Also, KDE and others are finally bringing programs out that replicate this feature.
Contacts -- replaced with Google Contacts, and now I'm migrating to  Nextcloud.
iCal -- replaced with Google Calendar, and now I'm migrating to Nextcloud; both can share calendars with iCal users too.
iWork -- I always detested these apps, and now I use Collabra on my iPad and Libre Office on FreeBSD and Linux.

In all, Apple beat everyone to the punch with integration, but so many years later, there's stiff competition in every category.

There are paper cuts along the way for sure. Like FaceTime is hard to replicate since my family uses Apple gear, and they have to switch over to Skype or Duo to contact me.

Also FreeBSD is not where Linux is in terms of easily installing Dropbox, Spotify, Skype and so on, so I've had to perform more work-arounds to approximate things on FreeBSD, but I can always dual-boot back into Linux as a failsafe. I prefer this to keeping OSX around.


----------



## Hakaba (Jul 15, 2020)

An another example is the windows management. In Mac OS X, since few years, there is a strange mix between fullscreen / free window with a lot of frustations.
I decide to always use full screen, but the place where new a window open is not predictable and I need to arrange the order of all windows too often.

In the same time, I buy a new laptop and install freebsd on it with DWM.
I can not compare Mac OS X with DWM in functionnalities. But in usage, I prefere the simplicity and the concistance of a very simple tilling WM. I have to accept that the Apple way is not always the best way and learn something else. But now, I am conviced that Mac OS X need to evolve to present a decent WM and not a nasty mix between mac OS 9 concept and iPad constraints


----------



## knightjp (Jul 15, 2020)

Hakaba said:


> I can not compare Mac OS X with DWM in functionnalities. But in usage, I prefere the simplicity and the concistance of a very simple tilling WM. I have to accept that the Apple way is not always the best way and learn something else. But now, I am conviced that Mac OS X need to evolve to present a decent WM and not a nasty mix between mac OS 9 concept and iPad constraints


I have tried DWM and other tiling window managers. I even got tiling window managers on MacOS working. I worked fine I guess. But I soon realized that tiling window managers are not for me.
I will concede that window management is an annoyance for some people that use MacOS. But like Linux and FreeBSD, it is an easy fix there. I use a program called MOOM and it works well. To be honest, I'm not even using a 1/4 of the what features it has.



phalange said:


> In all, Apple beat everyone to the punch with integration, but so many years later, there's stiff competition in every category.
> There are paper cuts along the way for sure. Like FaceTime is hard to replicate since my family uses Apple gear, and they have to switch over to Skype or Duo to contact me.


I agree that Apple started it, and now there are a number of apps and things that you can do to replicate it, but that's the issue. All of this is out of the box with MacOS. And it's always the little things that you don't think of initially but miss when you suddenly realize they're not there.

I enjoy having a dedicated Whatsapp client on my system so that I can use my computer to text. I can use iMessage as well.
Then it is the idea of having FaceTime work on my phone,  iPad and even my computer. Whichever device I am using at the time.
The way that if I edit my contacts on my system, my phone is automatically updated as well.
I know people call it a "walled garden" or limiting in many ways. And to a degree, it can be. I will concede to that. But with that said, the number of people that are enjoying the features of the "ecosystem" can actually suggest that they are doing something right. I mean even Google is trying to copy it with their Android systems.

If I have to move away from Apple ecosystem, I want to move to a place that is completely free of Google services as well. It would be moving from one walled garden to another.



phalange said:


> Also FreeBSD is not where Linux is in terms of easily installing Dropbox, Spotify, Skype and so on, so I've had to perform more work-arounds to approximate things on FreeBSD, but I can always dual-boot back into Linux as a failsafe. I prefer this to keeping OSX around.


This is what kind of bugs me. FreeBSD is inherently a more stable and better platform IMO, but still lags behind Linux in terms of support. I mean the little things such as driver support and stuff work better on Linux than with FreeBSD.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 15, 2020)

knightjp said:


> If I have to move away from Apple ecosystem, I want to move to a place that is completely free of Google services as well. It would be moving from one walled garden to another.



Definitely!

I've never felt comfortable with Apple's way of doing things, starting with UI design, so I've never owned Apple hardware.
Google has been appealing to me at some point, but they quickly became way too invasive for me.

I'm not a privacy paranoid, but I hate above all that someone decides in my place what is good or bad for me.
I also hate that someone reads my emails - to notify me of upcoming bills, for instance, as if I didn't already know.
I feel insulted by such practices.

So I ended up renting a VPS and having my own email system and web server.
I've learned (and still learn) a lot doing it and this is a great advantage for me - learning is one of the things I enjoy the most. 
It's also a great playground for my creativity: whenever an idea strikes me, I can easily implement it, for real. 

On the client side, I also tested a Kaios phone. More respectful to its users than Google and Apple, but still perfectible.
Anyway, my sight getting worse and worse with age, I tend to use a phone just to give phone calls, so an Ericsson GA628 would do. 
For anything else, I really need the comfort of a computer.


----------



## knightjp (Jul 15, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> Definitely!
> 
> I've never felt comfortable with Apple's way of doing things, starting with UI design,


When it comes to the UI, I personally find Apple's the best for me. So I would attempt to replicate it.
I guess it stands to reason when you find a number of posts about Linux and Windows saying, "Make your OS look like a Mac". Hardly find anything the other way around.



20-100-2fe said:


> I also hate that someone reads my emails - to notify me of upcoming bills, for instance, as if I didn't already know.
> I feel insulted by such practices.


I have never had that. However I think that Microsoft Outlook does it. Because I find that tasks appearing in my office box without me even entering them. So Microsoft is quite invasive IMO and the same for Google I guess.

In my experience, even though Apple has the data that you give it, it does really nothing with it; except store it for your own use. In terms of privacy, I guess that is kind of giving a company too much power over your user experience and devices, but you have the option to turn off those features if you don't want. That is why I prefer to use iOS over Android any day.
I watched a video where someone actually tested an iPhone vs Android in terms of privacy and the results were amazing.



20-100-2fe said:


> So I ended up renting a VPS and having my own email system and web server.
> I've learned (and still learn) a lot doing it and this is a great advantage for me - learning is one of the things I enjoy the most.
> It's also a great playground for my creativity: whenever an idea strikes me, I can easily implement it, for real.


The one thing with open source stuff is that if you have a good idea and you know how to develop it, you can do some pretty cool things. I am amazed at the things that Linux developers have accomplished over the years. And you do learn a lot in the process.
When actually building a desktop with FreeBSD, you get real control into what goes in a modern OS.. So it is quite interesting.


----------



## Mjölnir (Jul 15, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> So I ended up renting a VPS and having my own email system and web server.


TWIMC, I found these two email+ (cloud) service providers who offer real privacy at a very reasonable price.


----------



## Abraham79 (Jul 17, 2020)

Is Gnome-3.3x fully working in FreeBSD 12? I managed to get  Gnome running fine with elogind/eudev etc in Devuan, thought if it is possible in FreeBSD.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Jul 18, 2020)

Abraham79 /usr/ports/x11/gnome3/


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## Lamia (Jul 18, 2020)

FVWM rocks - be it fvwm2 or fvwm-crystal. I just can't get enough of it. It's out of this world.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 18, 2020)

Lamia said:


> FVWM rocks - be it fvwm2 or fvwm-crystal. I just can't get enough of it. It's out of this world.



Lamia, can you give a couple of examples of what makes FVWM rock?
And explain the difference between fvwm2 and fvwm-crystal?


----------



## zirias@ (Jul 18, 2020)

For me, FVWM rocks because it is extremely customizable and still kind of small and efficient. For a full Desktop, I like KDE very much, but I can also configure my own "nearly full" desktop based on FVWM, and it runs considerably faster on older hardware. As just a little example for the flexibility, I made a middle-click on a titlebar the command to automatically re-place this window as if it was newly mapped


----------



## Lamia (Jul 18, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> Lamia, can you give a couple of examples of what makes FVWM rock?
> And explain the difference between fvwm2 and fvwm-crystal?


It is a Dynamic Window Manager. It is powerful, stable, lightweight and highly customisable. You can make your own desktop environment (like MATE and KDE) from it. All it requires is a text editor to make changes to its config file.

In the beginning was Fvwm. Fvwm-crystal is actually based on fvwm2 but with many other features - ready to use with your choice theme.


----------



## diego (Jul 18, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> I've recently switched from MATE to KDE. I had always stayed away from it in the past because it was too complex and too heavy, but version 5 is really impressive performance-wise. Besides speed, the user experience is smooth and seamless, a real pleasure.


Agreed 100%. Moved from MATE to KDE5 as well
I always avoided KDE in the past because it was too heavy and complex but KDE5 is really impressive about performance comparing with GNOME3.


----------



## Sevendogsbsd (Jul 18, 2020)

My favorite DE of all time was Gnome 2.x. I don't use a DE now but Mate` was my favorite after the demise of Gnome 2.x. KDE is actually very light for its capabilities. Gnome 3 is, to me, visually unappealing, too simple and very heavy in terms of resources. Actually, I am pretty sure despite its "simplicity", Gnome 3 is the most resource hungry desktop environment available in the open source landscape.

For whatever silly reason, on FreeBSD I only use Fluxbox, never a DE. No clue why but I am an odd one so...


----------



## Aeterna (Jul 18, 2020)

On FreeBSD I tried Fluxbox, Openbox, Xfce, Mate, KDE/Plasma.
No doubt KDE/Plasma is most advanced but FreeBSD version is less modular and require some weird dependencies (MySQL server?) than other implementations of KDE/Plasma that I used, xfce has some filesystem issues.
I settled with Openbox.


----------



## Lamia (Jul 19, 2020)

Sevendogsbsd said:


> My favorite DE of all time was Gnome 2.x. I don't use a DE now but Mate` was my favorite after the demise of Gnome 2.x.


I like it too, particularly being able to use gnome extensions. But Gnome3 blew up everything.


----------



## hoobastank69 (Jul 19, 2020)

repos are bleeding out packages like crazy are you sure you want to?


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 19, 2020)

Aeterna said:


> require some weird dependencies (MySQL server?)



Same issue under Linux.
It seems MySQL Server is required by baloo, a feature that I'd prefer optional.
It's just there to be able to check marks in a KDE/Windows comparison, but is otherwise useless.


----------



## mickey (Jul 19, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> It seems MySQL Server is required by baloo, a feature that I'd prefer optional.


