# It is very tortuous install FreeBSD desktop



## teo (Sep 25, 2014)

It is very tortuous install FreeBSD desktop, you can not install some applications like Skype or Flash player support nor in Linux. In 2008 there was the DesktopBSD system based on FreeBSD, it was very comprehensive. Hopefully FreeBSD extends to GUI, the other derivatives are so incomplete.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 25, 2014)

*Re: It is very tortuous install freebsd desk.*



			
				teo said:
			
		

> It is very tortuous install freebsd desk, you can not install some applications like skype or flash player support nor in Linux.
> In 2008 there was the DesktopBSD system based on FreeBSD, it was very comprehensive. Hopefully freebsd extends to GUI, the other derivatives are so incomplete.


On the other hand, I have absolutely no issues whatsoever installing from the disk and, in fact, don't even use the disk anymore to install from and have a complete FreeBSD desktop running for 10 years.


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## hashime (Sep 25, 2014)

You can always try PC-BSD. It is basically FreeBSD with a GUI installer and some extra (half/not working) applications.


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## usdmatt (Sep 25, 2014)

As mentioned, the DesktopBSD system you are talking about was probably PC-BSD, which I think is fairly good these days as BSD desktops go. Unless you are a heavy BSD user and specifically want to set up and configure your own desktop, I would recommend all desktop users to use PC-BSD. FreeBSD itself really isn't user friendly if you just want to install and boot up to a desktop.

Personally I still think all *nix desktops, including all the Linux variants, are still a long way off the user experience you get from Windows or OSX.


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## zspider (Sep 25, 2014)

teo said:
			
		

> It is very tortuous install FreeBSD desktop, you can not install some applications like Skype or Flash player support nor in Linux. In 2008 there was the DesktopBSD system based on FreeBSD, it was very comprehensive. Hopefully FreeBSD extends to GUI, the other derivatives are so incomplete.



1.You already posted this somewhere else ,so don't do that anymore. 
https://forums.freebsd.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=46719


2. If you find that "tortuous", then your problems have just begun.


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## teo (Sep 25, 2014)

hashime said:
			
		

> You can always try PC-BSD. It is basically FreeBSD with a GUI installer and some extra (half/not working) applications.



If PC-BSD and tested, and is a heavy system that requires 52 GB hard disk to install, your system incomplete.
PC-BSD does not have any support for 32-bit system,  why we prefer to try to install FreeBSD directly with GUI, although it is stormy.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 25, 2014)

PC-BSDs minimum recommended is 20GB of hard disk space. In comparison, Ubuntu is 5GB but I can assure you no one runs Ubuntu with only 5GB and is happy.

PC-BSD's recommended disk space is 50GB. I haven't found what Ubuntu's is but it depends on what Ubuntu installs compared to PC-BSD. You can't just look at the numbers without knowing that. Looking at a Linux forum, I see one guy saying he's using 30GB but he can't do anything. Another guy says you need at least 60GB.

So I guess that means Linux sucks.


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## teo (Sep 25, 2014)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> PC-BSDs minimum recommended is 20GB of hard disk space. In comparison, Ubuntu is 5GB but I can assure you no one runs Ubuntu with only 5GB and is happy.
> 
> PC-BSD's recommended disk space is 50GB. I haven't found what Ubuntu's is but it depends on what Ubuntu installs compared to PC-BSD. You can't just look at the numbers without knowing that. Looking at a Linux forum, I see one guy saying he's using 30GB but he can't do anything. Another guy says you need at least 60GB.
> 
> So I guess that means Linux sucks.



I tried to install PC-BSD with 22 GB hard drive and I could not continue in GUI. Calls 52 GB hard drive.
Linux anyone said anything in this thread.


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## AzaShog (Sep 26, 2014)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> Looking at a Linux forum, I see one guy saying he's using 30GB but he can't do anything. Another guy says you need at least 60GB.
> 
> So I guess that means Linux sucks.



What on Earth are you talking about? You can run any Linux distro perfectly fine with a few GB of space. How much more you need depends on how much more of DATA (or stuff like Steam apps) you will put on your disk...


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## Oko (Sep 26, 2014)

AzaShog said:
			
		

> What on Earth are you talking about? You can run any Linux distro perfectly fine with a few GB of space. How much more you need depends on how much more of DATA (or stuff like Steam apps) you will put on your disk...


Just for the record this is not factually true. We use Springdale Linux (Princeton University clone of RHEL) in my Lab on all work stations. The installer requires more than 2 GB or RAM and default "minimal desktop" is close to 5 GB. With typical applications TeXLive, MATLAB, R, Python we typically end up using close to 30GB of HDD just for basic desktop functions and software. For a very similar OpenBSD desktop with exception of MATLAB which doesn't run on BSDs i need less than 8 GB of HDD space.  MATLAB itself is 8GB (Since we are major research university we have all toolboxes  §e). Replacing TeXLive pile of crap with KerTeX and using NetSurf instead of Firefox and my OpenBSD rich desktop is under 300 MB and happily running of 256 MB of RAM.

I will concede that PC-BSD is anything but light OS. Anything using ZFS as a default file system can't be light by definition. Want light fancy OS and fancy file system. Go with DragonFly.

As of FreeBSD based distros you might have a better luck with GhostBSD or even DesktopBSD http://www.desktopbsd.net/ which looks alive again. Around 2007-8 DesktopBSD definitely was much nicer than PC-BSD.


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## SirDice (Sep 26, 2014)

AzaShog said:
			
		

> drhowarddrfine said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I do believe @drhowarddrfine's comment was meant as tongue-in-cheek


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## AzaShog (Sep 26, 2014)

SirDice said:
			
		

> I do believe @drhowarddrfine's comment was meant as tongue-in-cheek



Ooh! Well, my sarcasm scanners are bash scripts, so... in the light of recent events, I demand to be excused.  :beergrin


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## teo (Sep 26, 2014)

FreeBSD because it does not extend to desktop?.
The world need this great system installed in the main computer, and not dwell on servers only. We miss the DesktopBSD system, that was a great complete desktop system based on FreeBSD. Derivatives are totally incomplete.


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## Durden (Sep 26, 2014)

teo said:
			
		

> FreeBSD because it does not extend to desktop?.
> The world need this great system installed in the main computer, and not dwell on servers only. We miss the DesktopBSD system, that was a great complete desktop system based on FreeBSD. Derivatives are totally incomplete.



People said this about Linux too and now look at the mess it is in. FreeBSD is a server OS. If you want to use it as a desktop, go ahead. No one will stop you. But you're using a server OS as a desktop. It's like complaining your hammer isn't very good at slicing bread.

FreeBSD is what it is. If you want a UNIX like desktop system, go with Linux or Mac OSX. Trying to make FreeBSD into something it isn't will only frustrate you and ultimately disappoint.


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## wblock@ (Sep 26, 2014)

I disagree.   The things that make FreeBSD a great server also make it a great desktop.  There are two difficult things about creating a desktop system out of FreeBSD.  The first is installing and configuring all the desktop software.  That's not impossible, just annoying.  The second is an automatic update that is robust enough to be run automatically.  That is more difficult.


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## Durden (Sep 26, 2014)

wblock@ said:
			
		

> I disagree.   The things that make FreeBSD a great server also make it a great desktop.  There are two difficult things about creating a desktop system out of FreeBSD.  The first is installing and configuring all the desktop software.  That's not impossible, just annoying.  The second is an automatic update that is robust enough to be run automatically.  That is more difficult.



We'll have to agree to disagree then. FreeBSD in my nearly 20 years experience is an absolutely atrocious desktop. I say this as a FreeBSD advocate and long time user. I wouldn't use FreeBSD as a desktop, unless I was working on nothing but FreeBSD servers all day and just needed a terminal to work from. Even then I would be far more productive on anything else, including Windows from a PuTTy shell.

FreeBSD lacks pretty much everything that a modern desktop requires and is quickly falling behind even Linux as far as desktops go. FreeBSD will likely not see Wayland and with GNOME and KDE and all the others signing on to Wayland, FreeBSD will soon be stuck in legacy hell with XFCE (which really isnt developed anymore) and plain Jane Window Managers.

If you don't use a desktop for anything productive then FreeBSD is fine. Most people however could not use it on a day to day basis, and by most people I'm talking 99.99%. The people on this forum could, most could not.


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## ondra_knezour (Sep 26, 2014)

I have to agree with @wblock against @Durden. I have been using FreeBSD as a desktop on my laptop for many years and I was happy with it most of the time. Supporting dozens of Windows servers, hundreds of Windows users, managing wireless infrastructure for 4k+ users in time where WiFi support in FreeBSD was far less developed than now, superior prints thanks to the LaTeX, which was always highly valued by colleagues running Windows without any DTP tools, even graphics using the Photoshop in Wine was someways doable (I never get used to the GIMP interface). Only reason, why I had (hopefully temporarily) migrated my mobile working environment to Mac via short stay in the Windows land is, that I have no time to cherry-pick best tools for new tasks, checking, what was broken in new versions etc., as wblock already said.

Side note: According to the wiki page https://wiki.freebsd.org/Graphics there is a experimental port of Wayland, reference implementation is waiting on the result of the Linux game which key system component we will move upside-down today. This week we play on udev.

Of course YMMV and I am not assuming you are wrong for your scenario.


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## Durden (Sep 26, 2014)

ondra_knezour said:
			
		

> I have to agree with @wblock against @Durden. I have been using FreeBSD as a desktop on my laptop for many years and I was happy with it most of the time. Supporting dozens of Windows servers, hundreds of Windows users, managing wireless infrastructure for 4k+ users in time where WiFi support in FreeBSD was far less developed than now, superior prints thanks to the LaTeX, which was always highly valued by colleagues running Windows without any DTP tools, even graphics using the Photoshop in Wine was someways doable (I never get used to the GIMP interface). Only reason, why I had (hopefully temporarily) migrated my mobile working environment to Mac via short stay in the Windows land is, that I have no time to cherry-pick best tools for new tasks, checking, what was broken in new versions etc., as wblock already said.
> 
> Side note: According to the wiki page https://wiki.freebsd.org/Graphics there is a experimental port of Wayland, reference implementation is waiting on the result of the Linux game which key system component we will move upside-down today. This week we play on udev.
> 
> Of course YMMV and I am not assuming you are wrong for your scenario.



You're contradicting yourself. It's perfectly usable as a desktop and yet you had to go to Mac OSX? And Wayland will be highly reliant on systemd which isn't in FreeBSD and isn't coming to FreeBSD and the Wayland devs have no interest in supporting it.

I don't get these arguments for FreeBSD as a desktop. They are overloaded with "if" and "but" as if that somehow excuses it's atrocious desktop support. Yes you can use FreeBSD as a desktop but you will be in legacy hell and resort to using wine and Linux emulation the vast majority of the time to do anything productive. At that point, why even bother with FreeBSD?

No one should take this as an attack against FreeBSD. Its just advocating the right tool for the job. FreeBSD on the desktop is not that tool.


