FreeBSD Cluster At Purdue 92
luddite writes: "Two guys at Purdue University have assmbled a FreeBSD based cluster built cheap - very cheap. With under $2500 spent on the cluster, it's one sweet set-up. Just shows that if you take the time and put some effort into something, money doesn't have to limit your resources! The site also goes into some detail about what the cluster is made of, where they found the parts, how it's been configured, and what they plan to use it for."
Re:Purpose? (Score:1)
Re:Budget fraud (Score:1)
Re:CPU Upgrades? (Score:1)
But it takes so long to install the operating system.
I also like to run sendmail, apache, name server, nfs, samba, etc.
When I use any of this while I playing mp3s through its sound card, my stereo sound awful.
You know, this 75mhz Pentium probably does more than my 650mhz Athlon.
Re:Why not BSD? (Score:1)
Yes, I know why Bind 8 isn't included. Red Hat changed Bind to run under the non-priviledged "named" user precisely because of this problem in 6.2.
I guess I probably feel the same about BSD and SunOS 4.1.3 - classic operating systems, but these days a little behind the times.
Re:University Advantage (Score:1)
>clearly see that the fighter umbilical is FDDI. (And of course the
>mother ship runs Windows -- don't you know that the reason Jeff
>Goldblum was using a Mac (apart from the fact that they own him
Yeah. That's why they were able to infect the mothership so easily with the virus. They just uploaded a
Cheap machines, beowulf and other things (Score:1)
With ~16 single proc 450's with 32mb of ram... what sort of problems can you solve. Sure, sure, they offer parallel tasking. But 32mb? How many large tasks that need parallel tasking can be done on a several single proc boxes with that little memory... and with PVM?
I have used PVM before on a similar set up of systems (ok... they were 300's and I only had like 4 of them) but I was able to sort numbers and compute digits of PI... but that was about it.
Now... on the other hand, buying real systems... like 42 dual 600's with 1gb ram. Those can rip through problems... well... rendering. And... Beowulf isn't always the soultion. Sometimes shared resources aren't good... can you imagine a network supporting a shared memory of up over 500mb's for a process?
Beowulf has its place, pvm has its place... but in a lot of places, it is good for research. I hope that they were able to acomplish this.
Linux 8 Node Cluster for $250 @ Purdue (Score:1)
Re:I believe... (Score:1)
Re:Linux 8 Node Cluster for $250 @ Purdue (Score:1)
Re:University Advantage (Score:1)
You really mean to tell me you didn't see Independence Day?
Everybody knows they have Mac workstations with their built in ethernet.. *duh*
BSD Icon (Score:1)
Just something I've noticed which I find irritating. Sorry to be so anal...
Re:Clustered BSD - with added Mach and Aqua? (Score:1)
There's no reason these technologies shouldn't migrate to OS X as well at some point. Many reports of the full SMP demo'd at Apple's WWDC under OS X beta on Apple hardware. Distrbuted processing may come along as well but may or may not make the first release as it's MUCH less sexy than SMP.
Apple's plan would probably center on "farming" your Mac network's extra cycles at night more than the kind featured in the story. But plain distributed machines - like the headless one's in the story - shouldn't need full OS X install, though, unless they need Carbonlib, OGL or something. Maybe a lite Darwin-ish install would be possible for those machines - who needs display code without a display?
Of course you're probably talking about an extra 32Megs of RAM to make up the difference so why worry about it?
=tkk
Re:Clustered BSD - with added Mach and Aqua? (Score:1)
LOL
Reminds me of that guy who wanted to sell dehydrated water...
Sorry, couldn't keep it for myself...
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
-Joe
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
Thanks!
Cluster of clusters... (Score:1)
It is quite a nice little system when you have enough users to keep it busy, and I imagine is quite easily scalable. The only trick is that if there are differences between the various machines you can have really annoying and hard to track down bugs. Fortunately consult is very responsive. Once they even contacted me about a bug in my code, because they saw the error in the system logs and thought it might be their fault!
And it's got sound (Score:1)
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Re:1, 2, 3...15, 22. (Score:1)
Re:Hot Setup (Score:1)
As a result the room has a raised floor with forced air from below, Liebert cooling, power conditioning, better security, etc etc etc.
Re:Budget fraud (Score:1)
I think not.
There is no reason at all that you can't do similar things. Your arguement is much like that of someone who says "oh you've comitted fraud because you didn't pay for that FREE operating system." FreeBSD and Linux happened because thousands of people gave their time (in huge amounts) to these projects. What would you have us do on the budget to account for the free O/S that we were given?
Unless you've lived under a rock, *lots* of things get given to places (non-profit and for-profit alike). Educational places get zillions of dollars worth of things every year (especially a person from MIT should know this!). Just this past week a group I consult for gave another group (us)$10k worth of equipment in a different division of the same company. It wasn't _fraud_ that they can now clain they didn't have to spend the money to buy that stuff. Their budget wasn't decrimented a dime.