It actually is optional, you can switch to postgresql or sqlite instead, if you're building from ports that is. Why the default uses mysql server however is one thing that also got me wondering.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 19, 2020)

mickey said:


> It actually is optional, you can switch to postgresql or sqlite instead, if you're building from ports that is. Why the default uses mysql server however is one thing that also got me wondering.



You mean baloo can be completely removed, or just the DB back-end configured?


----------



## a6h (Jul 19, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> You mean baloo can be completely removed, or just the DB back-end configured?


In the past, I changed some baloo config before KDE had worked correctly, i.e. without using 100% CPU all day long. To remove it completely, without messing with KDE, I think you should edit port/Makefile. I didn't. I installed it from pkg, not port. I guess, If you're going to install install KDE from the pkg, you have no way to uninstall baloo without removing KDE. port/Makefiles is different story. By the way, KDE team should be ashamed of themselves, to put this entity, aka baloo in their system. At the time, default config of baloo was rubbish. That was the last time I've tried KDE.
[EDIT]: There are find(1) and grep(1) in the system. Massive indexing! I don't get it.


----------



## Mjölnir (Jul 19, 2020)

vigole said:


> In the past, I changed some baloo config before KDE had worked correctly, i.e. without using 100% CPU all day long. To remove it completely, without messing with KDE, I think you should edit port/Makefile. I didn't. I installed it from pkg, not port. I guess, If you're going to install install KDE from the pkg, you have no way to uninstall baloo without removing KDE. port/Makefiles is different story. By the way, KDE team should be ashamed of themselves, to put this entity, aka baloo in their system. At the time, default config of baloo was rubbish. That was the last time I've tried KDE.


 Instead of fixing it, you can easily disable _baloo_ in the KDE systemsettings: Search for _"baloo"_ -> _file search_ (or similar, I have german translation) -> disable.  Sadly so, I had to do that after the Q3/2020 upgrade, and I'll file in a kind bug report...


----------



## jmos (Jul 19, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> It seems MySQL Server is required by baloo, a feature that I'd prefer optional.




```
root@freya ~>  pkg install kf5-baloo
Updating FreeBSD repository catalogue...
FreeBSD repository is up to date.
All repositories are up to date.
The following 3 package(s) will be affected (of 0 checked):

New packages to be INSTALLED:
        kf5-baloo: 5.71.0
        kf5-kidletime: 5.71.0
        lmdb: 0.9.24_2,1

Number of packages to be installed: 3

The process will require 3 MiB more space.
524 KiB to be downloaded.

Proceed with this action? [y/N]: n
root@freya ~>  pkg info | grep sql
php74-mysqli-7.4.8             The mysqli shared extension for php
py37-sqlite3-3.7.8_7           Standard Python binding to the SQLite3 library (Python 3.7)
qt5-sql-5.14.2                 Qt SQL database integration module
qt5-sqldrivers-mysql-5.15.0    Qt MySQL database plugin
qt5-sqldrivers-sqlite3-5.14.2  Qt SQLite 3 database plugin
sqlite3-3.32.2,1               SQL database engine in a C library
tcl-sqlite3-3.32.3             SQLite extension for Tcl using the Tcl Extension Architecture (TEA)
root@freya ~>
```

As you see: The baloo package doesn't pull in MySQL. But there's one thing different on my machine: I'm compiling databases/akonadi from ports, as this package always wanted me to have MySQL - and I do not. Same goes with many other software.: akonadi is the annoying package.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 19, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> Instead of fixing it, you can easily disable _baloo_ in the KDE systemsettings: Search for _"baloo"_ -> _file search_ (or similar, I have german translation) -> disable.  Sadly so, I had to do that, and I'll file in a kind bug report...



Yes, that's what I did. 

However, bringing in an RDBMS when installing a DE look completely insane to me.
Just like bringing in Xorg when installing Samba on a headless server.



vigole said:


> There are find(1) and grep(1) in the system. Massive indexing! I don't get it.



Yes, neither do I. Under Unix-like systems such as FreeBSD, it is easy to organize one's files so as to find them equally easily.
The only place where I need a search tool is in shell scripts and find(1) is designed for that.
Plus, when I use it, it is seldom below my home directory.

Under Windows, it's another story and the only way to find something is often to search for it.

My guess is that KDE aims at being a Windows-killer and its developers want to be able to say they have the same features as Windows, even when they make no sense under another OS.


----------



## Mjölnir (Jul 19, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> However, bringing in an RDBMS when installing a DE look completely insane to me.
> Just like bringing in Xorg when installing Samba on a headless server.


IMHO it's reasonable to have a prefix-oriented full-text index (aka _tries_, like the locate(1) DB).  To use a full-blown RDBMS for that purpose is certainly overkill...  I have to admit that baloo worked fine until I added some unusual setup in my $HOME (unionfs).


> My guess is that KDE aims at being a Windows-killer and its developers want to be able to say they have the same features as Windows, even when they make no sense under another OS.


My impression is they're more keen to come up with new features than to fix their existing bugs... 
If it goes on like this, I'll cancel my annual donation to KDE and switch to e.g. LxDE.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 19, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> switch to e.g. LxDE.



Ouch... :/


----------



## fender0107401 (Jul 19, 2020)

FreeBSD is also good for desktop users.


----------



## Mjölnir (Jul 19, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> Ouch... :/


Yes I know it's far from beeing ready yet.  It's just that I'm kind of angry after the last Q3/2020 package update.  This will calm down when I find out how to fix the issues I have.  E.g. _touchpad reset to defaults_.  Any idea is highly appreciated.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 19, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> Yes I know it's far from beeing ready yet.  It's just that I'm kind of angry after the last Q3/2020 package update.  This will calm down when I find out how to fix the issues I have.  E.g. _touchpad reset to defaults_.  Any idea is highly appreciated.



Sorry, mine isn't even supported (I2C touchpad), so I have to use a mouse...


----------



## Mjölnir (Jul 19, 2020)

A touchpad connected to the I2C bus??? What the heck is _that_?


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 19, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> A touchpad connected to the I2C bus??? What the heck is _that_?



I've read its one of Microsoft's "innovations" and it has been implemented in some consumer-grade laptops.
Mine is a Lenovo Ideapad.
Linux and OpenBSD support these touchpads, but neither FreeBSD, nor NetBSD.
And KDE doesn't support them under Linux, for a reason I cannot imagine.
And of course, you cannot know this before you buy your laptop.


----------



## Aeterna (Jul 19, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> Same issue under Linux.
> It seems MySQL Server is required by baloo, a feature that I'd prefer optional.
> It's just there to be able to check marks in a KDE/Windows comparison, but is otherwise useless.


it has also needless dependency to kdenlive for example. When I was trying to install amarok it pulled MySQL server too. By modularity I understand that I can remove a lot of stuff that one way or another are redundant or not necesary for environement to work. I don't have baloo or MySQL server installed on my VM host.


----------



## Phishfry (Jul 19, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> I've read its one of Microsoft's "innovations"


Yes I have read that it was an Microsoft reference design for tablet touchscreens circa Windows 8.
It spread from there to laptop touchpads.








						Protocol Implementation (touchscreen-protocol-implementation)
					

This section provides guidelines for Touchscreen protocol implementation. Windows Touchscreen devices are expected to use the Human Interface Device (HID) protocol to communicate with the host.



					docs.microsoft.com


----------



## jmos (Jul 20, 2020)

Aeterna said:


> it has also needless dependency to kdenlive for example.


Again, the package database/akonadi is responsible for that. You can build it f.e. with SQLite as backend, and afterwards the package multimedia/kdenlive installs without MySQL. Kdenlive itself has no dependency to MySQL. The default to MySQL of akonadi is annoying to me, but as it seems others want it that way… In my opinion SQLite makes here much more sense - that doesn't conflict with other packages, and no unused server has to be installed.


----------



## Mjölnir (Jul 20, 2020)

jmos said:


> Again, the package database/akonadi is responsible for that. You can build it f.e. with SQLite as backend, and afterwards the package multimedia/kdenlive installs without MySQL. Kdenlive itself has no dependency to MySQL. The default to MySQL of akonadi is annoying to me, but as it seems others want it that way… In my opinion SQLite makes here much more sense - that doesn't conflict with other packages, and no unused server has to be installed.


This dependency should be changeable at runtime.  IIRC I could change Amarok's DB backend from MySQL to SQLite.  If pkg(8) does not know about virtual packages for that purpose (e.g. dependency on _sqldb_virt_ can be fulfilled by either _mysql_, _pgsql_ or _sqlite_), that's a design flaw of _pkg-ng_.  If it can't be configured after installation, that's a flaw in the implementation of _Akonadi_.  AFAIK the Qt DB interface can handle configuration at runtime.


----------



## jmos (Jul 20, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> This dependency should be changeable at runtime.


 Unfortunately it is fixed before compiling: https://github.com/KDE/akonadi/blob/master/INSTALL
And from there: "MYSQL is preferred, SQLITE should be avoided." So our package maintainer made things correctly. Sigh.


----------



## Aeterna (Jul 20, 2020)

jmos said:


> Again, the package database/akonadi is responsible for that. You can build it f.e. with SQLite as backend, and afterwards the package multimedia/kdenlive installs without MySQL. Kdenlive itself has no dependency to MySQL. The default to MySQL of akonadi is annoying to me, but as it seems others want it that way… In my opinion SQLite makes here much more sense - that doesn't conflict with other packages, and no unused server has to be installed.


if I want to install kdenlive, why it is pulling akonadi/mysql server?


----------



## jmos (Jul 20, 2020)

Aeterna said:


> if I want to install kdenlive, why it is pulling akonadi/mysql server?


Kdenlive requires kf5-purpose; kf5-purpose requires kaccounts-integration; kaccounts-integration requires akonadi; akonadi requires a database. So Kdenlive requires a database. Which one is up to you, but: If you go with the package, it is MySQL.

<scnr mode="curse">Using as many third party tools, libs, frameworks as possible is *modern*. If you're not doing this other "programmers" look snippy down on you, telling you that you've got no clue about how things work today. Even for one simple "document.getElementById()"(Javascript) you need many KBs extra for jQuery (so it is shorted to "$()"). If you say "let's do that old fashioned, we don't need jQuery elsewhere" your on the outside.</scnr>


----------



## Aeterna (Jul 20, 2020)

jmos said:


> Kdenlive requires kf5-purpose; kf5-purpose requires kaccounts-integration; kaccounts-integration requires akonadi; akonadi requires a database. So Kdenlive requires a database. Which one is up to you, but: If you go with the package, it is MySQL. Using as many third party tools, libs, frameworks as possible is *modern*. If you're not doing this other "programmers" look snippy down on you, telling you that you've got no clue about how things work today. Even for one simple "document.getElementById()"(Javascript) you need many KBs extra for jQuery (so it is shorted to "$()"). If you say "let's do that old fashioned, we don't need jQuery elsewhere" your on the outside.