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## ondra_knezour (Sep 26, 2014)

Durden said:
			
		

> You're contradicting yourself. It's perfectly usable as a desktop and yet you had to go to Mac OSX?


No, I am not  I was talking about many years of comfortable work related desktop based on the FreeBSD. Then, new business came, with new tasks etc. with extreme time stress, so I grabbed first ThinkPad on the shelve (oh God, what they did to them, bending display, weird keyboard, what technical advance), which was loaded with Windows and with tools required already available and known to me. However, It was so counterproductive and annoying, that I move to Mac, not because it is shinny, but because it more resembles my workflow I acquired when used the FreeBSD desktop, which I unfortunately still have no time to polish enough.


			
				Durden said:
			
		

> And Wayland will be highly reliant on systemd which isn't in FreeBSD and isn't coming to FreeBSD and the Wayland devs have no interest in supporting it.



We will see. I am not interested in Wayland or systemd now, so I can't give any deeper comments, but I am sure that some solutions emerge when needed. I just wanted to notice work or at least research is already being done.


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## jrm@ (Sep 26, 2014)

wblock@ is spot on.  My girlfriend uses a computer a small step above how you would guess a typical 90-year-old grandparent would use a computer.  Put another way, she isn't interested in how things work, she just wants to accomplish typical desktop tasks.  _I set up and maintain_ her very simple, fluxbox-based FreeBSD laptop, which has working wireless, suspend and resume, and devd-based automounting (including the memory card reader).  There is a nice wallpaper that changes each time she logs in, a taskbar and I configure her web browser (www/firefox), media player (multimedia/mplayer), file manager (x11-fm/xfe), and office suite (editors/libreoffice) and she's happy.  In fact, she asks me for help less than when she was running Windows.  I do the same for a colleague at work and he's happy as well.  It's the installation and maintenance that are challenging for typical users.

Edit: Fixed a typo.


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## AzaShog (Sep 26, 2014)

I agree with @Durden. FreeBSD desktop is far behind what a modern desktop is capable of. For starters, the inability to suspend on most, and hibernate on any machine is simply unacceptable. Second, it must have been just bad luck but I've had so many issues running software that works perfectly on Linux. Firefox crashes every now and then especially when playing HTML5 YouTube. It doesn't on Linux. And to use Flash I'd have to bring down the security of the whole system significantly with a) old, unpatched Flash plugin and b) Fedora 10 (!!!) dependencies that are full of vulnerabilities and blocked by pkg audit. I've also had some bad luck with OpenOffice opening some documents, hanging the Office with no error message. I have no idea why, and debugging is impossible because the debug flag is blocked, marking the port as broken. Detail upon detail, tiny annoyance upon tiny annoyance, bug upon bug and I'm back on desktop Linux that simply just works.

And what is worse, things are not going to get better, not with the upstreams increasingly being eveloped only for Linux.


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## teo (Sep 27, 2014)

wblock@ said:
			
		

> I disagree.   The things that make FreeBSD a great server also make it a great desktop.  There are two difficult things about creating a desktop system out of FreeBSD.  The first is installing and configuring all the desktop software.  That's not impossible, just annoying.  The second is an automatic update that is robust enough to be run automatically.  That is more difficult.


His attitude is hope that someday FreeBSD can to extend desktop, nothing is impossible. FreeBSD is a great system and many people in the world want to use it as the main system on your computer, it would be a great success. 
One thing is outdated Linux using GNU tool. FreeBSD is better as Unix-based system, which uses the BSD tool,  many people who leave the windows system, want to use the FreeBSD desktop system.
Some people are opposed to all growth, perhaps those people who are linked to the private monopoly of these systems?,... and therefore oppose all free growth for the world.


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## teo (Sep 27, 2014)

teo said:
			
		

> wblock@ said:
> 
> 
> 
> > I disagree.   The things that make FreeBSD a great server also make it a great desktop.  There are two difficult things about creating a desktop system out of FreeBSD.  The first is installing and configuring all the desktop software.  That's not impossible, just annoying.  The second is an automatic update that is robust enough to be run automatically.  That is more difficult.


His attitude is hope that someday FreeBSD can to extend desktop, nothing is impossible. FreeBSD is a great system and many people in the world want to use it as the main system on your computer, it would be a great success. 
One thing is outdated Linux using GNU tool. FreeBSD is better as Unix-based system, which uses the BSD tool,  many people who leave the windows system, want to use the FreeBSD desktop system.
Some people are opposed to all growth, perhaps those people who are linked to the private monopoly of these systems?,... and therefore oppose all free growth for the world. I think they should take a look at DesktopBSD system that is based on FreeBSD, very complete.   

http://www.desktopbsd.net/


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 27, 2014)

AzaShog said:
			
		

> I agree with @Durden. For starters, the inability to suspend on most, and hibernate on any machine is simply unacceptable.


Complaining about that is like complaining about boot up time. Maybe they're more useful on a notebook but, on the desktop, I want to say, "Who cares?". 



> Second, it must have been just bad luck but I've had so many issues running software that works perfectly on Linux.


I've been running FreeBSD on the desktop for years and the only time I run into those issues is when the port didn't get ported smoothly. Eventually it does but the problem isn't true for everyone. Right now many are complaining Chromium doesn't work for them. However, I don't have the problems with Firefox or OpenOffice you complain about. 

One of the main issues is having enough people to work on the port and enough variety of hardware to test on all systems. Linux has more users and, therefore, more developers to work on that. That doesn't make Linux a better OS because of it. It's just they can port outside software quicker.

Looking at it from the other direction, the problem with using Linux as a server is that then you are running Linux instead of FreeBSD. Linux itself is no longer a Unix-like system so it's like comparing FreeBSD desktop to a Windows desktop. In fact, Linux has become a Windows-like system to its detriment. Windows does it better but I wouldn't touch Windows without trembling hands, especially as a server. And I haven't used Windows in 10 years or Linux in five.


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## AzaShog (Sep 27, 2014)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> Complaining about that is like complaining about boot up time. Maybe they're more useful on a notebook but, on the desktop, I want to say, "Who cares?".



That's hardly the same thing and I don't see how that problem is confined only to laptops. My desktop workstation, where I primarily work, I don't want to leave it turned on every time I have to step out. And it's an annoyance, that just keeps piling up one after another when you do that for the hundredth time, that I have to go through 6 password prompts every time I return to my computer. One to unlock the encrypted disks. Two to log into the desktop. Three to unlock the SSH keys, four to sudo back to the tmux env on the servers. Five to unlock master Firefox password. Six to unlock master Thunderbird password (because I have several different email accounts I can't just consolidate into one). Then I need to reactivate the python development virtualenvs in the terminals, and restore my gvim session - thankfully that's just a source command away.

And this pattern is in no way special or specific just to me. If you're a power user, I'm sure you'll find the inability to suspend or hibernate your workstation a real PITA.




> Looking at it from the other direction, the problem with using Linux as a server is that then you are running Linux instead of FreeBSD. Linux itself is no longer a Unix-like system so it's like comparing FreeBSD desktop to a Windows desktop. In fact, Linux has become a Windows-like system to its detriment. Windows does it better but I wouldn't touch Windows without trembling hands, especially as a server. And I haven't used Windows in 10 years or Linux in five.



I disagree. As long as the majority of its ecosystem is open source, and as long as the shared lib model is prevalent, Linux will never be Windows-like. There, just this morning I applied some updates to my Windows box and was thinking how I like the fact that on Linux (and FreeBSD too!) I can see exactly which component is being updated and why, I can check the changelog and know what is going on. Just a vague "Update to 64-bit systems" on Windows is far, far away from that, even the quoted KB page doesn't say much more. Linux systems are really far from that.

Besides, that Linux is becoming less UNIX-like is not really a bad thing. There's plenty of options if you need UNIX or UNIX-like OS, namely the BSDs. There is nothing wrong about Linux evolving into something that is not UNIX-like any more. Does it have to be? And it's really not becoming Windows either. But I agree, at some point, saying that Linux is a UNIX-like system will have to stop.


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## wblock@ (Sep 27, 2014)

Suspend works for some systems on amd64 10-STABLE and later now.  I agree that it's important, but have hardly tested it.  Is it absolutely required for a "desktop" (as in GUI) system?  It is important for notebooks, less so for desktops.


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## teo (Sep 27, 2014)

wblock@ said:
			
		

> Suspend works for some systems on amd64 10-STABLE and later now.  I agree that it's important, but have hardly tested it.  Is it absolutely required for a "desktop" (as in GUI) system?



Of course it is important for users with a graphical desktop, that would give huge profits to this great system.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 27, 2014)

AzaShog said:
			
		

> If you're a power user, I'm sure you'll find the inability to suspend or hibernate your workstation a real PITA.


As a power user I sit at my computer all day long and only find such things an irritation when they shut down while I'm thinking. My computers stay on all the time so it's not value to me and I know people who feel the same but ... meh.




> I disagree. As long as the majority of its ecosystem is open source, and as long as the shared lib model is prevalent, Linux will never be Windows-like.


It has turned away from the philosophy of Unix and is trying to be more Windows like. The users have wanted that for years and turning its back on Unix definitely no means it is no longer a Unix-like system. I've said elsewhere that, if you don't want to say it's Windows-like, then you can say it's now just Linux; not resembling any other OS and is Linux unto itself.



> There is nothing wrong about Linux evolving into something that is not UNIX-like any more.


Unless there is. On reddit (and oh how I loathe reddit), there's a sysadmin trying to educate people about how systemd has affected people like him in the real world of a large Linux center. A "trials and tribulations" story. Things he never had problems with are now major headaches. So moving away from and "not being Unix-like" is OK unless it's not something as good or better. From what I read, it's definitely not been better.


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## BSDBernd (Sep 27, 2014)

Durden said:
			
		

> wblock@ said:
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> 
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1) Well the two most used operating systems in the world don't use GNOME, KDE, and Wayland, one of them even contains a lot of BSD in it. 
If your goal is to built a comfortable desktop os out of FreeBSD, then I see no reason why you necessarily have to use GNOME, KDE, and Wayland for this, these terms don't show up in the formulation of your task. 
2) Could you provide a list of 10 things, the most important things you would say a desktop os should have and explain why this cannot be achieved when you don't follow the linux trends and build up on what you already have?


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## aht0 (Sep 28, 2014)

hashime said:
			
		

> You can always try PC-BSD. It is basically FreeBSD with a GUI installer and some extra (half/not working) applications.