The ACME budget stands as it is as that is what it cost in dollars to build it. If you're going to pick at us, then pick at the time that we've got invested in getting it working. But since this is /., I'll guess that everyone presumes that their time is free.
Re:1, 2, 3...15, 22. (Score:1)
We found cases last summer that all matched, so that's why we have all the cases. Since that picture was taken, the pile of computers on the far end has gone away and another rack replaced it.
The end you see closest to you is Column 'E' so all the nodes in C, D and E are up plus the top two in column B. The bottom machines in D and E are the two connected to the outside world. The bottom one in D now really is in the new rack, but we've not got new pictures since that was just done last week.
We add roughly a motherboard a month. Hard disks are not a problem (I see four within reach right now that are all 880mb). CPUs we purchase. Memory we find here and there mostly for free. The motherboards are the sticker. PU Salvage gets probably 100 machines a month and we try to get every one of them looked at before someone else gets them purchased.
Re:Cost is misleading (Score:1)
We have yet to have to pay for any disk space.
Watch ACME's news page... in a couple of days we should have eclipsed our 'free' disk space with even cooler stuff.
Re:slashdot effect - An Update (Score:1)
On the other hand, we'll also bet that the campus connection to the Internet probably couldn't have taken 10 times the load.
So far so good. I figured we'd get maybe 10,000 hits over the entire life of ACME and we crossed that in the first hour of
We've seen some security trouble, but nothing that reasonably well configured systems couldn't handle, though I'd be running a bit more security stuff if I'd known this was coming.
Being
David Moffett
Re:I believe... (Score:1)
Perhaps it will show up someplace where we can, ummm, 'acquire' it.
Re:Cheap machines, beowulf and other things (Score:1)
You can solve lots of problems. It comes down to how the problem is described and then coded.
ACME's first problem is CPU bound and not memory bound. If the nodes had 16mb it would be fine, since the code is small and the runtimes are long.
On the other hand, we have friends at Purdue who are adding their second gb of ram to each compute node. It all depends on the problem and the resources available.
Please don't mis-understand that we *like* having nodes with only 32mb, but we don't have huge money to buy huge (and very very cool) grown up machines. If you've got a free (or near free) source of 42 duals 600s with 1gb of ram per CPU in rack mounted cases, we've got racks that would be delighted to hold them instead of what they are holding. FreeBSD runs *real* well on duals.
$3000 doesn't go very far in 'new' computing. In another project we've got going, $3k didn't even buy the disk drives for one machine.
Finally, to your swipe about 'recognition'. I had no intent on ever making any kind of BIG deal about ACME. I figured we'd get 10,000 hits over the entire life of the project. We got that in less than the first hour after /. posted about us. ACME is doing real work, that's why it was built. If you don't like that, well that's your problem.
Re:why K6-2 ? (Score:1)
K6-2 because at the time we selected it K6-3 was still in the first revision and the motherboards that we had couldn't do the power requirements (3.x volt current in particular) that K6-3 needed. Also there was (and I'll guess still is) a pretty steep price premium on K6-3. This was one of those topics we discussed for a while before we decided. Original K6-2s were just on the current limits of what the P55T2P4 Rev 3 boards could do.
Our rule of thumb is each node is roughly a Pentium II/330. Most of the code we're running (at least at the moment) is in Fortran (80% - a 4800 line legacy) & C and is mostly integer.
I'm reminded of the expression, "when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." We have a hammer and some of the problems will certainly be screws, but at less than $3k we'll live with it. It isn't a perfect world.
Re:How long did this take to install? (Score:1)
It's safe to say we can bring up a new node in well under 30 minutes. That includes flashing it to a new BIOS, setting up the NV RAM in the network cards and then loading FreeBSD (via the network of course).
Sometimes it takes longer, but that is usually because we've got some piece of bad hardware (memory or disk usually) or we've screwed up along the way from raw tiredness. Most of the hardware work we do on this thing is done on Friday nights.
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
Of course FreeBSD allows for symbolic links. They've been around for a long time- 4.2BSD or so. Fully documented in the D&I of 4.4BSD..
If you are _sure_ about symlinks not working on SunOS, then that was probabaly because they were disabled for a reason.
Re:I believe... (Score:1)
I would use my real name, but the Alumni Association would be after me for money.
PVM vs Mosix (Score:1)
what the performance and usability issues are
between PVM and Mosix, other than issues dealing
with kernel mods.
Re:University Advantage. (Score:1)
$2,390 for a 4/5 diskless cluster of Celery 500/533 done right.