I have kdenlive installed and working without akonadi and MySQL-server (running sqlite instead).
these are FreeBSD introduced dependencies (a need for akonadi requiring MySQL to get kdenlive). 
KDE is/can be really light and very modular. In fact it is lighter than xfce4 if properly configured. 
I decided against (after testing) KDE/Plasma installation on FreeBSD because it is not flexible and it is heavy. Instead I am running Openbox. 
I like KDE Plasma 5 a lot but I think that I will wait a bit more before installing it on FreeBSD.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 20, 2020)

jmos said:


> <scnr mode="curse">Using as many third party tools, libs, frameworks as possible is *modern*. If you're not doing this other "programmers" look snippy down on you, telling you that you've got no clue about how things work today. Even for one simple "document.getElementById()"(Javascript) you need many KBs extra for jQuery (so it is shorted to "$()"). If you say "let's do that old fashioned, we don't need jQuery elsewhere" your on the outside.</scnr>



Stated otherwise: companies earn money by selling solutions, so they need problems; and when there aren't enough, they have to create some.
The more code, the more bugs, so the more "modern" development practices have to be, the more money flows in.

When a framework accidentally - and unfortunately - solves problems and makes developers more productive and software more reliable, there is still a solution to create more problems: release new versions of the framework more often, e.g. every 6 months, to make sure it becomes more unstable and unreliable.


----------



## jmos (Jul 20, 2020)

Aeterna said:


> these are FreeBSD introduced dependencies (a need for akonadi requiring MySQL to get kdenlive).
> KDE is/can be really light and very modular. In fact it is lighter than xfce4 if properly configured.


Haven't test it, but: Compiling Kdenlive without filesharing support should disappear the dependency to kf5-purpose. So that might be a second possibility to get Kdenlive without MySQL (even without any database). To me that's no option (another port relies on akonadi).
I don't see KDE as "light" - even on Debian it pulls me 150 packages in (checked!) - and that on a machine already running LXQT (so QT5 stuff is already available); On the other side Xfce installs only a dozen packages on the same machine. "Modular" might be, but it really isn't smart. FreeBSD compared to my Debian it is just: different.


----------



## Nasrudin (Jul 20, 2020)

jmos said:


> I don't see KDE as "light" - even on Debian it pulls me 150 packages in (checked!) - and that on a machine already running LXQT (so QT5 stuff is already available); On the other side Xfce installs only a dozen packages on the same machine. "Modular" might be, but it really isn't smart. FreeBSD compared to my Debian it is just: different.



So I still use my frankenstein KWin + XFCE (when I can get expose support in another WM that works well I'll stop doing this). I wanted to comment on the "lightness" of KDE by showing the lightness of a subset of KDE...KWin:


```
> pkg info -d plasma5-kwin | wc -l
      74
> pkg info -d xfce | wc -l
      14
```

That's just kwin! I haven't installed the rest of kde but I did have to install a few extra kde packages to get this to work. Note that KWin still hangs randomly, causing me to have to SSH in and kill it. The expose feature is worth this hassle.


----------



## Mjölnir (Jul 20, 2020)

jmos said:


> I don't see KDE as "light" - even on Debian it pulls me 150 packages in (checked!) [...]


His point was that it is possible to run a KDE w/o _KWin_ and _Plasma_ - only the _kf5-framework_ stuff - with _Openbox_ WM instead KWin and that makes up a lighter DE than XfCE4.  Probably even more feature-rich.  Very likely the Debian packages pull in _KWin_ & _Plasma_ packages, like on FreeBSD.


----------



## Aeterna (Jul 20, 2020)

Nasrudin said:


> So I still use my frankenstein KWin + XFCE (when I can get expose support in another WM that works well I'll stop doing this). I wanted to comment on the "lightness" of KDE by showing the lightness of a subset of KDE...KWin:
> 
> 
> ```
> ...


To be honest I am really surprised that someone would refer to the number of packages installed as a measure of lightness or not. 
System responsiveness, RAM use, CPU use, that what's count. This is on laptop where I prefer that system is working on battery as long as possible.
Xfce4 in virtual machine is not acceptable as it does not show properly vshares.


----------



## zirias@ (Jul 20, 2020)

jmos said:


> <scnr mode="curse">Using as many third party tools, libs, frameworks as possible is *modern*. If you're not doing this other "programmers" look snippy down on you, telling you that you've got no clue about how things work today. Even for one simple "document.getElementById()"(Javascript) you need many KBs extra for jQuery (so it is shorted to "$()"). If you say "let's do that old fashioned, we don't need jQuery elsewhere" your on the outside.</scnr>


You might have a point when these things are exaggerated (I see that for example in the whole "node" ecosystem, npm hell ...) -- but on the other hand, re-inventing the wheel was always frowned upon. KDE is a "full-featured" desktop, and this indeed means a shitload of features -- sure it has a lengthy list of dependencies, and actually, this is just sane reuse of existing libraries in most cases. Yes, a desktop depending on a database server is a bit over the top -- maybe it's just "akonadi" is a bad idea 

As for jQuery -- this had a totally different usecase, mainly working around all the quirks and little differences of different browsers. Nobody in their right mind would ever have considered using it just to get a few elements from DOM by their IDs. Yes, I'm writing in past tense here. As browsers evolved and improved, jQuery is used more and more rarely. Ask a typical "frontend developer" nowadays, most would tell you to better avoid jQuery.


----------



## jmos (Jul 21, 2020)

Aeterna said:


> To be honest I am really surprised that someone would refer to the number of packages installed as a measure of lightness or not.
> System responsiveness, RAM use, CPU use, that what's count. This is on laptop where I prefer that system is working on battery as long as possible.



I take care of a low power consumption when buying hardware - the software used on it isn't into question as it is bought therefore. (And as I don't want running software I don't need I always create my own desktop - I would never use a ready KDE, Xfce, LXQT, LXDE, GNOME etc. for my main desktops.)

The look at "how much RAM this and that desktop uses" I've even didn't understand 20 years ago. Really, if it takes 20 MB or 1 MB isn't the point in days 4 GB are called "little". And even in the "128 MB times" I didn't see the difference between f.e. KDE and a simple window manager - both were fast und enough to get my things done. But when it comes to "let's save ressources" I never even thought about using a whole DE; Using any DE says you're having ressources and want to sacrify them for comfort aspects.

The responsiveness thing … may that belong more to QT vs GTK in a VM on *your* setup? Also to this aspect: I cannot see a difference *whatever* desktop I'm using in a VM; Actually I'm using Xfce, LQXT, GNOME and simple window managers in my unixoid VMs, and all I can say is that only the Win 10 VM is less responsiv, all others are equal. (But since the last hardware upgrade - low power consumption of course - the Win 10 thing is gone.) The limit on desktop VMs belonging to responsiveness is in my case more of using VNC than choosing DE x or y.

Also the CPU usage: Requesting a website, moving some files to other drives etc. - everything I'm doing the desktops CPU usage itself is just vanishing in the noise. Over the last years the one thing my computer comes to limits was neither RAM nor CPU, but: disk space.

So yes, I'm taking care of low dependencies when I'm choosing my software. To me that is one indicator of good designed software: Keep it simple. In my opinion "keep it simple" also means not to need 150 third party packages. The concept of sharing libs is great, but todays overflow and the freewheeling and blithely unaware use of them is far too much. To me KF5 is one of the most ugliest things onto this aspect - and there was a time Kdenlive didn't need this whole monster (!). And even that time: I remember Kdenlive had heavy dependencies on strange third party tools not really needed to just cut movies.



Aeterna said:


> Xfce4 in virtual machine is not acceptable as it does not show properly vshares.



What are vshares? If that are mountable disks: Just make an entry in fstab, and Thunar should show them.


----------



## Nasrudin (Jul 22, 2020)

Aeterna said:


> To be honest I am really surprised that someone would refer to the number of packages installed as a measure of lightness or not.
> System responsiveness, RAM use, CPU use, that what's count. This is on laptop where I prefer that system is working on battery as long as possible.



Well first, I intended my message to be "number of dependencies" not "number of packages".  I find that is a measure of lightness because the more a package depends on, the more that has to be installed and the heavier the memory requirements. 

But there's, of course, more to the story:


```
> ps auwx | grep X
...
root     27354    2.6  0.6 26013796  752208 v2  S     4Jul20   1290:26.32 /usr/local/bin/Xorg :0 -nolisten tcp
```

Now this box has a lot of RAM to be sure, but 26GB of VSZ is what the X server -itself- takes. I doubt that is considered light by any metric.


----------



## shkhln (Jul 22, 2020)

Nasrudin said:


> Now this box has a lot of RAM to be sure, but 26GB of VSZ is what the X server -itself- takes. I doubt that is considered light by any metric.



Can't tell if trolling or serious. It's completely normal for applications primarily targeting Linux to map much more memory than they actually need or will ever use. Mmaping large files, for example, will inflate this number quite a bit.


----------



## skeletonboss12 (Jul 22, 2020)

gofer_touch said:


> Here is another one for you:
> 
> https://cooltrainer.org/a-freebsd-desktop-howto/
> 
> There is also the script `desktop-installer` in the package repository and the ports tree. You simply do `pkg install desktop-installer` in a new install and follow the instructions. You can have a basic FreeBSD desktop up and running literally within about 15 minutes.



This is a very outdated guide and some of these things will cause issues or maybe even render your system unbootable.  It does contain some valuable info, such helpful tuneables to change for desktop/workstation use 

vermaden and a few other users on here have comprehensive spoonfeeding guides for setting up desktops on freebsd, they may not cover _everything_ though


----------



## ralphbsz (Jul 22, 2020)

jmos said:


> Kdenlive requires kf5-purpose; kf5-purpose requires kaccounts-integration; kaccounts-integration requires akonadi; akonadi requires a database. So Kdenlive requires a database. Which one is up to you, but: If you go with the package, it is MySQL.


Well, it turns out that these days, nearly every piece of software requires certain infrastructure. For example, most software uses networks, so you need good RPC support. Most software requires configuration, so they use libraries that know how to decode config files. They store data in interesting formats, which requires record management, and often databases. Given that de-facto all software needs this, wouldn't it make sense if operating systems contained the facilities as a basic part?