   I wish it was only applications. Until PC-BSD 10.0.2 I could not get my Geforce GTX 660Ti work on PC-BSD. Well, I could but it was maddening before I could work out, just how to do it. Xorg worked fine during installation phase, correct driver included. 
   But on first boot it all failed somehow and it's looping custom scripts kept pushing wrong automatic config, also immediately  writing over all changes I tried to make. As a result, all I got was looping text on console flickering in and out. Not even vesa driver worked. My Roccat mouse and Trust eng/rus keyboard seemed to give additional fits to the OS - I had to install xf86-input-mouse and xf86-input-keyboard ports manually, both seemed to be left out from installation.
  Finally, after getting around those issues (it meant killing PC-BSD looping shell scripts, installing new Nvidia drivers etc), I found that in Xorg itself, my mouse kept freezing in every 15-30 seconds, each time for half a second. Compared to Linux desktop distributions, PC-BSD 10 left me quite bad impression with it's literally endless issues. Tried PC-BSD 10, 10.0.1, 10.0.2. Different builds inside those versions included.

   At some point in September, I gave up and destroyed PC-BSD installation in my PC, thinking to make one attempt using plain FreeBSD.  Downloaded FreeBSD 10.1-BETA2 iso and had Nvidia v337.25 drivers on USB flash stick ready. Setting up KDE desktop took about 5 hours because I wanted to compile as much as possible from ports. If some package gave an error, I tried to solve the error or after giving up on it, installed pre-built package from net. Using Intel i5/i7, it would probably have gone slightly faster (I used FX-8350). Mouse issue is gone, 3D acceleration works, Flash works. Nothing left to pick on  :beergrin


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## jrm@ (Sep 30, 2014)

Durden said:
			
		

> FreeBSD lacks pretty much everything that a modern desktop requires and is quickly falling behind even Linux as far as desktops go. FreeBSD will likely not see Wayland and with GNOME and KDE and all the others signing on to Wayland, FreeBSD will soon be stuck in legacy hell with XFCE (which really isnt developed anymore) and plain Jane Window Managers.


GNOME on GNU/Linux is doing much better.


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## teo (Sep 30, 2014)

Durden said:
			
		

> FreeBSD lacks pretty much everything that a modern desktop requires and is quickly falling behind even Linux as far as desktops go. FreeBSD will likely not see Wayland and with GNOME and KDE and all the others signing on to Wayland, FreeBSD will soon be stuck in legacy hell with XFCE (which really isnt developed anymore) and plain Jane Window Managers.


How can you say such a thing_?_  In CLI you can build a FreeBSD desktop with KDE. Hopefully soon spreading to the FreeBSD system GUI.


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## cuq (Oct 22, 2014)

I have used FreeBSD on my laptop for almost ten years now and it is kind of painful to set up but I don't miss almost anything, Netflix is the great void, that's it. I love the clean light i3; it is fast as hell and everything works great once you learn how to use and configure it. Suspend-resume would be nice but I don't think it's such a deal breaker. It's fantastic to have all the tools on your desktop, I could not live without grep, cut, sort or sed and the Linux distributions all have some kind of annoying subtleties that I don't get. Sometimes there are no man pages even. I agree that the learning curve is steep but nothing out of this world and it pays back! You will have a tool powerful enough to convert hundreds of videos from one format to another with a few lines of sh. That you can't do in Windows and in Linux, well, is not that much fun.

Cheers


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## bryon (Oct 28, 2014)

This is an interesting thread; many thoughts. My favorite install is OpenBSD - not necessarily for the desktop though. I like how fast and to the point it is but any BSD can be a pain when you have to manually dig into graphics drivers, Xorg and sysctl settings to get things running how you want. That said, vanilla FreeBSD is getting closer step by step and the documentation is really coming along nicely.

Initially what aggravated me, when setting up a FreeBSD desktop, was the constant changes (from -RELEASE to -RELEASE) in how KDE needed to be configured. Also, the Linux mindset that comes with the KDE desktop and network utilities; many things just don't jive. I believe that comes from KDE developers being all over the map as concerning which distribution they use and how different distributions attract specific types of users with varying technical demographics. I will say there are very helpful and understanding people working on KDE and they see more and more FreeBSD users all the time,  so within a year or two integration could possibly become nearly seamless.

Lately I'm fine with using a 50/50 approach to setting up a desktop. I want some automation and some manual work. GNOME works fine as a package, I know how to locate Xorg settings for just about any monitor and graphics drivers just take a little pre-planning. The rest of it is machine dependent sysctl stuff like kernel thresholds or stuff that's easily found in the manual or wiki.

There are the goofy, albeit expected, things like Skype dropping the Linux-based FreeBSD port (out of nowhere). Oh well. That ball was picked up rather quickly though. LibreOffice can be a learning curve for some coming from a Windows environment, who need to work with docx files, but hey,  it's a pretty smooth alternative to OpenOffice.Org (which sometimes chokes). Other than that it boils down to setting up and staying on top of Linux compatibility depending on just how Windows-y I want life to be.

Imagining starting from scratch (no BSD experience at all) I might say it would be nice to have a system scanning tool that makes desktop specific suggestions based on all of the latest changes between RELEASEs. The notes at the end of packages and ports are great and for experienced users they are really all that's necessary but sometimes it's hard to keep track of everything that needs to be done - especially for newer users (or if, like me, you never do anything all at once).


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## rmoe (Oct 28, 2014)

I have multiple Linux installations (VMs) much below 10 GB disk space. And usually they run a nice window manager, too. I also have a FreeBSD based firewall running with way less than 4 GB disk (CF) space. And I had quite a few FreeBSD systems running with a full graphical desktop in well below 20 GB disk space.

As for Skype, etc. So what? There are quite some alternatives available. I've yet to find some functionality that I could have on Linux but not on FreeBSD.

Concerning "tortuous", I personally found Linux less pleasant than FreeBSD because their package managers look comfortable at first sight but soon turn out to create trouble because they hide much (like configuration options). Those few that are not a nuisance turn out to be rather FreeBSD-like (Arch, Gentoo).

But then, we are all free to do as we please and if someone prefers Skype and such alike he is free to install Windows. Would I ever complain in a Windows forum that I don't get source code or that I can't build my own kernel? Certainly not.


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## jjthomas (Oct 28, 2014)

I came from Fortran;  CP/M, DOS, Windows 3.10, WFWG, through Linux and now, onto FreeBSD. I'm not sure I would consider any of it tortuous. I built a computer that saved data to a cassette deck. I've even used punch cards (yep, I'm old). I love working on computers. I've had lots of failures on Windows, Linux and even FreeBSD. After two years, I've finally got a home media server running on FreeBSD. Along the way I had multiple problems, I got most of them fixed.  My last solution involved changing hardware.

I'm planning to put a web site on OpenBSD using a re-purposed laptop. Once 5.6 comes out, I will give it a go. If it works, awesome; if not,  I'll troubleshoot and make the decision to fix what got broke, or look at something else to run my website on.

I'm also running Windows 8.1, it does what I want. Skype, Digital Audio Workstation.  Video and photo work.

My media server does have the Xfce desktop.  It's perfectly fine for what I do.  Admittedly, when I start working on a project, I have at least two terminal windows open.

I agree, that in some ways, some of the Linux distributions are becoming more Windows-like.  An idea I'm not comfortable with. I like Slackware and FreeBSD because _I_ have to turn things on. I don't like Ubuntu, too much automation. I've tried PC-BSD, but it would do things I did not want it to do.

If I have a problem with a port, I look for a solution. 90% of the time, someone else had the same problem and has a fix for it. I've fixed a few problems, myself. If all else fails, there are other ports.

We all started from scratch, at some point. I still remember compiling my first kernel, under Red Hat. Talk about trembling. The first couple of times I compiled a kernel, I had the shakes. The other day I compiled a FreeBSD kernel. I got it configured, and compiled it. It was no big deal. I've installed from ports, I've installed packages.

One of the reasons it took two years to get a media server going, was when things went sideways, I returned to Linux. But through determination and failure, I was able to get MythTV running on FreeBSD.

I have no complaints about Linux or FreeBSD. If anything, I have gratitude. Let's be honest, if it wasn't for all the developers and volunteers of both projects, we might all be using Windows Vista. Or worse, the AS/400.  Now that's torture.

-JJ


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## sulman (Oct 29, 2014)

AzaShog said:


> Besides, that Linux is becoming less UNIX-like is not really a bad thing. There's plenty of options if you need UNIX or UNIX-like OS, namely the BSDs. There is nothing wrong about Linux evolving into something that is not UNIX-like any more. Does it have to be? And it's really not becoming Windows either. But I agree, at some point, saying that Linux is a UNIX-like system will have to stop.



I look at it as a set of design and engineering principles that have been proven over time; not a hard set of defined standards.

What's happening with Linux (systemd's growth in particular) is a tightly-coupled scheme is exposing the Linux ecosystem to a big fat bundle of risk over the coming years. Falling for the siren song of convenience and the lure of standardisation isn't worth much when it is costly in the long run.


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## arevans (Oct 30, 2014)

As a recent convert from OS X, I have to say that I've had hardly any trouble whatsoever in setting up a FreeBSD desktop. Any problems that I did have were easily solved either by the documentation or by a quick search of these forums. Of course, my needs in a desktop system are likely to be different from the next person's, so whether or not installing a FreeBSD desktop is straightforward enough is quite obviously an entirely subjective matter, but I think describing it as "torturous" is a tad unfair by anyone's standards. If anything, I find it to be a valuable lesson in learning to adapt and become technically independent. The only thing I'm currently missing is Skype, but I still have my Mac so I don't really care about that too much.


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## rmoe (Oct 30, 2014)

(Upfront: I'm a European).

As Skype comes up pretty frequently as an issue with FreeBSD I'm wondering whether we should build and offer an NSA interface for FreeBSD, too, as relatively many seem to miss that.


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## sulman (Oct 30, 2014)

arevans said:


> The only thing I'm currently missing is Skype, but I still have my Mac so I don't really care about that too much.



I used to miss Skype, but they really murdered the client in the last update. It's a bit of a shit sandwich on all platforms.

As regards NSA stuff, I quite like SELinux. I really, really did not at first, but once I understood it better it's really not bad.


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## tankist02 (Oct 30, 2014)

Here is my experience of building a home desktop. With every new FreeBSD release I spend a few days building a desktop machine and in the end I have to go back to Linux.

Official packages are built with very conservative options. E.g. freetype2 has sub-pixel rendering off (patented). Mplayer has VDPAU off (why?). But for a good desktop experience these and other options should probably be on. Thus the necessity to build your own ports where you can turn these options on. But then I read that mixing packages and ports is not recommended unless you are a FreeBSD guru. I am not one. It means everything needs to be built as ports. Then what is the point of having a great package system such as pkg if official packages may not be best for desktop usage?

Maybe PC-BSD packages are built with the desktop in mind? But then again, perhaps they may conflict with official FreeBSD binaries?

As for just settling on PC-BSD - they chose to use ZFS only. I had a drastic performance drop with extensive writing activity. I tried reading up on ZFS tuning and quickly got overwhelmed. My impression is that ZFS is great for servers, but may be an overkill for a desktop.

Another negative is hardware support. E.g. I have Haswell HD 4600 graphics and it is still not supported after more than a year on the market. Years ago I had problems with a/the 64 bit Nvidia driver, SATA support, USB support, KMV switch not working, being unable to print, etc.