Go with scrap cases, a crossover cable, used Boomerang cards in a hypercube, cheapo DFI mobos and a smaller SCSI drive and you can get out the door for $1,800. Go for offbrand memory and O/C Celery and you can push it down another $150.
Re:Motherboards not shown in budget (Score:1)
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
Re:Purdue Salvage (Score:1)
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
I've got a similar cluster with a somewhat different focus - I need to be able to generate enough HTTP client traffic to saturate (well, nearly saturate) a single gigabit ethernet server. The clients in my system are eight eTower 266s that I got on clearance at buy.com for $229 each. These have 200MHz Cyrix M-II CPUs, and running FreeBSD that's enough horsepower to saturate a 100baseT ethernet, so eight can pretty much saturate the gig ether.
However, if the client machines were running Linux, they would not be able to saturate, since Linux still has about half the networking performance of FreeBSD. That's the main reason I run FreeBSD and not Linux. Other reasons include Linux's tremendous supply of bugs that were fixed in BSD years ago, and the general obnoxiousness of the Linux and Gnu user community.
If not for those things, sure, I'd run Linux.
Re:Purpose? (Score:1)
Purpose? (Score:1)
Did the site say anywhere the ultimate purpose of the cluster? Is it just to test speed and cost-effectiveness? Also, it sounds like the machines are lacking in some hardware departments. Do they have high-end graphics cards, what kind of drives are they currently sporting? My research group is also based at Purdue, and it sounds like the cluster we have set up is superior. We currently have ten nodes (one dual) each running Redhat. The processors are AMDs, 6 K6/2's and 3 Athlons. 550MHz and 6-700Mhz respectively. All have 256Mb of RAM and 44x CD drives. We also have 100MBit intranet. The current setup ran 10 grand, with monitor and monitor switches. I doubt the ACME cluster could run the simulations we run. Our simulations have a run-time of 12 hours. I wonder what it would be on theirs...
Okay, now I'm done with the "Mine is better than yours" rant.
Ciao
nahtanoj
Re:Purpose? (Score:1)
First, thanks to thundrcast for answering my question, and I apoligize for the boasting I did. Different problems require different set-ups, and from thundrcast's reply it sounds as if what they have is adequate for their research. Our own is analyzing atmosperic Cherenkov radiation, both electron and proton showers. And now for all the other questions. We have 44x CDroms because the supplier threw them in for free. ;) While they are handy for loading and re-analyzing data, the only really useful bay drive is the DVD-RW. The dual machine is not K6/2, but two of the Athlons. And yes, we could rip a lot of Britany Spears, but here we would all rather rip Christina Aguilera. ;)
Ciao
nahtanoj
Re:Budget fraud (Score:1)
Budget fraud (Score:1)
First, there's a BUNCH of things missing, like motherboards, memory, etc.
Second, the numbers don't make any sense, 40 network cards for a cluster of 16 machines? But wait, only 15 CPUs??
Third, many of the prices they got was sheer luck (and perhaps a little bit of work, which I would applaud them on)...I mean comeon, they managed to get from their salvage dept. (what's that, BTW?) network cards for ONE DOLLAR a piece and tape drives for $2.50 a piece (their keyboard adapter cost $2.32, only 18cents less than a tape drive). Those prices are so not good examples of real prices others would be able to consistently find -- or most likely at all!
All in all, almost none of their budget makes any logical sense, and it all just strikes me as stretched truth + luck = a cheap cluster here. I mean comeon, I'm going to have my friend by a $5000 computer, and sell it to me for 1cent, and then post to the world on my webpage that I bought the cheapest PentiumIII-whatever around?
Re:Cost is misleading (Score:1)
Damm dis shit be scandalous.
-Jon
Re:Lame. Six years late. (Score:1)
The cluephone is ringing...
Re:University Advantage. (Score:1)
Look at the budget! They bought 107 network cards! Now that's a lot of bandwidth.
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Re:University Advantage. (Score:1)
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Re:How long did this take to install? (Score:1)
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
BSD originated from a set of modifications to various versions of the 'original' AT&T Unix, which mostly (and especially at Berkeley) ran on DEC PDP11s and Vaxen.
f.
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
Every enlightened person knows that Linux is optimized for doing one thing at a time. Therefore, Linux will easily saturate a 100mbs connection. Unless, of course, it does something else at the same time.
-T
Re:How long did this take to install? (Score:1)
RTFM:
FreeBSD Handbook Installation Guide [freebsd.org] and the FreeBSD Newbie install [freebsd.org] for screenshots with play-by-play instructions (screenshots are for 2.2.5, but they look the same for 4.0).
Clustered BSD - with added Mach and Aqua? (Score:1)
Could this mean, at least theoretically, we could see an open source base for clustered OS-X?
The idea could be awesome if it happened. Designers using OS9 are screaming for multiprocessing.
If some OSS team came up and gave them "BeoMac" or whatever, Apple had better watch out or pull its hardware - roll - out - socks up.