Well, it turns out in the 60s and 70s there was lots of research into operating systems, and a few OSes that became spectacularly successful followed that advice. For example, both System/38 and VMS shipped with a full relational database integrated into the OS, with backup facilities integrated into file systems, in the case of VMS with a networked cluster file system starting in the late 80s (VAXcluster). That was REAL progress. Alas, due to a cost-saving move by the whole industry, we ended up standardizing on the "minimum viable product" among operating systems, namely Unix (today shipped in the form of Linux and the BSDs), where none of this comfortable stuff is available by default. Interestingly, those two operating systems still exist; System/38 is still shipping today (it turned into AS/400 and then into System i, which today is just a software package you can run on a PowerPC system). And a lot of the technology from VMS (and the people that made it) ended up in Windows, through the path of NT. There is a reason that technologically, Windows has been ahead of the game in many areas, even if we (as Unix snobs) refuse to acknowledge that.



> <scnr mode="curse">Using as many third party tools, libs, frameworks as possible is *modern*.


Yes, it is, And for VERY good reasons. It is insane if every developer ends up having to re-invent all the infrastructure for their little project. Using well-made existing projects is much more sensible.

Let me explain that with a little joke, from about 40 years ago (I started doing commercial data processing in the late 70s and early 80s): A small business owner wants to use computers to run his business more efficiently. And he decided that the best place to start is by automating "accounts receivable" (the act of printing invoices, collecting payments from customers, and matching payments to outstanding bills) would be the best place to start. So he buys a computer (which in those days was something big enough to require a room of its own), and hires a programmer. The programmer tells him that it will three years to develop "accounts receivable". Well, that seems expensive and slow, but the business owner has no alternative than to let the programmer do it. After one year, the business guy goes to the programmer to see what progress has been: the programmer is putting the finishing touches on an editor. He's hoping in the second year to create a compiler, and in the third an operating system. Once he has those tools, "accounts receivable" will be quick and easy.

Today, if I'm supervising a junior software engineer, or I'm doing a code review for a colleague, and I find out that they have re-implemented something that exists as a good-quality library, I will stop them, and make then use the library. Because I want them to invest their time into creating something new and useful, not re-inventing the wheel.


----------



## unitrunker (Jul 22, 2020)

Thanks ralphbsz.

There are other sides to this. 

Rolling your own code gives you ownership of the underlying infrastructure and escapes any concerns over software license compatibility. If it breaks, you wrote it and presumably know how to fix it. If a third party library breaks, it may take you a long time to either come up with a fix or wait for a fix upstream. 

Lots of libraries do more than I want. This larger surface area carries more bugs and a higher risk of CVEs. I see the same libraries in 'pkg audit' over and over.


----------



## Aeterna (Jul 22, 2020)

jmos said:


> I take care of a low power consumption when buying hardware - the software used on it isn't into question as it is bought therefore. (And as I don't want running software I don't need I always create my own desktop - I would never use a ready KDE, Xfce, LXQT, LXDE, GNOME etc. for my main desktops.)
> 
> The look at "how much RAM this and that desktop uses" I've even didn't understand 20 years ago. Really, if it takes 20 MB or 1 MB isn't the point in days 4 GB are called "little". And even in the "128 MB times" I didn't see the difference between f.e. KDE and a simple window manager - both were fast und enough to get my things done. But when it comes to "let's save ressources" I never even thought about using a whole DE; Using any DE says you're having ressources and want to sacrify them for comfort aspects.
> 
> ...


virtualbox client FreeBSD xfce4 reports incorrectly contents of virtualbox shares in GUI and CLI. This is not an issue with KDE/Plasma or Openbox (see picture attached)

Disk is/was never a problem as it is possible to replace one with the larger disk RAM is an issue (I maxed it out at 32GB on my laptop), battery/CPU is an issue. 
I am not sure where VAX fits here. I was using IBM in mid 70'. Still don't see any relevance. 
I have several linuxes, BSDs, windows, solaris, openindiana in VM. I run different VM clients at the same time. So yes RAM is important. KDE/Plasma uses 369MB (not FreeBSD), without extra modifications, Openbox uses 270MB (could be less but this is good enough)

I think that with the modular design, RAM/CPU use we hit the wall (nearing ridiculousnes in part of your answers) so no point to discuss it anymore. 

Anyway thank you


----------



## ralphbsz (Jul 22, 2020)

unitrunker said:


> There are other sides to this.
> 
> Rolling your own code gives you ownership of the underlying infrastructure and escapes any concerns over software license compatibility. If it breaks, you wrote it and presumably know how to fix it. If a third party library breaks, it may take you a long time to either come up with a fix or wait for a fix upstream.
> 
> Lots of libraries do more than I want. This larger surface area carries more bugs and a higher risk of CVEs. I see the same libraries in 'pkg audit' over and over.


All of those are concerns. Clearly, if the tradeoff is to use a giant package (100 page manual, lawyers have to do special work to deal with license agreement, repeat offender in vulnerabilities...) to save 10 lines of code, you don't do it. That's good engineering common sense. On the other hand, re-implementing things just to "own" them means that you own all of their downsides too: If it breaks, you can't get any help with fixing it, because it's only your own fault.

A lot depends on the trust relationship. In the old days, when I was programming with systems that came from trusted vendors (such as Digital, HP, IBM), I could expect that the software they sold me was of high quality and had good support. And if not, I would call 1-800-DIGITAL or 1-800-IBM-SERV, open a trouble ticket, and a few weeks later a tape with patches would be on my desk. Today, we expect software to be free, and too often the quality matches the price. Still, if a library of reasonably quality exists to solve a problem, and using it is more efficient than solving the problem yourself, then use it.


----------



## Hakaba (Jul 22, 2020)

ralphbsz said:


> Still, if a library of reasonably quality exists to solve a problem, and using it is more efficient than solving the problem yourself, then use it.


Efficience is a good point.
If it install python 2.7 or a db dependency it is not efficient.
And a lot of project have a very long obscure and useless list of dependencies.
I use dwm with dmenu. What things KDE offer at what price ?
KISS is a past concept today.
What about user preference encoded in obscure DB like Xressource ?
A file in .config do the same thing.

The OS need to offer tools to solve use case. But UNIX is brained as a set of concepts that can handle a lot of use case with few tools. So IMHO we better have to see how we can use basic tools/lib to feet our need instead of searching a foreign monster that solve our use case.

I am pretty sure that the big majority of node programs will not be transpilable in the 2 years.
Do I want that mess in the OS I daily use  ?


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Jul 22, 2020)

unitrunker said:


> Thanks ralphbsz.
> 
> There are other sides to this.
> 
> ...



There's also the staffing issue. The more tools and frameworks you use, the longer the list of requirements in your job posts. You'll get the applications you deserve: none, or liars and incompetents.

It would be different if companies were thinking in the long term and were willing to invest in people. But in reality, the words "human capital" are just section titles in the annual social audit report of the company, it doesn't translate in facts.

Furthermore, technology is volatile, but applications last decades. Over time, you end up with technology patchworks, e.g. some features using XML/XSLT from the database to the browser, other features using Struts, some using Spring MVC, some more using Angular, and others using React. And the list is still open, as the company still needs the services of this application.

How are you going to find a developer mastering all those technologies to do the maintenance of the application while coding new features?
And if you find one, how long will you be able to retain him/her?

If you want your projects to be rolled out, you have to accept compromises.


----------



## jmos (Jul 22, 2020)

ralphbsz said:


> Well, it turns out that these days, nearly every piece of software requires certain infrastructure. […]


I agree with you, and I understand the "why". And as always: Your words are well chosen and your arguments are valid.

But meanwhile it's getting more and more tricky to get a webbrowser compiled (again: I know the "why"). A few years ago Kdenlive runs even without KF5, and as KF5 came in the dependencies increased and some functionalities were droped - and of course the developers had their reasons to switch over to KF5.

(Marginal note - nice thing yesterday hapened: Tiny up to date headless Ubuntu server. Found a sound lib, and thoght "why the hell on this machine…", so I typed in: "apt-get purge libasound2" and pressed [Enter]. Then I've been asked if I really want to remove Vim. So guys: Don't complain about FreeBSDs packages having curious dependencies - it's the same elswhere; You're just recognizing such things if you're switching over from an other system that is: different. If you don't want it to be different don't switch.)

I would like to see more developers not to be finished with a fast "cool, works", but a little more often on the greenfield site. In my opinion dealing with third party stuff has become a little too carefree.

Is this the future? More and more specific and simultaneously growing environments to get things working? Then massively more hardware will find its way to the dump. And we can no longer afford that (fact: we never could).

The current situation is understandable - but therefore not good.


----------



## Nasrudin (Jul 23, 2020)

shkhln said:


> Can't tell if trolling or serious.



No one can effectively and consistently tell the difference these days, even in person. 



shkhln said:


> It's completely normal for applications primarily targeting Linux to map much more memory than they actually need or will ever use. Mmaping large files, for example, will inflate this number quite a bit.



Normal != lightweight. I was discussing the latter, not asserting the former. Speaking in a serious way, in my opinion using 26GB of any memory mapped space is not really lightweight.


----------



## AngryChris (Jul 23, 2020)

Nasrudin said:


> Normal != lightweight. I was discussing the latter, not asserting the former. Speaking in a serious way, in my opinion using 26GB of any memory mapped space is not really lightweight.


Your view, while reasonable, I believe is mistaken. This is because the requested size (the _SIZE _column in top(1) and the _VSZ _column in ps(1)) is not what the program is using, it's merely what the program has requested. You want to look at what's actually resident in memory (the _RES _column in top(1) and _RSS _column in ps(1)). This is how much memory the program is really using.

Here's an example from this new VM:


```
cbell@athena:/usr/home/cbell $ ps ux
USER  PID %CPU %MEM   VSZ  RSS TT  STAT STARTED    TIME COMMAND
cbell 801  0.0  0.2 20292 9808  -  S    05:39   0:00.05 sshd: cbell@pts/0 (sshd)
cbell 809  0.0  0.1 13480 4744  -  Ss   05:40   0:00.28 tmux: server (/tmp//tmux-1001/default) (tmux)
cbell 802  0.0  0.1 12248 3440  0  Is   05:39   0:00.01 -sh (sh)
cbell 807  0.0  0.1 12964 3940  0  I+   05:40   0:00.01 tmux: client (/tmp//tmux-1001/default) (tmux)
cbell 810  0.0  0.1 12288 3444  1  Ss   05:40   0:00.01 -sh (sh)
cbell 840  0.0  0.1 11940 3136  1  R+   05:56   0:00.00 ps ux
cbell@athena:/usr/home/cbell $
```

Note how much smaller the RSS value is than the VSZ value. That's the one you want to be using to determine real memory usage.  So in your example X server, while it has requested 26 GB from the operating system, it's only using 750 MB (or roughly 3% of the VSZ value).