Some software I use may lag behind. E.g. rawtherapee in ports is 4.1 and doesn't support my Nikon D610 well. Version 4.2 was released a few days ago, it supports my camera and is available on Linux (or easy to build). I don't know how long I'll have to wait for this version to be ported to FreeBSD. Before that I had to wait for XBMC, avidemux and darktable latest and greatest. Pan still doesn't work.

I want to use FreeBSD, it has a lot of great points as discussed earlier. But from a practical point of view Linux is so much easier and everything I need just works.

Sorry for the rantey message, I know FreeBSD developers are wonderful people that work hard and then give away their system for free. It is just sentiments about FreeBSD not being suited for casual modern desktop arise from time to time and I feel they are somewhat justified.


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## rmoe (Oct 30, 2014)

tankist02,

I understand your point of view and I think there is a certain point that had a tendency to create misunderstanding, namely the fact that many FreeBSD users say that FreeBSD is perfectly fine for desktop use. In fact, I'm one of them. Thinking about your post I discovered what I think might be the misunderstanding. "Desktop" can mean a whole lot of things. Quite some of your problems are about new (or considered current) versions of some software and about software I never heard about.

When I say "desktop" I mean something like "does run the usual GUI stuff, can run Office software, GIMP, browsers, etc." In other words: I come from the server and/or console side and "desktop" for me is "GUI stuff on top. FreeBSD can do that, too. Cool!"

You and many others, on the other hand, tend to come from a GUI world; to you, it's probably cool that, say, Linux can run servers, too. Your expectation, however, is very different than that of many FreeBSD users.

(From my perspective) that's in a way funny because history repeats itself there. Some time ago potential Linux users would try Linux and compare it along a line like: "Windows has and can do this and that. Can Linux do that, too?" (and be disappointed). Let's take a messenger as an example. On Windows one had some messengers and it was quite normal to chat with a camera running. On Linux that was not yet available and Linux guys seemed to be the underdogs having but rather basic messengers available.

Linux, BTW, seems to have chosen the path of trying to close the gap and to, in a way, reach a point where they could say: "If you can do it in Windows, you can do it in Linux, too". I also remember similar stories concerning hardware support where one had a driver for everything on Windows while one had to carefully check whether Linux (let alone FreeBSD) supported some device, too.

And now, FreeBSD seems to be in the underdog role. But, in fact, it isn't because FreeBSD was and is a real Unix and is happy to be just that (and not a Windows competitor). Of course, times change and so do users' needs and technologies and FreeBSD tries hard to keep up (and succeeds quite well). But - and that's a big but - FreeBSD was never "anti-Windows" nor did it have the goal to be a 98% replacement.

If you're interested in FreeBSD that's great. You should by all means have a VM or a secondary machine running FreeBSD. But looking at your needs, you should probably stick with Linux for your main system.

(I myself do something similar if the other way around. I have Windows on a partition on a secondary system for cases like gaming, etc.)

As for ZFS, I personally think that's a grossly exaggerated hype, particularly for desktop systems. And I avoid it like the pest and I don't trust it because it may run, yes, but a file system should be very _mature _before being used in production.


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## jb_fvwm2 (Oct 31, 2014)

These issues (pkg being too new to have extensive guides, Haswell not being supported fully yet and PC-BSD using ZFS), taken singly and not lumped together,  can usually be sidestepped. I'd simply skip ZFS and install most from `pkg install` and build a few from ports. And most of the functionality of others that are not up to Linux versions can usually be duplicated with others from the same category.  And quickly found and tested.  One using Linux may do this quite a lot slowlier and settle for less in the long term.  Not always, but often enough. Not to mention grub breaking too often (in some distributions) and other impending steep technologies.


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## Martillo1 (Oct 31, 2014)

I see some people avoiding ZFS for a "desktop". I can understand it for a laptop or notebook, but a real desktop PC has room for several disks, hence using a ZFS mirror is very suitable if you want to keep your data safe even from "bitrot".

Add geli and you have a fortress on "top" of your "desk"


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## AzaShog (Oct 31, 2014)

jb_fvwm2 said:


> Not to mention grub breaking too often (in some distributions) and other impending steep technologies.



Oh? Care to mention the distributions? Because with the mainstream ones like Fedora, Debian, CentOS and Gentoo I haven't had broken GRUB in years, across many desktops and servers.


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## jb_fvwm2 (Oct 31, 2014)

The one I follow daily is a rolling release. The forum gets two or three "booting broken by update" threads daily lately it seems. I'm not (I apologize) wishing to name it, persons reading this post may have better use of their time probably than reading its forum every day like I do, most of them anyway.


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## AzaShog (Oct 31, 2014)

jb_fvwm2 said:


> The one I follow daily is a rolling release.  The forum... two or three "booting broken by update" daily lately it seems.  Not (I apologize) wishing to name it, persons reading this post may have better use of their time probably than reading its forum everyday like I do, most of them anyway.



Oh so it's not your experience at all, but you're making assumptions based on some forum titles? So, by that logic, FreeBSD and especially ZFS are broken too often just by looking at the frequency of titles on this forum?


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## sulman (Oct 31, 2014)

AzaShog said:


> Oh so it's not your experience at all, but you're making assumptions based on some forum titles? So, by that logic, FreeBSD and especially ZFS are broken too often just by looking at the frequency of titles on this forum?



To be fair, in Arch Linux land you _will_ at some point experience downtime due to an update. I've had it happen around three times in the last couple of years. It's not necessarily actionable items (per Arch's web page) either; they are just aggressive enough in some updates that some configurations will be broken by it.


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## AzaShog (Oct 31, 2014)

sulman said:


> To be fair



That's not being fair at all. To begin with, I was talking about GRUB.

And as for Arch, it is a bleeding edge rolling release distribution. It is *by design* bound to break often because they don't do weeks or months of package testing before they roll them out. That's not a fault or flaw, that's the design of it. Something breaks, users report it, it gets fixed. That's the cost of running a bleeding edge rolling release distribution.

There are distributions designed for that, there are distributions designed for maximum stability. And when people cherry-pick issues to generalize against distributions as a whole, that's called spreading FUD.


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## sulman (Oct 31, 2014)

AzaShog said:


> That's not being fair at all. To begin with, I was talking about Grub.
> 
> And as for Arch, it is a bleeding edge rolling release distro. It is *by design* bound to break often because they don't do weeks or months of package testing before they roll them out. That's not a fault or flaw, that's the design of it. Something breaks, users report it, it gets fixed. That's the cost of running a bleeding edge rolling release distro.



This is against my better judgement, as it is getting a bit 'arguing on the Internet', but it most certainly applies to Grub, that being the bootloader, and that being the thing (particularly GRUB2 - look around at Gentoo) that _has_ proved difficult on occasion.

It's definitely not a reach to suggest some things in Linux land aren't terribly reliable - it has always been the place where better can be the enemy of good.


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## AzaShog (Oct 31, 2014)

sulman said:


> This is against my better judgement, as it is getting a bit 'arguing on the internet'



You were quoting my post that was a comment to a user negatively generalizing about Linux by reading some title in some forum somewhere, and not speaking from personal experience. That was your first mistake if you don't want to "argue over the Internet". 




> It's definitely not a reach to suggest some things in Linux land aren't terribly reliable - it has always been the place where better can be the enemy of good.



Well, blanket statements that GRUB breaks too often in Linux, without saying it breaks in a bleeding edge rolling release distribution which is by design in constant state of semi-broken (especially from the standpoint of someone using FreeBSD because of its stability etc.), is just FUD. See, one argument in "*BSD vs Linux" (and the "vs" thing seems to be prevalent in this thread so it's pretty much relevant) is that the said *BSD is just one distribution and Linuxes are many. Funny how that argument conveniently disappears when a problem in ONE of the Linuxes (especially in an unstable-by-design one) is being generalized to all of them.


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## rmoe (Oct 31, 2014)

I'm not sure whether the recent discussion contributes to the original question, in particular as that user seems to have some experience with Linux (or at least with his distribution) anyway.

While I can understand the occasional (halfway friendly grinning) sniping at Linux this FreeBSD forum should (in my minds eye, anyway) not be a tribunal accusing or defending Linux. In the end it's not helpful anyway because neither is it FreeBSD's desire to keep anyone away from other operating systems nor can anyone be convinced by accusation-defense to and fro.

It is my understanding that FreeBSD's guiding principle is to stay sharp and to get even better; the major motivation is not to be better than xyz but rather to be the best FreeBSD can be, we act _for_ FreeBSD and _not against_ xyz.

I personally don't like Linux. But I see perfectly well that there are many things for which we should be grateful toward Linux. Having lots of insight into many hardware devices that we had to painfully reverse engineer previously comes to mind as an example. Or, even better, having many hardware companies actually thinking about other systems than Windows only. Even the pool of people interested in Unixoids or, even better, capable of contributing has very significantly increased thanks to Linux.

Linux, like everything, has its brighter and its darker sides (and so does FreeBSD). And it's certainly one of the more interesting and potent players on the field. In the end the best OS is the one that serves you well.


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## sulman (Oct 31, 2014)

rmoe said:


> ...the major motivation is not to be better than xyz but rather to be the best FreeBSD can be, we act _for_ FreeBSD and _not against_ xyz.



A frequent aphorism on this board is 'FreeBSD is not Linux'. It is usually written in a seemingly offhand, abrasive context, but there is an almost Zen-like wisdom to it.

When you come to FreeBSD from Linux, the problem (I think) is a tendency to want it to be the same, or to try and make it feel the same, and it is tempting because much of it feels so familiar to a Linux user. In reality you need to treat it like a new city, a new home. It's only superficially similar.

Interestingly I think the same thinking inhabits Windows refugees and this is plaguing Linux development right now; it's an idea that has come up a few times on the Gentoo boards. Recent and future developments (systemd's strong desktop focus and binary black-box approach) is perhaps the unwitting recreation of Windows, or at least Windows _culture_.

It's curious how we subconsciously re-invent the wheel.


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## AzaShog (Oct 31, 2014)

rmoe said:


> While I can understand the occasional (halfway friendly grinning) sniping at linux this FreeBSD forum should (in my minds eye, anyway) not be a tribunal accusing or defending linux.



I don't mind when Linux is getting flak, there are a lot of things in the GNU/Linux ecosystem that deserves a lot of it. But it grinds my gears when that flak is cherry picked or made up just to attack Linux and make FreeBSD any other system look better based on that, without any real merit. You know, like "AboutTheBSDs" does in the other direction and we all know how bad that looks. It absolutely doesn't serve the community, that's what bothers me.


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## Martillo1 (Oct 31, 2014)

Well, as an ex-ArchLinux five-years user I can say I had problems with GRUB as well. Rock & Roll!

Boot loaders are a kind of magic that drives me crazy.


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## DutchDaemon (Oct 31, 2014)

Unless the bikeshed needs a new layer of paint, I suggest we wrap this up.


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## Beeblebrox (Oct 31, 2014)

Myself and the many tortoises I feed,
agree that following this thread
has been most tortuous indeed.

RIP: Dr. Seuss


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## sidetone (Aug 29, 2015)

FreeBSD as a desktop for years has run a lot smoother than Linux, even if it does take a lot of work to configure and lacks features.


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## Beastie7 (Aug 30, 2015)

sulman said:


> A frequent aphorism on this board is 'FreeBSD is not Linux'. It is usually written in a seemingly offhand, abrasive context, but there is an almost Zen-like wisdom to it.
> 
> When you come to FreeBSD from Linux, the problem (I think) is a tendency to want it to be the same, or to try and make it feel the same, and it is tempting because much of it feels so familiar to a Linux user. In reality you need to treat it like a new city, a new home. It's only superficially similar.
> 
> ...



Yup, and it's only getting worse.

Also, it's ironic that Windows refugees seem to think Linux is any different in terms of "Freedom". It's pretty clear RedHat owns GNU/Linux at this point.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Aug 30, 2015)

DutchDaemon said:


> Unless the bikeshed needs a new layer of paint, I suggest we wrap this up.



OK. I'll summarise. Those who like to use FreeBSD for a desktop do so. Those who don't like FreeBSD for a desktop don't. Did I miss anything?


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## Deleted member 45312 (Aug 30, 2015)

I hate Desktop Environment. I am using x11-wm/fvwm2 since 1996, firstly on Linux until 1999 and then on FreeBSD, and I am happy with that. I have sometime tried DE (KDE, Gnome, Xfce) and always returned to Fvwm.
Thanks to that, my desktop computer is fast and light. It takes less than 5Gb on disk.
And for things I can't do on FreeBSD, I am running Windows XP as guest in emulators/virtualbox-ose.


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## RichardET (Sep 1, 2015)

So what is the "real" story here, vis a vis, systemd?  Is FreeBSD and possibly OpenBSD going to have to embrace systemd?

http://lwn.net/Articles/524606/
On November 6, longtime OpenBSD hacker Marc Espie complained to the OpenBSD project's "tech" list about behavior from "upstream vendors" that, in his view, is proving harmful to the OpenBSD project. In short, projects like desktop environments are increasingly adding dependencies on changes being made at other levels of the (Linux) systems on which they are developed. That makes it harder for OpenBSD to port and support that code, to the point that "if you don't have tens of people, it becomes more and more of a losing battle". The OpenBSD project doesn't have those people, so it is hurting. Marc continued, saying:


> It's also quickly turning Posix and Unix into a travesty: either you have the linux goodies, or you don't. And if you don't, you can forget anything modern...
> I'm pretty sure there's a lot of good intention behind the "progress" in recent desktops. But this is turning the field of OS distributions into a wasteland. Either you're a modern linux with pulseaudio and pam and systemd, or you're dying. So much for the pioneer spirit of opensource, where you were free to innovate and do cool things, and more or less have interesting software able to run on your machine...


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## sulman (Sep 1, 2015)

RichardET said:


> So what is the "real" story here, vis a vis, systemd? Is FreeBSd and possibly OpenBSD going to have to embrace systemd?



I think systemd is the 'real' story, in as much as I believe that is what this quote refers to:



> in some cases, you even have some people, who are PAID by some vendors,
> agressively pushing GRATUITOUS, non compatible changes. I won't say names,
> but you guys can fill the blanks in.



This isn't just a problem for the *BSDs to worry about; it is an ongoing worry in Linux land outside of the Poettering collective, specifically Gentoo and Slackware are having to navigate an increasingly difficult sea. 

This is not conspiracy theory territory; it is going to get worse. However, things change fast in software. I have a feeling we will always be here.


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## Beastie7 (Sep 1, 2015)

I think the problem is two fold;

1) one side of the problem is the issue of GNU centrism, and it's attitude that lingers around the community, coupled with a copy-left license; this behavior is reinforced. Linux side pragmatism be gone.

2) the lack of focus and involvement from the BSD community at large with the upstream vendors for desktop related stuff. The focus simply isn't the desktop, it's other (and more important) things.

The latter is probably in large part because a solution (OS X) to the problem (A Unix Desktop) already exists. Whether you agree with Apple or not; the solution is there. It's a useful one, and to many a great user experience. So why re-invent the wheel?


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## Deleted member 9563 (Sep 2, 2015)

Beastie7 said:


> So why re-invent the wheel?


Because OS X is not open source.


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## Beastie7 (Sep 2, 2015)

OJ said:


> Because OS X is not open source.



A lot of things aren't open source; hardly relevant. And it's Cocoa that isn't open, which is fine.


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## protocelt (Sep 2, 2015)

Beastie7 said:


> The latter is probably in large part because a solution (OS X) to the problem (A Unix Desktop) already exists. Whether you agree with Apple or not; the solution is there. It's a useful one, and to many a great user experience. *So why re-invent the wheel?*


Simply because you can and there are plenty of FreeBSD users that would like the option available, so why not?


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## Beastie7 (Sep 2, 2015)

protocelt said:


> Simply because you can and there are plenty of FreeBSD users that would like the option available, so why not?



I'm sure that's enough for the core committers to care otherwise. 

By the way, how's Haswell support?


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## Deleted member 9563 (Sep 2, 2015)

Beastie7 said:


> A lot of things aren't open source; hardly relevant.


I'm not following your logic. 

Perhaps I should clarify what I meant in the first place. I require an OS that has choices because I have an intense and overwhelming dislike for being told what to do by any kind of company, although I can accept what I get from a random and motley group of open source committers. I know that's personal, but it's not going to change. Another requirement is that there is no commercial license attached because I don't want to spend the time and effort to read and understand it and if I did it would probably say things I don't want to hear - especially regarding telling me what I can and cannot do (which as I explained above rubs me the wrong way.) And then there is the money aspect. I don't have a lot of that, so anything more than a few bucks for unlimited use is out of the question. To me, proprietary operating systems are not relevant.


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## hashime (Sep 2, 2015)

Beastie7 said:


> The latter is probably in large part because a solution (OS X) to the problem (A Unix Desktop) already exists.



Not really.OS X does not run on my PC, nor does it run on 93% of the PCs out there. I don't see how that is a solution for anything?


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## Crivens (Sep 2, 2015)

protocelt said:


> Simply because you can and there are plenty of FreeBSD users that would like the option available, so why not?


As long as I am to choose which of those wheels I want - and do not find myself with some rectangular things glued on with chewing gum on any suitable, and unsuitable, surface of my system - I'm fine with lots and lots of wheels to pick from.

But with regard to POSIX/Unix/... I think this Linux-centrism is going to turn out to be the big asteroid hurling down onto some unsuspecting critters thinking they rule the place. I'll do my best not to be among the ones being concerned by that.


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## ANOKNUSA (Sep 2, 2015)

Beastie7 said:


> The latter is probably in large part because a solution (OS X) to the problem (A Unix Desktop) already exists. Whether you agree with Apple or not; the solution is there. It's a useful one, and to many a great user experience. So why re-invent the wheel?



These particular apples don't grow on trees.


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## protocelt (Sep 2, 2015)

Beastie7 said:


> I'm sure that's enough for the core committers to care otherwise.


The core committers don't span the entire community. As long as there are able and willing developers to work on the desktop as well as users that want it, it will continue to exist and improve. 

Not everyone wants to use OS X as their choice of UNIX operating system for many reasons. ~7% or so market share in the desktop space despite apple being one of, if not the richest company in the world, supports this.



Beastie7 said:


> By the way, how's Haswell support?


 It's being worked on, and things should go much smoother in the future once it arrives.


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## abishai (Sep 2, 2015)

protocelt said:


> t's being worked on


https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd-base-graphics/commits/drm-i915-update-38 Looks very stalled


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## Beastie7 (Sep 2, 2015)

protocelt said:


> The core committers don't span the entire community. As long as there are able and willing developers to work on the desktop as well as users that want it, it will continue to exist and improve.
> 
> Not everyone wants to use OS X as their choice of UNIX operating system for many reasons. ~7% or so market share in the desktop space despite apple being one of, if not the richest company in the world, supports this.
> 
> It's being worked on, and things should go much smoother in the future once it arrives.



But it's the core committers (and somewhat the Foundation) that influence the direction of the Project. By all means, use what you want to use. I'm not suggesting not to use FreeBSD as a desktop. In fact, I wouldn't mind if the Lumina Project in particular received a little more love and support from the greater community. I'm just giving credence to why things have been the way they are. People who lurk the forums and complain (and don't do anything either) aren't seeing the forest for the trees. For example, just look at all the Foundation sponsored projects within the last 5 years; very few of them has to do with improving FreeBSD as a desktop.

If you truly want an open source desktop, for the sake of it being open source; you're better off (hate to say it) with Linux. GNU owns the open source desktop, no matter how you slice it. If you want a good BSD Unix desktop, such one already exists.

I'm not trying to be an ass here, it's just annoying seeing "FREEBSD SUCKS! WHY NO WORK ON DESKTOP?!"-like posts when the situation isn't just "Linux and vendors focusing on Linux only". It's simply not a focus, and for good reason.


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## protocelt (Sep 3, 2015)

> But it's the core committers (and somewhat the Foundation) that influence the direction of the Project. By all means, use what you want to use. I'm not suggesting not to use FreeBSD as a desktop. In fact, I wouldn't mind if the Lumina Project in particular received a little more love and support from the greater community. I'm just giving credence to why things have been the way they are. People who lurk the forums and complain (and don't do anything either) aren't seeing the forest for the trees. For example, just look at all the Foundation sponsored projects within the last 5 years; very few of them has to do with improving FreeBSD as a desktop.
> 
> If you truly want an open source desktop, for the sake of it being open source; you're better off (hate to say it) with Linux. GNU owns the open source desktop, no matter how you slice it. If you want a good BSD Unix desktop, such one already exists.
> 
> I'm not trying to be an ass here, it's just annoying seeing "FREEBSD SUCKS! WHY NO WORK ON DESKTOP?!"-like posts when the situation isn't just "Linux and vendors focusing on Linux only". It's simply not a focus, and for good reason.



It would be nice to see the Foundation show a little bit more interest in the desktop area, at the very least, graphics support. Given the large difference in corporate involvement, developer, and monetary resources between the FreeBSD project and Linux though, I can understand to a certain extent. After all, you need to make the paying customers happy first, and by paying customers, I mean the companies who donate both through code as well as monetary donations to the project that help keep it going. This is of course how I've understood things and certainly not an official position of the project or Foundation in any way. Work is being done on the desktop though, albeit slower than some would like. Anyone that can help is encouraged to get involved. 

I can only speak for myself, but I'm not an open source purist. I merely want a good operating system that has good documentation, allows me access to change any part of it as I see fit, and use it how I wish. For me, FreeBSD meets that criteria. Linux is also an option, but changes too much and too often for my liking and OS X is locked down tighter than Edward Snowden's laptop besides Apple's hardware being much too expensive for my taste.