----------



## Nasrudin (Jul 23, 2020)

AngryChris said:


> Your view, while reasonable, I believe is mistaken. This is because the requested size (the _SIZE _column in top(1) and the _VSZ _column in ps(1)) is not what the program is using, it's merely what the program has requested.



I am aware of this idea. Perhaps I should have said "requesting" instead of "using". Still...are you suggesting that I consider a process requesting 26GB of main memory as "lightweight" because it only uses 3% of what it asked for?


----------



## AngryChris (Jul 23, 2020)

Nasrudin said:


> I am aware of this idea. Perhaps I should have said "requesting" instead of "using". Still...are you suggesting that I consider a process requesting 26GB of main memory as "lightweight" because it only uses 3% of what it asked for?


Yes.


----------



## shkhln (Jul 27, 2020)

By the way,

```
% cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep "virtual memory"
[   388.912] (II) NVIDIA: Reserving 24576.00 MB of virtual memory for indirect memory
```


----------



## Nasrudin (Aug 2, 2020)

shkhln said:


> By the way,
> 
> ```
> % cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep "virtual memory"
> ...





Aeterna said:


> To be honest I am really surprised that someone would refer to the number of packages installed as a measure of lightness or not.
> System responsiveness, RAM use, CPU use, that what's count.





AngryChris said:


> Your view, while reasonable, I believe is mistaken. This is because the requested size (the _SIZE _column in top(1) and the _VSZ _column in ps(1)) is not what the program is using...


 
So the pedantic responses above, while correct, have ultimately resulted in obscuring the original subjective point I made.

By the exchanges above, it's clear to me that "lightweight" must be a subjective metric, not an objective one. Unless someone is willing to provide an objective definition, with clear rationale for that definition that everyone can agree on, then we must conclude that "lightweight" remains a subjective metric.

Despite the above quotes, I still claim that the number of packages installed is a  personally valid metric of lightweight-ness. Each dependent package takes, at the very least, disk space. For purely shared library packages, each shared library takes up some memory and adds complexity to your system. Some of these packages take up space as a process because they must be daemonized and run in the background; this adds complexity as well. 

To be clear, I am not saying subjective OR objective system responsiveness metrics,  RAM use, CPU use, or network load are not also indicators of lightweight-ness. Measuring these ideas objectively and properly often takes more than just one command (unless you have a monitoring system going on) and dedicated intention. Looking at the package count is quick and easy. 

Thus, I will continue to claim that a simple count of dependent packages, while not definitive, is a pretty good and convenient indicator of how heavy or light software is.


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## shkhln (Aug 3, 2020)

Nasrudin said:


> So the pedantic responses above



There's nothing pedantic about correcting a gross misunderstanding of memory managements basics. This is a regular user level knowledge. (And I don't care to participate in "lightweightness" debates.)


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## Márcio Rezende (Sep 3, 2020)

Mine either. Mouse works fine, but touchpad and touch screen in my Acer Spin SP111-32N are not usable.

Touchpad have become a confortable...  Handsrest and my screen is clean... No fingerprints on it!

I've tested with 3 live CD (Fury, DragonFly, GhostBSD) none of that worked.

But, testing with 2 linux (Q4OS and Devuan) both worked fine.

Some ideas:

- Use a mouse ... Lame because a usb stick spoil one usb port and could bend my usb port... That's a slim machine and it compromise it's mobility.

- Change for a tabbed window manager ... Good, I'm testing with xmonad and ratpoison and I'm very impressed with it. Cool ... But I'm spending a lot of time to learn all those "key chords" (not a big deal for an emacs user) and improving my independence .... But some applications are simply impossible (xv for instance) and others like firefox have a good set of shortcuts... But they are very intrincate. More time wasting.

- Find some mouse emulator for FreeBSD. I couldn't found yet if some know how to emulate mouse with keyboar arrows keys please post here.

- Develop a drive... No way... Never mind.

Definitely... This modern world is not  for those people without a mouse... Without one you are a crippled guy even in FreeBSD biosphere.

And worse... Nobody cares.... If you will buy a brand new computer ask for spartan one. Nice gadgets demands time to be accepted in. Linux guys (maybe it is a money matter) receives their toys first.

I refused to install linux on this notebook... It will stay with other "live `side' pendrive".  And I have to wait for some solution.  (I don't have driver developer skills and refuse moaning here for someone - who have - work on it)

The bright side: In this mean time I'm learning a lot about drivers, boot, Xwindows, fonts and configurations.

That's why I'm in true love with FreeBSD.

It's a real nice experience - frustranting often - but very useful. I'm growing... and learning.


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## ekvz (Sep 3, 2020)

Márcio Rezende said:


> Definitelly... This modern world is not  for those people without a mouse... Without one you are a crippled guy even in FreeBSD biosphere.



I am not sure how much help it would be but as long as you are able to define custom key bindings (through your WM maybe?) you could add mouse emulation for those applications that absolutely won't work without it. Example:


```
key "Super+1"            xdotool click --clearmodifiers 1
key "Super+2"            xdotool click --clearmodifiers 2
key "Super+3"            xdotool click --clearmodifiers 3
key "Super+Next"         sh -c "xdotool mousedown 5; xdotool mouseup 5"
key "Super+Prior"        sh -c "xdotool mousedown 4; xdotool mouseup 4"
key "Super+W"            xdotool mousemove_relative 0 -5
key "Super+S"            xdotool mousemove_relative 0 5
key "Super+A"            xdotool mousemove_relative -- -5 0
key "Super+D"            xdotool mousemove_relative 5 0
```

Now you have a mouse on your keyboard.

Edit: Sorry had to fix an error with clicking the buttons. I actually have just the Prior/Next binds to simulate the mouse wheel so i thought it would also work for buttons 1-3. Turns out it  doesn't so i had to adapt it.


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## mickey (Sep 3, 2020)

Márcio Rezende said:


> Mine either. Mouse works fine, but touchpad and touch screen in my Acer Spin SP111-32N are not usable.
> Touchpad have become a confortable...  Handsrest and my screen is clean... No fingerprints on it!
> I've tested with 3 live CD (Fury, DragonFly, GhostBSD) none of that worked.


Well, at least some progress is being made. After a couple rounds of unsuccessfully trying to get the touchpad on my notebook to work in the past, I thought I'd revisit this subject after some of the more recent updates to libinput, xf86-input-synaptics, etc. arrived in the ports tree. Turns out it's working now without needing any special configuration and now KDE recognizes it and is able to configure it. So it pays off to have another look at problematic things from time to time.


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## kpedersen (Sep 3, 2020)

I like the keyboard idea. I have always been meaning to give it a try and remove the need for a mouse entirely.

I do like my ThinkPad trackpoint (little red nipple) but find it annoying if I ever have to use machines without it.

If you decide you really do need a mouse, perhaps you can get a cable-less mouse? These often have a shorter "stubby" USB dongle which has a less chance to break and keeps the laptop thin and easy to move around.

Something like this: https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/compu...wireless-optical-mouse-grey-10732373-pdt.html

I avoid Bluetooth like the plague because it is a faff to set up, especially in environments where the OS isn't properly installed yet. You can get some generic wireless ones (infra red?) that are hard-coded to connect so no silly authentication stuff needed (there are some minor security impacts with this but a mouse is a lot safer than a keyboard for this stuff (can't remotely type commands for example)).


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## Márcio Rezende (Sep 3, 2020)

ekvz said:


> Now you have a mouse on your keyboard.



I'm eager to test it right now...  Thanks a lot, pal!


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## Márcio Rezende (Sep 3, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> Something like this: https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/compu...wireless-optical-mouse-grey-10732373-pdt.html



All right ... And thanks for suggestion @kapedersen. I know it works. I have an logitech keyboard with a trackpad (2in1) that works fine in FreeBSD environment and have a "bug" donkey. It is compact and ligth ... But terrible to use with computers (good for tv and multimedia appliances) and... I have a logitech mouse (solo) as you see - but the donkey is big - and one maxell with a little one - AAA addicted... Well all those things are another clumsy gadgets to carry and handle out on the streets and even worse - doesn't matter which one I can own -  it will hijacks my second usb (one is in use to be my "hd" as you can see in attached photo ). I need that spare usb free to insert portable devices or get fast files exchanges through it at all.

At end those workarounds not solve the problem but come to be a crutch!


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## kpedersen (Sep 3, 2020)

Márcio Rezende said:


> At end those workarounds not solve the problem but come to be a crutch!



Yeah, I understand. Similarly I always start off impressed by the Raspberry Pi Zero's size. However after adding 2 USB hubs, usb mouse, usb keyboard, usb disk and usb wifi adapter, it becomes a little less impressive and more like a mess XD


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## Márcio Rezende (Sep 3, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> ... more like a mess XD


LOL... Breaking completely with the purpose of being a small compact thug!


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## Márcio Rezende (Sep 4, 2020)

ekvz said:


> .... Now you have a mouse on your keyboard.


It was a great try but on my testing, with twm (simpler wm that I know) it worked but is hellish slow (besides on configuration complexity). Maybe I could increase steps beyond 5 ...

But the real problem is: when the mouse is captured by window focus it drops in application control and seems you drifted to another scenario (or portal to another dimension). So the easy way to get out is closing that window but unfortunately, you can't reach using the "close icon" with the "key"mouse.
At the end, the last resource is to exit the application at all. I couldn't find another way yet.
Anyway, it destroys the 'easiness goal' of using a window manager, making it over in a very nice "window 'torture chamber' manager". 
But for my information, which wm are you using with that configuration?
Thx again.


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## ekvz (Sep 4, 2020)

Márcio Rezende said:


> It was a great try but on my testing, with twm (simpler wm that I know) it worked but is hellish slow (besides on configuration complexity). Maybe I could increase steps beyond 5 ...



Yes, you are right, at 5 pixels per step it's really kinda slowish. Well, it somewhat depends on the resolution used but with anything > 1024 it's likely quite sleep inducing to wait for the mouse to reach it's destination. As you already said this could be increased though. It's really just about how to balance speed vs. accuracy. It could also be split into 2 sets of slow and fast controls but i guess that would just make it even more confusing / finger twisting.



Márcio Rezende said:


> But the real problem is: when the mouse is captured by window focus it drops in application control and seems you drifted to another scenario (or portal to another dimension). So the easy way to get out is closing that window but unfortunately, you can't reach using the "close icon" with the "key"mouse.
> At the end, the last resource is to exit the application at all. I couldn't find another way yet.