Keep in mind everyone was green once and posts on forums now and again that voice frustrations and the like are to be expected in any similar project. Linux forums have their share, if not more, of these posts as well. It can be quite frustrating to spend your weekend trying to get an operating system installed on your laptop or server only to find out after two days of constant reading and tinkering that your hardware is just not compatible. It's always a smart move to match the hardware to the OS and not the other way around if you can. This goes for server and desktop use alike. Windows is really the only operating system exempt from this as for the most part nearly all consumer hardware, barring some hardware in the mobile space, is supported by Microsoft.


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## sidetone (Sep 3, 2015)

A lot of GTK dependencies are redundant, and unnecessarily bloated, because a Linux style wants to be kept in ports. Qt dependencies seem to be a lot cleaner. There is a lot of good in GNU and BSD licenses together, and they are both beneficially mutual. I wonder, what if BSD makes the leap, then the next obvious code is copyrighted by a more restrictive license based on FreeBSD's efforts, but alternatively, there may be an infinite amount of ways to achieve the same result. I think the base system of FreeBSD is efficient, with a few minor exceptions, so this goes a long way into desktops even if they are full of dependency madness. Many may hate to hear this, but I think the ports tree itself needs a fork, for those who insist on using Linux style, dependencies or scripts without having a BSD/MIT default when it exists. GNU is perfectly good, but I see some of its related sub-projects as bloated, when many times as much ports with their full features have to be installed to get just 1 library dependency or feature. When this isn't the case, I can see why a port wants certain features, because it fits a niche. This is related to the desktop environment, because this is mostly about graphical tool-kits and desktop related dependencies.

It would be great if Wayland Thread wayland-moves-to-mit-licence.26502 were brought in, not as the base system, but readily available. Then Xorg optionally be ported on top of it with less hardware bloat. It makes no sense to bring a display server into a base system, since many servers are meant to be set up and left to do their work, without a direct display.


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## Beastie7 (Sep 4, 2015)

sidetone said:


> A lot of GTK dependencies are redundant, and unnecessarily bloated, because a Linux style wants to be kept in ports. Qt dependencies seem to be a lot cleaner. There is a lot of good in GNU and BSD licenses together, and they are both beneficially mutual. I wonder, what if BSD makes the leap, then the next obvious code is copyrighted by a more restrictive license based on FreeBSD's efforts, but alternatively, there may be an infinite amount of ways to achieve the same result. I think the base system of FreeBSD is efficient, with a few minor exceptions, so this goes a long way into desktops even if they are full of dependency madness. Many may hate to hear this, but I think the ports tree itself needs a fork, for those who insist on using Linux style, dependencies or scripts without having a BSD/MIT default when it exists. GNU is perfectly good, but I see some of its related sub-projects as bloated, when many times as much ports with their full features have to be installed to get just 1 library dependency or feature. When this isn't the case, I can see why a port wants certain features, because it fits a niche. This is related to the desktop environment, because this is mostly about graphical tool-kits and desktop related dependencies.
> 
> It would be great if Wayland Thread wayland-moves-to-mit-licence.26502 were brought in, not as the base system, but readily available. Then Xorg optionally be ported on top of it with less hardware bloat. It makes no sense to bring a display server into a base system, since many servers are meant to be set up and left to do their work, without a direct display.



Wayland is a good start. That alone would convince me that they care.


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## Phishfry (Sep 9, 2015)

teo said:


> It is very tortuous install FreeBSD desktop, you can not install some applications like Skype or Flash player support nor in Linux. In 2008 there was the DesktopBSD system based on FreeBSD, it was very comprehensive. Hopefully FreeBSD extends to GUI, the other derivatives are so incomplete.



How torturous is `pkg install xorg mate mate-desktop`...

I would consider lack of Flash to be a feature of FreeBSD.


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## troublemaker (Sep 9, 2015)

Phishfry said:


> How torturous is `pkg install xorg mate mate-desktop`...
> 
> I would consider lack of Flash to be a feature of FreeBSD.


I think you have to consider who your user is. Sure, you run `pkg install xorg mate mate-desktop`, but after that you have to change configuration files. And Flash is still used by many sites. I personally find Flash still helpful. And people also use things like Skype. The availability of applications can be important.
I am not sure FreeBSD is intended for the "average" user, and I don't know to what extent FreeBSD derived systems solve the problem, but to have a leap in terms of user base it would be nice to solve it, like Linux did. That would also mean, among other things, better hardware support.

Personally I am usually fine with FreeBSD since I stopped using ports, and there are a few reasons why I would prefer it, the last one being systemd morphing into a system of its own (add this to a better licensing model, a less chaotic distribution landscape, and a venerable history). But I am still using mostly my Debian testing exactly because of its wider hardware and software support.


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## kpa (Sep 9, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> I am not sure FreeBSD is intended for the "average" user, and I don't know to what extent FreeBSD derived systems solve the problem, but to have a leap in terms of user base it would be nice to solve it, like Linux did. That would also mean, among other things, better hardware support.



FreeBSD is hardly a good choise for an "average" user who expects those bits to be available out of the box. Both flash and skype are going to be a lost cause very quickly unless something changes drastically, not on FreeBSD's end but in the way the vendors of those pieces of software mentioned treat the more obscure platforms. Even on Linux flash is very much dying because it's completely closed source and Adobe killed the NPAPI plugin version of flash. Skype is now in the hands of Microsoft and they have zero interest in supporting Linux.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 9, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> I am not sure FreeBSD is intended for the "average" user


FreeBSD is a professional operating system for professionals. It's target is not Windows users as Linux has turned into.



> I am still using mostly my Debian testing exactly because of its wider hardware and software support.


FreeBSD's hardware support is mostly not an issue except for one networking vendor and one graphics vendor. Software support generally is not an issue either. While one can cherry pick things that are missing on FreeBSD, most everything people use on Linux is also on FreeBSD.

Whenever I read someone complaining about such things, it's cause Linux supports 10,000 variations of something while FreeBSD only supports 9624 of the same category.


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## troublemaker (Sep 9, 2015)

kpa said:


> FreeBSD is hardly a good choise for an "average" user who expects those bits to be available out of the box.


Okay, so this also means that when someone says that it is very tortuous to install FreeBSD the only answer is "learn your way or choose another system". It is a respectable answer, although maybe not what I was hoping for, unless the other system is PC-BSD or equivalent. Too bad.



drhowarddrfine said:


> FreeBSD's hardware support is mostly not an issue except for one networking vendor and one graphics vendor. Software support generally is not an issue either. While one can cherry pick things that are missing on FreeBSD, most everything people use on Linux is also on FreeBSD.


Well, the thing is that this is not an issue for you. I personally didn't install FreeBSD 9 because it had a problem with USB 3. And many people would like to use Skype. A friend of mine doesn't even use Linux, because he needs AutoCAD. He's stuck with Windows.
As I said, you can say this is the choice FreeBSD is taking. Fine, I think I can live with that. I'll say "too bad" and I'll walk away.


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## ANOKNUSA (Sep 10, 2015)

kpa said:


> Even on Linux flash is very much dying because it's completely closed source and Adobe killed the NPAPI plugin version of flash.



Well, even on [insert platform here] Flash is effectively dead. It still exists, but nobody worth a damn is actually developing new websites or web applications with it.

As for Skype, every time I see someone chalk its absence up as a loss for *nix, I can't help but consider that I've never met anyone in meatspace who's actually used it.


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## troublemaker (Sep 10, 2015)

ANOKNUSA said:


> Well, even on [insert platform here] Flash is effectively dead. It still exists, but nobody worth a damn is actually developing new websites or web applications with it.


Flash has been pretty much dead everywhere for a long time. The problem is that Flash doesn't know it. It's not about new websites or web applications, but old ones. There are still many of them.



ANOKNUSA said:


> As for Skype, every time I see someone chalk its absence up as a loss for *nix, I can't help but consider that I've never met anyone in meatspace who's actually used it.


Unfortunately I can't found really up to date figures, but this should give an idea:

http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/01/15/skypes-incredible-rise-in-one-image/

I have in this moment 14 online contacts on Skype, even if many are afk. I don't really trust this information, to be honest, but again, just to give an idea.

And those are just examples, only part of the whole issue. Anyway, I reread the thread a bit, and I saw quite a few posts making the point apparently better than me (I would like to add videogames to the bunch, but maybe it's just me; which actually is surprising). I feel like I'm beating a dead horse; I'll see if I can refrain from posting in the future, unless those posts are brought into context.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 10, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> As I said, you can say this is the choice FreeBSD is taking.


You are mistaken. Not having those is not a choice on FreeBSD's part. Some of it is the lack of effort on the part of the software or hardware vendor. Others are the lack of people available to work on such things. In both cases, complaining doesn't do anything but reiterate what we already know. Becoming proficient enough to contribute is a far better thing to do.


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## troublemaker (Sep 10, 2015)

drhowarddrfine said:


> You are mistaken. Not having those is not a choice on FreeBSD's part. Some of it is the lack of effort on the part of the software or hardware vendor. Others are the lack of people available to work on such things. In both cases, complaining doesn't do anything but reiterate what we already know. Becoming proficient enough to contribute is a far better thing to do.


Ah, okay. I thought there was more a general desire to keep things "user unfriendly", because it's always possible to hack the system somehow to solve whatever problem.
This is very understandable; it is unthinkable to pretend everything is solved overnight. I saw Linux for the first time in 1992, but I waited about 13 years to use it as main system. These things go slowly.
In that case I will be happy to stay. Who knows, if I get into it enough I might contribute. It's probably a very steep learning curve though.


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## Phishfry (Sep 12, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> Okay, so this also means that when someone says that it is very tortuous to install FreeBSD the only answer is "learn your way or choose another system". It is a respectable answer, although maybe not what I was hoping for, unless the other system is PC-BSD or equivalent. Too bad.
> 
> 
> Well, the thing is that this is not an issue for you. I personally didn't install FreeBSD 9 because it had a problem with USB 3. And many people would like to use Skype. A friend of mine doesn't even use Linux, because he needs AutoCAD. He's stuck with Windows.
> As I said, you can say this is the choice FreeBSD is taking. Fine, I think I can live with that. I'll say "too bad" and I'll walk away.



Well I agree with your AutoCAD statement. I use it and Solidworks and must maintain a Windows box as there are no viable alternatives...


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## Deleted member 9563 (Sep 12, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> It's probably a very steep learning curve though.


I'm guessing half the effort of learning MS-Windows since you won't need a law degree.


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## Phishfry (Sep 12, 2015)

I am surprised how small an install my FreeBSD desktop is. I am have set up Mate, web-browser, email and Anjuta and Glade all with a 5Gig Install (Sources and Ports Too). I am using an old 16GB SSD.

I was daunted at first after being dumped to a command prompt, after the DVD install, but after trying PC-BSD, I decided to hit the books and figure it out a FreeBSD desktop. 2 small file mods are a small price to pay. It helped that I am an pfSense user and have a motivating factor to learn more so I can contribute back.


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## troublemaker (Sep 12, 2015)

OJ said:


> I'm guessing half the effort of learning MS-Windows since you won't need a law degree.


I meant more in terms of knowledge of the code, not to mention the commitment. I don't think you can just say "I'll write two lines of code". Diving into the existing code is probably not easy, especially if you want to do things like Linux compatibility, which to me is quite important.


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## fernandel (Sep 12, 2015)

My first FreeBSD was version 6.?? (I forgot) and I have to used Fluxbox and KDE. Later with version 10 I installed FreeBSD on my iMac and use Fluxbox, Lumina, KDE and later remove KDE and installed GNOME 3. And as a not computer educated person I didn't have problem with installation. And I use FreeBSD as a desktop from version 6 (before I had OS/2 and Linux).


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## ANOKNUSA (Sep 12, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> Diving into the existing code is probably not easy, especially if you want to do things like Linux compatibility...



Yeah, I'm a perpetual novice when it comes to coding, but I'll bet Linux compatibility would be the among the most confusing, if not _the_ most confusing, parts of the codebase to actually get involved with (short of perhaps Sendmail ). *BSD devs tend to pride themselves on code cleanliness--see style(9), for instance--but if your focus is on a very specialized layer of abstraction, then you'll probably hurt yourself in the long run if you don't look at the rest of the code before jumping head-first into the more complex, obscure, possibly less-used parts.


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## kpa (Sep 12, 2015)

ANOKNUSA said:


> *BSD devs tend to pride themselves on code cleanliness--see style(9)



Good style does not imply good quality code although it often helps. It is possible to write code that looks pretty and conforms to style(9) but is incomprehensible when you try to deduce its logic by reading it.


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## ANOKNUSA (Sep 12, 2015)

True enough, but merely being conscientious about code and documentation standards counts for something, and code that's easy to read and patch into a larger base is easier to maintain. But now I guess I've dragged this off-topic...


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## troublemaker (Sep 12, 2015)

ANOKNUSA said:


> Yeah, I'm a perpetual novice when it comes to coding, but I'll bet Linux compatibility would be the among the most confusing, if not _the_ most confusing, parts of the codebase to actually get involved with (short of perhaps Sendmail ). *BSD devs tend to pride themselves on code cleanliness--see style(9), for instance--but if your focus is on a very specialized layer of abstraction, then you'll probably hurt yourself in the long run if you don't look at the rest of the code before jumping head-first into the more complex, obscure, possibly less-used parts.


Absolutely. I never get those people who just write code without even looking at the consequences. Perfect way to implement bugs. Hackers. I need the bigger picture.



ANOKNUSA said:


> True enough, but merely being conscientious about code and documentation standards counts for something, and code that's easy to read and patch into a larger base is easier to maintain. But now I guess I've dragged this off-topic...


Maybe a bit, but it's worth it 
Documentation is very important, and yet too often overlooked. More than the standard is the content that matters; you can have a great standard and terrible documentation. It's about an important aspect of code quality: readability and understandability. Having people you can ask helps too, but in that case I wouldn't say the code is good.


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## teo (Sep 23, 2015)

protocelt said:


> It would be nice to see the Foundation show a little bit more interest in the desktop area, at the very least, graphics support. Given the large difference in corporate involvement, developer, and monetary resources between the FreeBSD project and Linux though,
> 
> Work is being done on the desktop though, albeit slower than some would like.



FreeBSD to lost a lot of ground to other systems, betting only to servers and that has a quota low in the  world for their service. Because follow pawned in the old rhetoric of other systems with desktop?  Even OS X does not give eating to  FreeBSD, because it is a closed source system, and depends on a minimum of BSD.

Therefore the FreeBSD system, had constant problems of financing, and the earnings for the service of the servers have been insufficient. What strikes me, is that FreeBSD can not evolve to  default for graphical desktop, as did Debian along with their derivatives.


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## Wozzeck (Sep 23, 2015)

"What strikes me, is that FreeBSD can not evolve to default for graphical desktop"

I really don't care about that. If I want a good desktop graphic environment I use Windows (eventually Mac OSX), I really don't care about using Linux or BSD just for the pleasure of aping what Windows does very well. I am not a *nix fascist, all systems have their own qualities and especially since Windows 7. Personally I have never had serious problem with virus and spywares under Windows because I am a clever guy and I know what I am doing. Windows or not WIindows this is not the question to me.

I can use Linux/BSD for desktop in some particular situations :
- Money is a matter for the user, he can't afford to pay.

- The hardware platform is quite old and last version of Windows doesn't support it very well.
For example I have collected an old Pentium 4 Prescott x86_64 platform. First, I must switch to Win 10 x32 because Win 10 x64 needs now the virtualization instruction (you know that Windows 64 is quite different of Windows 32, it uses the kernel of Windows server), second "Wintel" dropped the support of the integrated i915 graphic chipset so Windows 10 is miserably displaying under the generic and slow Microsoft VGA card driver with No possibility to add a graphic card... so Linux/BSD is a magic solution here. The i915 is still well supported and I can install the x64 version, the lack of virtualization instruction won't stop the installation.. and all is working dramatically well. A Pentium 4 6xx has still enough power to do basic things as browsing, playing music and video, this is surprising.

In this case I install Linux for its better ability to support various hardware. I know that automount of usb key is working so the client won't come back to me with some disatisfaction. Making automount working under BSD is something terrible, I have never succeed in... and i think I am not the only one.

But in some cases I will choose FreeBSD in the following situations 
- a lack of memory, BSD is incredibly good in the memory management
- embedded systems through pico BSD

I use FreeBSD for what it is tailored to : server. It is still great to have a graphic help, I am not crazy I won't refuse that, but I don't need here something perfect as I want to for my regular desktop computer. 

Complaining here for a lack of graphic environment is useless and is a nonsens because FreeBSD is very clear on this point : developers don't care about ease of use, about graphic aesthetic, they work on the core system to implement full stability.

But in fact you have misunderstood something : FREEBSD ALREADY LISTENS TO YOU.
Desktop environment is a PC-BSD's concern. PC-BSD is not a fork of FreeBSD, this is a complementary project. This means that FreeBSD will never get involved in graphic desktop environment because this is the job of the PC-BSD staff. They have done a great job, the graphic installer works nearly as well as the Mageia installer. All is not perfect, there is a lot of work to do... but they have recently launched the Lumina DE desktop environment project. This project is just answering to your question : a graphic interface perfectly tailored for BSD that would replace KDE (which seems to get closer to Linux), the horrible GNOME, a graphic interface fullfilled of "linuxism" which raises many issues.

Many people just install PC-BSD to get inspiration regarding some strange settings and switch back to FreeBSD to apply what they learned... because FreeBSD gives the incredible "flexibility" to compile the way you want, to choose and discard the components you want to install or not. You must choose : you want something out of the box... ok go to Linux of PC-BSD, you want the flexibility... stop complaining, flexibility means that you need to challenge all kind of issue.

But work is still on... the Lumina project is quite "young".


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 23, 2015)

This thread reminds me of why we have a "Greetings and self-introduction" thread. Keeps these things in their place so it doesn't mess anything else.


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## Deleted member 9563 (Sep 24, 2015)

rmoe said:


> When I say "desktop" I mean something like "does run the usual GUI stuff, can run Office software, GIMP, browsers, etc." In other words: I come from the server and/or console side and "desktop" for me is "GUI stuff on top. FreeBSD can do that, too. Cool!"



I think you hit on something important there - input method. It would seem that some people insist on using a mouse and tick boxes because to them it is comfortable and not because it is either useful or required. I learnt to type very many years ago and find it infinitely easier than using a mouse. My tired eyes are just not up to the task of searching all over a screen for some clue about a relevant clickable item any more. I even still use DOS because it is so damned comfortable and does now what it did when I first started using it. That is perhaps why when I talk about a "desktop" in my world it is only for the purpose of doing graphical things - i.e. things that involve pictures. Like you say, Gimp, Office, and browsers. If something can be done by plain typing, then of course (to me) that is the way to go.

So, I guess that you and I think of a "desktop" as kind of a hybrid affair, whereas there are others who religiously avoid typing commands. I recently had the fortune of being asked to do some file management on a Windows 7 computer owned by someone who has used MS-Windows for many years but has yet to understand about files and directories. It was a steep learning curve for me and a frustrating experience because I had to keep doing web searches for things like "how to get to a terminal", and "how to open two file browsers", etc. In the end I got the work done, but not without screaming (silently) that Windows was not ready for the desktop. That, of course, is because "desktop" means something different to me.


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## Phishfry (Sep 24, 2015)

I will drag the dead horse out here and point out what I would consider needed software for desktop usage:
NetworkManager
This Linux software is what is missing in FreeBSD desktop arena.

I recently setup an Sierra MC7700 LTE card on my FreeBSD laptop and manually creating an PPP.conf was a drag as was figuring out ddial.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 24, 2015)

Phishfry You are presuming NetworkManager is needed and there are no other equivalent or better resources. There are lots of network tools on FreeBSD, and all of the well known ones, and I'd bet most network admins couldn't care less about needing Network Manager. If it was that great, someone would have ported it, and no one has, so, no, I don't think anyone misses it.


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## ANOKNUSA (Sep 24, 2015)

drhowarddrfine said:


> There are lots of network tools on FreeBSD...



Sure, but in this modern, hectic, on-the-go world, who really has time to type `wpa_passphrase [SSID] [Passphrase] >> /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf`?


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 24, 2015)

ANOKNUSA 


> There's gotta be a button on this thing for that thing. -- Homer Simpson


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## hedwards (Sep 24, 2015)

sulman said:


> I look at it as a set of design and engineering principles that have been proven over time; not a hard set of defined standards.
> 
> What's happening with Linux (systemd's growth in particular) is a tightly-coupled scheme is exposing the Linux ecosystem to a big fat bundle of risk over the coming years. Falling for the siren song of convenience and the lure of standardisation isn't worth much when it is costly in the long run.


SystemD is a large part of why I'm back to FreeBSD. The other being that I didn't have to give up crashplan to return.

I've found the attitude of some of the Linux devs to be increasingly disturbing. The more I read about systemd the more concerned I became and then the dev announced that su needed to be glommed in there. IMHO, su is a good example of something that specifically needs to be separate from systemd and similar programs. The last thing you want is something that starts running on the system almost immediately and is responsible for things like starting any security programs you having control over privileges.

As far as the argument about desktop goes, I started using FreeBSD with version 4.2 and by that point the only real impediment to using it as an everyday OS was a lack of Flash and the limited number of available drivers. I seem to recall some other program being a bit of a problem as well, but that was it. These days things are even better.

For people who think that installing FreeBSD is "torturous" there's always PC-BSD, it's probably 99% FreeBSD with a nifty install program.


rmoe said:


> As for ZFS, I personally think that's a grossly exaggerated hype, particularly for desktop systems. And I avoid it like the pest and I don't trust it because it may run, yes, but a file system should be very _mature _before being used in production.