`xdotool` can also focus/activate windows and while i don't see any option to simply unfocus everything maybe focusing  the WMs root window could have a similar effect. At least it could be worth an experiment if that would be the sole show stopper.



Márcio Rezende said:


> Anyway, it destroys the 'easiness goal' of using a window manager, making it over in a very nice "window 'torture chamber' manager".



I know what you mean. While it sure works it's really more of a last resort kind of thing.



Márcio Rezende said:


> But for my information, which wm are you using with that configuration?



Like i said above, i am really just using the mousewheel emulation. I came up with it when i had to deal with mouse where the mousewheel was broken but it's also kinda useful when dealing with touchpads i think (i am not a big fan of 2 finger acrobatics).  My go to window manager is IceWM. So nothing really special regarding input handling / window arrangement. Just a boring old stacking window manager.


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## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

Perhaps you need the window manager to "eat" the keypress instead so it doesn't forward it through to the application.
A couple of solutions that might work:

1) Add some fake Twm bindings (i.e for the left)


```
"Left"    = m    : all        : f.nop
```

Note: I think "Super" (the windows key?) is mod4 or just 4 in Twm. However it might not be and you might not be able to map it. In that case, perhaps alter your xdotool bindings to use the meta / alt key instead (to match the window manager absorbing the key)

2) Perhaps consider using another light window manager that supports the moving of the mouse internally (Fvwm, Cwm)

For example Fvwm it would be: 





__





						The Official Fvwm FAQ
					

FVWM is an extremely powerful ICCCM-compliant multiple virtual desktop window manager for the X Window system.




					www.fvwm.org
				




Note: You will still need the xdotool to "click" the mouse. I don't think Fvwm actually provides that.


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## Mjölnir (Sep 4, 2020)

I'm always amused when you _"minimal WM"_ freaks are willing to invest _maximum_ time & effort to set up enhanced configuration to resemble the same effects that are standard in a full-blown GUI...   On KDE, I click on the configuration interface & within 5 seconds, I set up to move the mouse via keyboard with a few mouse clicks


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## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> On KDE, I click on the configuration interface & within 5 seconds, I set up to move the mouse via keyboard with a few mouse clicks



Don't worry. You're "solution" will be broken next week in an update 

Actually, my guess is that the accessibility stuff in FreeBSD's KDE was never ported. So perhaps tick that box and it will either come up with a dbus or udev error, or simply nothing will happen.

In my experience "Fat DE" users often have so much broken stuff installed that the actual working functionality is barely that of a minimal window manager anyway. Unlike minimal setups (where it is a one off configuration), you will be fighting with KDE almost every time a new major version comes out.

Off topic:
Christ, is KDE still doing that "metal" Mac OS X (10.4) look? That seems pretty dated now doesn't it? And why does your mouse cursor look like it is from a "space game"? Is that still the default? I thought KDE looked more modern than that these days. No complaints from me, I love retro stuff! I am just surprised with all of the focus of Linux these days being on glitz and trendy GUI stuff, this is the current state of the art?
KDE has certainly got more of my respect for barely changing for the last 10 years. XD
Or is the FreeBSD port just out of date?


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## Mjölnir (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> Christ, is KDE still doing that "metal" Mac OS X (10.4) look? That seems pretty dated now doesn't it? And why does your mouse cursor look like it is from a "space game"? Is that still the default? I thought KDE looked more modern than that these days. No complaints from me, I love retro stuff! I am just surprised with all of the focus of Linux these days being on glitz and trendy GUI stuff, this is the current state of the art?


No, the default design _Breeze_ looks like _Windoze_, which I can not stand for obvious reasons  Thus I changed the default global design from _Breeze_ to _Oxygen_, Plasma design from _Breeze_ to _Air_ & application style & window decorations from _Breeze_ to _Oxygen_.  BTW, only a few mouse clicks that took me ~10 sec.
Until a few years, no update broke my KDE setup, instead the last few updates fixed a few bugs that bugged me


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## Mjölnir (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> Actually, my guess is that the accessibility stuff in FreeBSD's KDE was never ported. So perhaps tick that box and it will either come up with a dbus or udev error, or simply nothing will happen.


Works perfectly, although the defaults are weak (for me), I changed the _repeat delay_ to 1 ms, pointer acceleration to 7500 ms, max. velocity to 1500 px/sec & acceleration profile to 1000.  Maybe the defaults are fine for the target users (people with spasticus or gout).  Plus, it does not work with the arrow keys on my laptop's keyboard, but only with a numerical pad, which my laptop doesn't have.  I tested with an external keyboard.  Should be easy to fix or patch though.


> In my experience "Fat DE" users often have so much broken stuff installed that the actual working functionality is barely that of a minimal window manager anyway. Unlike minimal setups (where it is a one off configuration), you will be fighting with KDE almost every time a new major version comes out.


No.  Maybe you're refering to _Gtk_-based DEs? _Gtk_ is broken by design.  E.g. they're ignoring modern displays high resolutions _intentionally_.


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## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> Plus, it does not work with the arrow keys on my laptop's keyboard, but only with a numerical pad, which my laptop doesn't have.  I tested with an external keyboard.  Should be easy to fix or patch though.



Hmm, I am glad it works to an extent (I always think computing must absolutely suck if you are disabled) but this does kinda reduces its usefulness on most laptops (rarely do they have numpads). But what about wasd keys? It just doesn't seem flexible enough compared to the ad-hoc approach. DEs rarely do seem flexible enough which is why many people still prefer WMs.



mjollnir said:


> they're ignoring modern displays high resolutions _intentionally_.


In all fairness, most platforms "support" high resolutions simply by making things bigger. This seems to completely waste the whole point of high resolutions. Instead they just use more power and are more resource intensive for no gain. To truely support high res, a complete redesign of how we think about GUI paradigms is in order.


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## Mjölnir (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> Hmm, I am glad it works to an extent (I always think computing must absolutely suck if you are disabled) but this does kinda reduces its usefulness on most laptops (rarely do they have numpads). But what about wasd keys? It just doesn't seem flexible enough compared to the ad-hoc approach. DEs rarely do seem flexible enough which is why many people still prefer WMs.


The _fat_ DEs try to cover the average & most wanted use-cases.  I don't know what _wasd_ keys are.  I'm not interested in any kind of flexibility when it takes me days or weeks to figure out how to get what I want...  We must not fill the precious forum's space & waste our time with a pro/contra bare WM vs. full-featured DEs discussion.  I have to admit I started it... 


> In all fairness, most platforms "support" high resolutions simply by making things bigger. This seems to completely waste the whole point of high resolutions. Instead they just use more power and are more resource intensive for no gain. To truely support high res, a complete redesign of how we think about GUI paradigms is in order.


That's the Gtk way...  Enable Qt's _automatic HiDPI scaling_ (in sddm.conf), then see & enjoy the difference.


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## mickey (Sep 4, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> I changed the _repeat delay_ to 1 ms


Are you _sure_ about that? 1ms? 








mjollnir said:


> I don't know what _wasd_ keys are.


Those keys are usually used in games for controlling movement, up/down, left/right, and after years I still dont get it how anyone can play any game whatsoever using those keys. First thing I usually do is remap those keys to use the cursor keys instead.

Regarding the KDE style I just say one thing: Breeze AlphaBlack


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## Márcio Rezende (Sep 4, 2020)

Pals...

I always wondered what mjollnir here asks: why bother using a "raw" environment instead of using a full "Whistler-n-Beller? Honky-Donkey?"

I have always liked (and used) KDE since I first met it in 1998. What surprises me is why they use KDE to do the same thing that well-known and established window systems already do?

I think KDE, like Gnome, is bloated ... But they are rightly bloated: to give us more comfort.

So why do we look for "discomfort" if we already have "comfort"?

I think that:

1) We look for certain discomforts because we are not lazy and we like to have fun learning.

2) As in the 'Naked and Afraid' paradigm: when we put ourselves in a situation of discomfort we learn to value comfort and to deal with it with more "responsibility": it is not just because it is there that we have to use it.

3) For the sake of homage and respect for those who did not have that comfort, like the old patriarchs, they did everything they did to have that comfort. Keeping that culture alive is a matter of principle.

My beautiful tablet book has everything I need at my fingertips, simply by initializing the partition on the internal NVMe or by placing one of the Linux live distros that have everything working ... Ok, there is.

If I want to work and do the same boring things I always do, it will be the same distance as I reach my nails. But if I want to learn and have fun and even work more fun, I keep the "beastie" right next to me, growing and learning and with it.

I fear that opinions with a critical bias are a seed for a fiery war - no fun ... At least for me.

A few days ago I installed and tried to use MULTICS  and I was then able to have a dimension of 50 years ago what the world was like without a mouse: Space Travel was (and is until today) played. If you want to have an idea, just install it. I did and I was surprised how Unix was ... But without the current nail polishes and even then, raw, they managed to do what they did and that is why we have our “comforts” today.

Besides, each one has its problems. But try to help when possible it is a good camaraderie habit that deserves to be fostered.


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## shkhln (Sep 4, 2020)

mickey said:


> Those keys are usually used in games for controlling movement, up/down, left/right, and after years I still dont get it how anyone can play any game whatsoever using those keys. First thing I usually do is remap those keys to use the cursor keys instead.



Really? It's a typical FPS control scheme: left hand for movement  (wasd), right hand for camera control (mouse).


----------



## ekvz (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> almost every time a new major version comes out.



That's what i love about my setup: 10 years from now it will look and be exactly the same. Even if i had to compile all the sources (aside from X itself maybe) it would still be easy to keep it going.


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## mickey (Sep 4, 2020)

shkhln said:


> Really? It's typical FPS control scheme: left hand for movement  (wasd), right hand for camera control (mouse).


Then it's probably because I use a trakball instead of a mouse left handedly and cursor keys (+ins/del/home/end/pgup/pgdown) on the right for movement and anything else


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## shkhln (Sep 4, 2020)

mickey said:


> Then it's probably because I use a trakball instead of a mouse left handedly and cursor keys (+ins/del/home/end/pgup/pgdown) on the right for movement and anything else



Sure enough, if you are left handed it makes sense to remap this.


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## Mjölnir (Sep 4, 2020)

mickey: No, I was refering to the configuration of accessibility aids as in my previous post.


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## mickey (Sep 4, 2020)

shkhln said:


> Sure enough, if you are left handed it makes sense to remap this.


Just left-moused, not left handed... Putting the mouse on the left side was a deliberate decision I made many years ago cause it seemed more ergonomic to me. For example when alternating between mouse and keyboard you don't have to reach over the "dead space" caused by the numerical keypad on usual AT keyboards, and your arm takes a more natural, relaxed position.


----------



## a6h (Sep 4, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> I'm always amused when you _"minimal WM"_ freaks are willing to invest _maximum_ time & effort to set up enhanced configuration to resemble the same effects that are standard in a full-blown GUI...  On KDE


I'm one of those WM minimalist freaks, i3oid to be exact! and/but I approve your message [WINK/WINK]


shkhln said:


> Really? It's a typical FPS control scheme: left hand for movement (wasd), right hand for camera control (mouse).


AFAIR Doom II or Duke Nukem 3D was my first time WASDing. I can't remember exactly, but no WASD for Wolfenstein 3D. Am I correct?


----------



## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> I'm not interested in any kind of flexibility when it takes me days or weeks to figure out how to get what I want...


Honestly, I am. But only if I have to do it exactly *once* and then I can move on with my life until the Wayland kids come in and fsck(8) everything up.



mjollnir said:


> I don't know what _wasd_ keys are.


As mentioned by others, it is a control scheme mostly for gaming, however it is a good example of a flexibility that most people would expect. Another typical one is 'hjkl' so you don't need to move your hand away from the home row. For true disabilities this is very important because the arrow keys are hard to reach, especially if you have one arm, and it happens to be on the wrong side.

I am certainly not suggesting KDE is bad (to the contrary, the death of Gnome 2 has made KDE very competitive again!). Simply that it cannot (and never will) be able to cater to everyone. And since Windows has 99% of the market, KDE is as niche as the rest of us I am afraid XD. I just hope your requirements remain inline with what the KDE developers dictate.



ekvz said:


> That's what i love about my setup: 10 years from now it will look and be exactly the same. Even if i had to compile all the sources (aside from X itself maybe) it would still be easy to keep it going.


Yep, I find this fairly liberating! Every year or so I spend a little time looking at what is "current" but always come to the same conclusion that it is either less effective, time consuming or unsustainable. One big thing I have learned (due to the continuing success of the Windows desktop and Gnome 3) is that usability experts absolutely do not exist and you just have to decide what works best for you, ignoring almost everyone else!

I did have a few concerns in the past that Wayland was going to undo a *lot* of good work but frankly, the day it gets popular I reckon it will include more X11 functionality via compatibility layers than Xorg does currently XD



mjollnir said:


> Enable Qt's _automatic HiDPI scaling_ (in sddm.conf), then see & enjoy the difference.


I did try this out, it wastes too much space. In no way am I ever going to allow a taskbar take up over 500 pixels in height! XD
If I wanted a big taskbar I would plug in my old 1024x768 LCD and save the electricity!


----------



## ekvz (Sep 4, 2020)

shkhln said:


> Really? It's a typical FPS control scheme: left hand for movement  (wasd), right hand for camera control (mouse).



Correct me if i am wrong but i vaguely remember at least some of first generation shooters (Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Duke Nukem, Blood, Blake Stone, ...) using cursor keys which led to me remapping keys once the first Quake/Quakebased games appeared. I've been playing like 10 years of ET using cursor keys but the whole layout is quite custom (there are no default keys and weapon switching is done in a somewhat strange way) and also depends on a very specific keyboard model. With the right  keyboard it's perfect though. It opens up so many movement possibilities that would end in broken fingers on a default layout.


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## Mjölnir (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> [Qt's automatic HiDPI scaling] I did try this out, it wastes too much space. In no way am I ever going to allow a taskbar take up over 500 pixels in height! XD
> If I wanted a big taskbar I would plug in my old 1024x768 LCD and save the electricity!


You can easily change the taskbar's height.  Obviously, some sizes are too large, some too small, as this is fairly new stuff it's no surprise that the defaults are far from perfect & the whole thing contains bugs that remain to be fixed.  At least they support the facilities of modern displays, fonts are crystal clear.


----------



## ekvz (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> Honestly, I am. But only if I have to do it exactly *once* and then I can move on with my life until the Wayland kids come in and fsck(8) everything up.



Exactly. My GUI has been mostly in stasis for a couple of years now. I have some plans to improve it but that's something for when i happen to have a lot of free time as it's perfectly usable as is and a lot of the things i'd like to try are rather experimental anyways.



kpedersen said:


> One big thing I have learned (due to the continuing success of the Windows desktop and Gnome 3) is that usability experts absolutely do not exist and you just have to decide what works best for you, ignoring almost everyone else!



To be honest the evolvement of DEs puzzles me. OK, in the case of Windows i kinda understand how it has to reinvent itself to keep selling copies but regarding non commercial projects i am fully at loss. The base functionality probably hasn't really changed in 10-15 years but still the product keeps changing and changing way more than the added functionality (which often seems to me like it would be used by a tiny fraction of the user base at best) would require. What is the goal here? A functional environment or some artistic statement?

As far as usability experts are concerned: They certainly are not experts of my usability. According to my GUI most of them should have retired soon after Windows 2000 was released and the other half should have finally scratched that messy waste of space called "desktop" and put something useful (a tabbed full screen terminal, what else?) there


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## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

ekvz said:


> According to my GUI most of them should have retired soon after Windows 2000


Agreed. Sadly, nowadays I don't feel developers have the skill or discipline to make a desktop environment anywhere nearly as functional or consistent as the Windows 2000 shell. Not to mention the entire OS, not just the UI could run in ~100MB of RAM. That is fairly outstanding. Instead, to make up for their shortcomings, developers now just add more tacky OpenGL effects as the windows whizz around the screen. What a joke.



ekvz said:


> and put something useful (a tabbed full screen terminal, what else?) there


Yes, even traditional GUI software is becoming just one big maximized window. Gimp, Dia and Gnome3 are some that come to mind. People are basically starting to use a computer like they would MS-DOS (and DESQview for the multi-tasking). We just need to wait until others catch up (catch down?) and suddenly we will be seen as "modern" again! XD


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## Mjölnir (Sep 4, 2020)

KDE has _activities_ & _virtual desktops_ instead of tabs.  Very handy.  And the graphical effects adopt to the machine's hardware _automagically_.  It runs well on low resources.  So what?


----------



## phalange (Sep 4, 2020)

ekvz said:


> What is the goal here? A functional environment or some artistic statement?



Can't it be both?



kpedersen said:


> the windows whizz around the screen. What a joke.



I don't think that's so bad. Horses for courses. I don't (often) use anything but a window manager, but I fool with Plasma now and then to see what they're up to. I must say, I admire the frills. It's fun, flashy, and it has its place.


----------



## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> It runs well on low resources.  So what?



What would you define as low resources? I suspect we might be out of calibration.



phalange said:


> I must say, I admire the frills. It's fun, flashy, and it has its place.


I do agree but feel we must be very careful that it doesn't define the desktop and smother innovation or lighter alternatives.

We can *kinda* see this with Wayland. The complexity of implementing a compositor has greatly reduced the choice of light window managers. It is getting to the point where if it wasn't for Sway, there would be next to nothing light to compete with monstrosities like Gnome 3.

It is fairly common for users "new" to the UNIX world to come along and assume this kind of environment is the defacto standard when it isn't. There is more to computing than flashy desktops! Especially on fringe OSes like FreeBSD where a lot of functionality is missing from KDE (and especially Gnome 3 due to focus on systemd tech). Who are those users going to blame? KDE or FreeBSD. I can guarantee it is the latter.


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## ekvz (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> Yes, even traditional GUI software is becoming just one big maximized window. Gimp, Dia and Gnome3 are some that come to mind. People are basically starting to use a computer like they would MS-DOS (and DESQview for the multi-tasking). You and I just need to wait until others catch up (catch down?) and suddenly we will be seen as "modern" again! XD



I've experimented with having multiple full screen apps on various workspaces (as in the desktop on workspace 1 is the fullscreen terminal seen above, workspace 2 has a full screen file manager, ...) but it didn't seem very practical. I keep my terminal where a couple icons and long forgotten text files would otherwise sit on some cutesy wallpaper but that's enough full screen for me


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## shkhln (Sep 4, 2020)

ekvz said:


> Correct me if i am wrong but i vaguely remember at least some of first generation shooters (Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Duke Nukem, Blood, Blake Stone, ...) using cursor keys which led to me remapping keys once the first Quake/Quakebased games appeared.



I'm not sufficiently old to correct anyone with regard to early shooters. All I know is that by the time Q3, UT and Counter-Strike arrived WASD was already established as the dominant control scheme.



ekvz said:


> I've been playing like 10 years of ET using cursor keys but the whole layout is quite custom (there are no default keys and weapon switching is done in a somewhat strange way) and also depends on a very specific keyboard model. With the right  keyboard it's perfect though. It opens up so many movement possibilities that would end in broken fingers on a default layout.



Well, if you need a custom keyboard you might as well use an ortholinear mechanical keyboard, or a gaming mini-keyboard, or an Apple Magic Trackpad with some sort of virtual keys emulation for all I care. What kind of pointing device do you use though?


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## ekvz (Sep 4, 2020)

phalange said:


> Can't it be both?



I don't know, maybe? It just seems to me that those goals often interfere with each other.



shkhln said:


> Well, if you need a custom keyboard you might as well use an ortholinear mechanical keyboard, or a gaming mini-keyboard, or an Apple Magic Trackpad with some sort of virtual keys emulation for all I care. What kind of pointing device do you use though?



I am not sure if a certain ultra cheap laptop style keyboard really is all that custom. It's just specific i'd say.


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## phalange (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> It is fairly common for users "new" to the UNIX world to come along and assume this kind of environment is the defacto standard when it isn't.



It's true. But then again, I came from the gimmick-filled DE-dominated world of MacOS and Windows. I remember the first time I saw OpenBox and I was like, holy s***. My head exploded. That was it. My point is, there's hope.


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## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

shkhln said:


> I'm not sufficiently old to correct anyone with regard to early shooters.



It was probably as soon as proper rasterization came in (i.e not ray casting like Build Engine, Doom) and people needed to actually look up and down in actual 3D worlds rather than "pretending" then we needed the mouse because the pg-up/pg-down was too awkward!
'wasd' then just felt more balanced than using arrow keys and mouse both on the right.

I didn't really like the idea at first but I recall the game that finally convinced me was Half-Life. Duck jumping and facing into pipes was too hard without XD

Since I have gone back to older shooters (less DRM!), I am back to the arrow keys haha!


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## ekvz (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> Since I have gone back to older shooters (less DRM!), I am back to the arrow keys haha!