ZFS has been around for a decade and it's reliability is quite well known at this stage. What other OS are you wanting to use that's been actively developed for more than a decade?

Granted, I don't have my job on the line with ZFS, but at some point you do kind of have to draw the line. If the newer features aren't ones you're comfortable, you can tell ZFS to just run as an older version. Or has that changed, I haven't been using it in a while.


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## srobert (Sep 24, 2015)

Phishfry said:


> I will drag the dead horse out here and point out what I would consider needed software for desktop usage:
> NetworkManager
> This Linux software is what is missing in FreeBSD desktop arena.



Try net/wpa_gui.


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## troublemaker (Sep 24, 2015)

Speaking of desktops it's clear that Windows has several things that FreeBSD doesn't have. Linux does too. FreeBSD is clearly at disadvantage from this point of view, which honestly shouldn't be very surprising. To me the main point is the fact that people have interest, that people are willing to look more at FreeBSD on the desktop. In that sense I find comments like "FreeBSD is for the server" or "I only use the command line, no GUI" a bit concerning; the popularity on the desktop is essential for the popularity overall, and I personally think a popular system is a good thing. However, from threads like this I know that there are people with interest in a desktop FreeBSD, and that's positive.
It reminds me of Linux many years ago, when it was domain of hard core sysadmins and command liners. And then things started to change, simply because more casual users and users with different needs had interest.

A real desktop FreeBSD is probably the domain of PC-BSD, DesktopBSD and similar, and in that sense FreeBSD will probably always be a bit tortuous to install. But nothing prevents FreeBSD from getting some nice desktop applications and some configuration tools with a nice GUI. It's just a matter of time.


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## kpa (Sep 24, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> the popularity on the desktop is essential for the popularity overall



This is a conjecture, what do you have to back it up?


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## Beastie7 (Sep 24, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> It reminds me of Linux many years ago, when it was domain of hard core sysadmins and command liners.



And it still is, nothing really changed. Except for the Windowization (yeah, I made it up) of Linux.



troublemaker said:


> Speaking of desktops it's clear that Windows has several things that FreeBSD doesn't have.



Which is why people will continue to use Windows (or OS X) for their respective purposes.



troublemaker said:


> But nothing prevents FreeBSD from getting some nice desktop applications and some configuration tools with a nice GUI. It's just a matter of time.



That's a terrible oversimplification. Even Canonical isn't making any measurable gains in the market with Ubuntu (Touch).



troublemaker said:


> the popularity on the desktop is essential for the popularity overall



You think Linux (as an ecosystem) is popular because of Canonicals' (failed) attempt at the desktop with Ubuntu? lol


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## Deleted member 9563 (Sep 24, 2015)

Beastie7 said:


> Which is why people will continue to use Windows (or OS X) for their respective purposes.



I honestly don't think that people use MS-Windows for any reason that they are aware of. They buy a computer and to them that's one single thing. On this board people know what an OS is. In the wide world people don't know the difference between a browser and the internet. MS-Windows is commercially successful for one reason only - market monopoly techniques. It has nothing to do with the qualities of the software, although people like what they're used to. The bottom line is that the non-professional market (I include general office workers here) do not know that they even have a choice. Though of course they do know that they can always buy a Mac, and whatever that means to them is the only choice that they feel can be made.



Beastie7 said:


> You think Linux (as an ecosystem) is popular because of Canonicals' (failed) attempt at the desktop with Ubuntu? lol



Lol indeed. Again, you're not going to get market share from non-market techniques. I wish it were otherwise. . . . or perhaps I don't. I like the fact that FreeBSD (and others) are developed according to the needs and whims of more OS oriented people. In fact I hope FreeBSD never gets popular. (Yes, I'm selfish.)


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 25, 2015)

troublemaker Your quest to make FreeBSD popular among the masses is yours. Go for it if you wish but please start your own forum or go to the PC-BSD board for that. Your audience here is the wrong one. This is a board for professionals and serious hobbyists who generally share little interest in what you speak of and will provide little to no support. You're speaking into the wind.


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## troublemaker (Sep 25, 2015)

kpa said:


> This is a conjecture, what do you have to back it up?


Well, if you define popularity of a system in terms of machines running it, and user knowing it and using it, I'm afraid it's not just a conjecture



Beastie7 said:


> And it still is, nothing really changed. Except for the Windowization (yeah, I made it up) of Linux.


I disagree. Maybe they still are a majority, but much less than many years ago. And the system is quite usable by less skilled users. Look for example at all the public institutions that replaced Windows.
And I agree with OJ: big part of it is just that people use what they find.



Beastie7 said:


> That's a terrible oversimplification. Even Canonical isn't making any measurable gains in the market with Ubuntu (Touch).
> 
> You think Linux (as an ecosystem) is popular because of Canonicals' (failed) attempt at the desktop with Ubuntu? lol


I'm not sure why you are so focused on Canonical. No, I just think that part of a popularity is psychological (marketing or whatever), but part of it is user friendliness, mainly nice interface and good hardware and software support.



drhowarddrfine said:


> troublemaker Your quest to make FreeBSD popular among the masses is yours. Go for it if you wish but please start your own forum or go to the PC-BSD board for that. Your audience here is the wrong one. This is a board for professionals and serious hobbyists who generally share little interest in what you speak of and will provide little to no support. You're speaking into the wind.


Well, if I'm still here it's actually because I see more than just little interest. And it's not just about popularity per se, it's about being able to do things I want and I like. And that comes with popularity.
Besides, I really don't understand why anyone would be against it. There is only to gain.
By the way: if PC-BSD becomes popular I'm not sure FreeBSD will be unaffected


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## Beastie7 (Sep 25, 2015)

You're conflating two different markets that aren't interdependent. I highlighted Canonicals efforts because Ubuntu was their attempt at competing in the consumer market with Apple and Microsoft (kind-of); efforts (that failed) which had no influence as to why Linux is popular in the first place. FreeBSD, GNU/Linux, Windows, OS X are all "popular" in their respective markets; due to their specific focus and targeted audience.

Conspiracy aside, Windows is popular simply because Microsoft was the first to exploit the horizontal model of software distribution on a commodity platform (x86), and their Enterprise focus. <--- This is the exact reason why GNU/Linux is popular. (ie RedHat or argueably, Debian); which contradicts your "popular on the desktop, popularity for all" false dichotomy.

I don't think you've been paying attention.


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## troublemaker (Sep 25, 2015)

Beastie7 said:


> Conspiracy aside, Windows is popular simply because Microsoft was the first to exploit the horizontal model of software distribution on a commodity platform (x86), and their Enterprise focus. <--- This is the exact reason why GNU/Linux is popular. (ie RedHat or argueably, Debian); which contradicts your "popular on the desktop, popularity for all" false dichotomy.
> 
> I don't think you've been paying attention.


Okay, I am afraid this discussion is not going anywhere nice, so I will answer this and then I will stop.
I am afraid I have to remind what I wrote: the popularity on the desktop is essential for the popularity overall. Which doesn't mean "popular on the desktop, popularity for all", but "popularity for all, popular on the desktop".

Check now who hasn't been paying attention.


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## Beastie7 (Sep 25, 2015)

troublemaker said:


> Okay, I am afraid this discussion is not going anywhere nice, so I will answer this and then I will stop.
> I am afraid I have to remind what I wrote: the popularity on the desktop is essential for the popularity overall. Which doesn't mean "popular on the desktop, popularity for all", but "popularity for all, popular on the desktop".
> 
> Check now who hasn't been paying attention.



To quote drhowarddrfine



> Your quest to make FreeBSD popular among the masses is yours. Go for it if you wish but please start your own forum or go to the PC-BSD board for that. Your audience here is the wrong one. This is a board for professionals and serious hobbyists who generally share little interest in what you speak of and will provide little to no support. You're speaking into the wind.



I recommend taking your conjecture over to the PC-BSD forums. Your drivel and bashing of FreeBSD is really unwarranted.


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## Oko (Sep 25, 2015)

drhowarddrfine said:


> troublemaker Your quest to make FreeBSD popular among the masses is yours. Go for it if you wish but please start your own forum or go to the PC-BSD board for that. Your audience here is the wrong one. This is a board for professionals and serious hobbyists who generally share little interest in what you speak of and will provide little to no support. You're speaking into the wind.


+1 to end this thread with this wonderful post of Mr. drhowarddrfine


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## teo (Sep 25, 2015)

Is that it is inadmissible, the selfishness of some people who defends the system only for servers, and it shields itself in other systems for using applications of graphical desktop, without caring the future of FreeBSD, which today with the service of servers does not reach for your finance, due to their low market share.

In one of my comments at first I expressed it. PC-BSD is an insufficient project of many years and has no support for architecture of 32 bits. Please, do not follow in the old rhetoric only for servers, and appoint to other systems of closed-source for the use of applications in graphical desktop, even Linux becomes corrupted with its systemd.

Nowadays, operating systems have several functions, not just for servers, are also for tablets, for devices from mobile phones, video games console, this is modern technology that faces all the challenges, the centrist egotism only to servers is causing his big losses to the FreeBSD defunding, with the passing of time is more weak, due to their low market share. It may evolve the graphical desktop in standard way, just as they Debian with its derivatives of the hand.


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## scottro (Sep 26, 2015)

Well, there's GhostBSD, which works with 32 bit, I think.
But honestly....if you want an easy to use desktop, you're better off with Linux. (Though if you went to some of their forums and criticized, they'd say, Leave, we don't want you--you're getting treated more nicely here than you would be on some Linux forums.) 

For my needs--browsing, terminals, video stuff....once I do the 6 minutes or so to install FreeBSD, I do pkg install xorg-server, a driver for the video, input device drivers, mplayer and some other stuff and I'm done.  Actually easier than Fedora, where one needs to add an extra repo to get some codecs. 

What losses of funding are you discussing?  Please be more specific.  

So, who gets funding due to their great desktop support?  Fedora?  They get it from RedHat--that 2 percent market share--that's for all the Linux versions--isn't getting funding.  RH gets it from its servers.   Ubuntu gets it from Mr. Shuttleworth. 

Linux's desktop support is useful if one wants to avoid Windows or Mac, but even with Lady Gaga saying she uses Ubuntu, has such a small desktop share, that many vendors pay NO attention to whether their machine works with Linux.  Complain to Amazon video that your Linux won't properly play a video and you'll be told they don't support Linux.

So, perhaps FreeBSD and other BSDs will fall by the wayside.  Perhaps, Linux's gradual swing towards being user friendly will so alienate the ones who use it commercially, system administrators, that within 5 years, it will be almost dead.   Perhaps some other system will be developed that puts them all to shame.

TL;DR  Linux's easier to use desktop isn't getting it very much commercial support, it has an almost non-existent desktop share, less than 2 or 3 percent.


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## junovitch@ (Sep 26, 2015)

I'm fairly certain all the useful discussion that could be had in this thread has already been had.  I'm going to close the thread.  If anyone has anything useful to add and can convince me otherwise then I'll gladly open it back up.


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