If you are into that kind of thing you should like really, really, really check out Blade Of Agony. You can thank me later


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## shkhln (Sep 4, 2020)

kpedersen said:


> It was probably as soon as proper rasterization came in (i.e not ray casting like Build Engine, Doom) and people needed to actually look up and down in actual 3D worlds rather than "pretending" then we needed the mouse because the pg-up/pg-down was too awkward!
> 'wasd' then just felt more balanced than using arrow keys and mouse both on the right.



Not quite, Quake and Quake 2 default to arrow movement. MDK is similar as well. So, it took roughly 2-3 years at least.


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## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

shkhln said:


> Not quite, Quake and Quake 2 default to arrow movement. MDK is similar as well. So, it took roughly 2-3 years at least.


Yeah they certainly defaulted to it but `+mlook` found its way into many config files for Quake 1. I think it was default in the quakeworld client (a few years later).
What I can't recall is if the original WON version of Half-Life also defaulted to arrow keys or if you had to customize it.


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## kpedersen (Sep 4, 2020)

ekvz said:


> check out Blade Of Agony


You are right. This looks great. I had not heard of it before!


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## knightjp (Oct 2, 2020)

When it comes to desktop environments on open source systems, I've always had a soft spot for KDE. However, I will agree that it was bloated, but in a good way. There was a reason. You could not have that much customization and functionality, without it being that way. 
I would liken it to the Porsche 911. A car with the engine in the rear. Back in the day, having a fast 911 was dangerous; If you didn't know how to handle it. So getting its full potential and using it at its peak performance levels was only available to a select group of people. One reason why most manufacturers have been using front or mid engine layouts.
But for the past decades, Porsche has been stubbornly working on this that now, the 911 is basically the benchmark that we gauge all the other would-be sports cars on.

For me, this is KDE. KDE has given us so much in terms of customization and choice, it needed to have it all. The developers wanted it all. But it became bloated and it was slow. It was ridiculed; stating why do we have all of this stuff that we don't need. We need minimalist DEs, faster ones like XFCE, etc. 
I like XFCE. If I can't run KDE, that is my DE of choice. But much like the Porsche engineers tinkering with the idea of the rear engined sports car, the KDE developers have been tinkering with their DE and in recent years have managed to chip away the bloat and still retain all the same functionality; to the point that many reviewers are saying its comparable to XFCE in terms of system resource usage. That is pretty impressive and hereby makes my top choice as a DE benchmark that all other DEs should be judged. 

Running FreeBSD as a desktop seems to becoming something that I may have to do within a while. I've been running a Hackintosh and MacOS on my system because it works the best for me. With the recent announcement from Apple moving over to their own chips, it would seem the days of the Hackintosh are numbered and I don't want to invest in a new system. I'd much rather save up and get a good Apple silicon mac soon. 
But in the mean time, what do I use on my current hardware? Well FreeBSD would be by choice. And so comes this video... 





_View: https://youtu.be/RO0wOW6_u-A_



Although he uses Linux, I would be looking to replicate it on FreeBSD.


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## meine (Oct 2, 2020)

knightjp said:


> I've been running a Hackintosh and MacOS on my system because it works the best for me.
> 
> But in the mean time, what do I use on my current hardware? Well FreeBSD would be by choice.



When you like a Mac-alike DE and FreeBSD at the same time, maybe LIVEstep is something to look at:









						GitHub - probonopd/LIVEstep: Experimental Live ISO based on FreeBSD with GNUstep and other components.
					

Experimental Live ISO based on FreeBSD with GNUstep and other components. - GitHub - probonopd/LIVEstep: Experimental Live ISO based on FreeBSD with GNUstep and other components.




					github.com
				








_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rOzMgMj72zw&feature=youtu.be_


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## christhegeek (Oct 11, 2020)

FreeBSD with Kde Plasma right now is at least two times faster than the latest Manjaro Kde Plasma release !!!
Lol everything runs slower in manjaro even if it has newer nvidia driver , also everything feels snappier on freebsd from launching applications to using video editors ,office, programming compiling etc.
The only thing that really makes me ungry is pkg downloading its just slow and with constant delays between downloads, please solve this issue.


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## Alexander88207 (Oct 11, 2020)

christhegeek said:


> The only thing that really makes me ungry is pkg downloading its just slow and with constant delays between downloads, please solve this issue.



This is still an issue on your side, please check your DNS settings or try to use an DNS server outside of your provider.

If you think its a problem of ports-mgmt/pkg, create a bug report here.


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## christhegeek (Oct 11, 2020)

Tried both,
last time i tried to use google's dns and i think it got better i think i have nearly no delays now but ofcourse the download speed is not ok not for the year 2020 for the year 2009 is fine 



Alexander88207 said:


> This is still an issue on your side, please check your DNS settings or try to use an DNS server outside of your provider.
> 
> If you think its a problem of ports-mgmt/pkg, create a bug report here.


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## christhegeek (Oct 11, 2020)

Also installing freebsd on an Efi Only bootable Laptop with Amd cpu , Vega Gpu is hell  i tried many times with many switches and settings so i can make it work !
Afters searching on the web i finally succeed configuring it ,everything works touchpad, graphics,wifi,sound  but it took me too much time i'm gonna backup this installation with dd just to be sure i will never have to do that again !!!!!




Alexander88207 said:


> This is still an issue on your side, please check your DNS settings or try to use an DNS server outside of your provider.
> 
> If you think its a problem of ports-mgmt/pkg, create a bug report here.


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## knightjp (May 16, 2022)

Sorry to raise an old thread.. I've just taken the plunge and removed macOS from my Hackintosh. Its now running FreeBSD.


This is my setup. Or rather was my setup running macOS. 

These are screenshots of the system now.



So far it has been a bit of a journey. It took a bit of time to figure out what I was doing wrong to get xorg working. Then came the installation of KDE. It wasn't as daunting or difficult as I remember it being so many years ago.

So far, here are my impressions and issues. 

One of the reasons that I choose KDE was because it was so much more insanely customizable that any of the others. My intentions were first to get the same features that I had on mac. The reason being that I prefer the layout in terms of functionality. I like the global menu and so I did that, but unlike macOS, the top bars don't hide even though I've selected the option. I've spent about 24 hours working at this to get it to this level. 

The end goal is this..


I thought I would get a guide and so I followed this video. 





I faced a number of challenges trying to install themes. Maybe this might not be top priority with many who are on here, but I like my system to look good. 
One of the issues was I kept getting these sddm related errors. Apparently I was missing a dependency. I figured that since KDE was primarily  developed for Linux, there were going to be issues. 
This wasn't the case. I searched online, I couldn't find the answer, except one FreeBSD user had posted on a thread saying, "I told you not to install that Linux stuff". 
It turns out that I needed to install ICODE]pkg install plasma5-sddm-kcm[/ICODE] along with sddm. 
That help me follow the video perfectly. 
I haven't gone through the whole video. And I will be making more changes as it goes on. 
I have to adjust a few things and wire myself to do things a bit more differently than on macOS. 

For one, I'm not sure how the copy and paste works on KDE. I preferred the way that the shortcuts worked on macOS. Cmd+Z/X/C/V ,etc. is so much more easier than CTRL. That too in order for to open a new window I have to CTRL + Shift + N. That seems more of a hassle than MS Windows.

Another issue is that I have to keep removing and plugging in my glass keyboard. It get detected when booting up, but that is all. I have to remove the plug and plug it back in so that I can log in when sddm comes on the screen. 

I have not tried or checked what might happen if I used xdm. I guess that is for another day. 

If anyone has any insight to the issues I've mentioned above, please let me know.


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## grahamperrin@ (May 18, 2022)

knightjp said:


> … on KDE. I preferred the way that the shortcuts worked on macOS. …



KDE Plasma is one of a number of desktop environments that default to using the much the same shortcuts as Windows.

You can change the shortcuts, but in my experience it's better to learn (and adopt) the defaults. Better to learn than to _repeatedly_ find the need to change things.

For anyone whose overriding need is Apple-like behaviour, there are FreeBSD-based distros such as helloSystem.









						helloSystem !
					

Hello !  what do u think about this new freebsd "distro" based on the macOS interface ?  https://github.com/helloSystem/hello  let's talk about it !




					forums.freebsd.org
				






knightjp said:


> … Apparently I was missing a dependency. … `pkg install plasma5-sddm-kcm` along with sddm. …



Not exactly a dependency. Under <https://www.freshports.org/deskutils/plasma5-sddm-kcm/#dependencies> "There are no ports dependent upon this port"'. 

deskutils/plasma5-sddm-kcm is simply something that adds value, for people who choose to use SDDM, which is unrelated to KDE. I'll add it to the quick start.

Via x11/sddm:









						GitHub - sddm/sddm: QML based X11 and Wayland display manager
					

QML based X11 and Wayland display manager. Contribute to sddm/sddm development by creating an account on GitHub.




					github.com


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## knightjp (May 18, 2022)

grahamperrin said:


> KDE Plasma is one of a number of desktop environments that default to using the much the same shortcuts as Windows.
> 
> You can change the shortcuts, but in my experience it's better to learn (and adopt) the defaults. Better to learn than to _repeatedly_ find the need to change things.
> 
> ...


I would have liked to give "RavynOS" a go. The idea of making a free and open source clone of macOS is the same way that ReactOS is for Windows sounds cool. Even "Hello System" is cool, but I wanted to use the standard FreeBSD and customize it into what I wanted it to be.
Even though the default KDE layout lends itself to a Windows style, from what I've learned about KDE in the past couple of days, its is just a default design. Each item that makes up the desktop are nothing more than panels and widgets arranged that way, hence it can be changed into anything that you wish.
This is actually a brilliant way of doing stuff.
I wanted the macOS style layout of the global menu and the dock. I've tried others but this is what I prefer.


Regarding the additional package I needed for sddm, it was only necessary for me to install it in order to install some themes for KDE. That was why I called it a dependency. If was a poor choice in words. My apologies. 
It wasn't really necessary for Sddm's normal operation.


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## grahamperrin@ (May 18, 2022)

knightjp said:


> … My apologies. …



So polite  but really, not necessary. You led to improved documentation. 



knightjp said:


> … I wanted the macOS style layout of …



I like the top left orientation of things. I'll post something to the FreeBSD screenshots topic.


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## knightjp (May 19, 2022)

I have a new issue.

I have some widgets on the desktop in KDE and when my computer goes to sleep and then wakes, the widgets are not all stacked in the left corner. They're not in the position that I arranged them before. How do I keep the arrangement I want?


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