Re:Clustered BSD - with added Mach and Aqua? (Score:1)
erm, if you read my subject line "-with added Mach and Aqua" I figure (at least i thought this was clear) that any micorkernel integration for clustering and GUI on top would be the icing on the cake.
The OS-X kernel is quite extensible and pretty well documented. Since this Free-BSD clusterrelies on network cards between node (prolly not great for memory latency on large datasets tho') I expect you could make some use of reading the Kernel Network Extensions [apple.com]reference for a start.
But what I was thinking about was to replicate Darwin across a cheap cluster and modify the Standard Apple Numerics Environment or its OS-X enquivalent to pass real heavy duty FP to the cluster. Oratleast do something similar in a set of system calls / api in Cocoa or another environment.
Im sorry if my postwas a quickie, but I dont want to open source all of OS-X just maybe open up the hardware hegemony which Apple has at the moment. I mean, can you imagine if OS-X became a serious compute platform / renderfarm candidate. Surely even Jobs would droolRe:1, 2, 3...15, 22. (Score:1)
They probably just don't quite have enough for a 5x5 (25), and so are dropping down to a 4x4 until they get a couple more machines going.
-k
Beowulf Cluster (Score:1)
But seriously. Anybody got any info on multilayer clustering technology?
Re:University Advantage. (Score:1)
Re:Clustered BSD - with added Mach and Aqua? (Score:1)
In some sense, this could be done pretty easily.
1) Port PVM and MPI to Darwin (if not already done).
2) Use bitchin' G4 with OSX as your head system.
3) Send your tasks to the cluster for computation.
Now, there are a few problems, like the fact that PVM and MPI aren't transparent, but require specialized programming in each app, and that you can't get PowerPC nodes as cheaply as recycled x86s, but these are just details, right? Right?
Rock on, Mac Beowulf Darwinthing!
Re:YABC (Yet Another Beowulf Cluster) (Score:1)
nice (Score:1)
why K6-2 ? (Score:1)
UP on the Farm (Score:1)
Re:How long did this take to install? (Score:1)
Someday, we'll be installing OSes with stacks of CD-ROMS... that'll be when I need to install FreeBSD on this machine:
500 GHZ Quad Intel Octium (80x886) Processors
30 Terrabyte HD
256 Gb RAM
1.44 floppy
--Cr@ckwhore
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
BSD came out of the most liberal atmosphere one could think of. Anybody remember those yellow t-shirts with the daemon dressed up as a flower child, and the slogan "Peace, Love and Rdist" across the bottom.
The truth of the matter is that the BSD development psychology may seem outwardly conservative when compared to Linux, but is really democratic, and quite liberal. There is simply more control over the final product than there is in Linux.
Linux is just weird. I cannot understand it. It seems to be a mix of part anarchy and part autocracy.
All very nice, but.. (Score:1)
Why?
Ever seen how much machine room space costs?
It'd be interesting to see a price comparison where individual nodes were as powerful as individual Sun units (though add on the cost of freebsd OS support, since you do get that from Sun)
james
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
And stop pretending our camps are at odds; both camps share. FreeBSD & Linux are both kernels; both kick ass.
BTW, does FreeBSD allow for symlinks? I remember my days of using SunOS (pre-Solaris days) and symlinking was verboten then.
slashdot effect (Score:1)
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:1)
KLAT2, a more powerful "cheap" cluster (Score:1)
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Re:KLAT2, any one? (Score:1)
As for using the 3DNow! stuff, their K6-2's can have some real punch if they are willing to code for it... Check out our SWAR - SIMD Within A Register [aggregate.org] compiler technology for doing just that. Actually, the Ph.D. student doing most of the work on SWAR is AT Purdue.
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Re:KLAT2, a more powerful "cheap" cluster (Score:1)
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Re:Motherboards not shown in budget (Score:2)
Why not BSD? (Score:2)
Or why not Linux? A couple of reasons each way:
The BSD people are great, and Linux owes a lot to them. BSD continues to make great contributions to the world of Linux. It would be the best of all possible worlds if each had the same capabilities. But, because of the hype factor and the real development it brings, BSD has no hope of being as flexible as Linux in the near future.
I guess it is a question of what you grew into, the level of risk you are willing to tolerate, and the hardware that you need to support. The decision of BSD or Linux starts there.
CPU Upgrades? (Score:2)
These guys are buying AMD K6-2 3D 450 processors, which they say work in a variety of motherboards. Do these work in non-MMX (single voltage) motherboards?
I'm using an old Gateway P75 as a masquerade box for my cable modem. It would sure be nice to upgrade it to 450 on the cheap.
I am looking for the best way to squeeze a little more life out of this box.
Re:YABC (Yet Another Beowulf Cluster) (Score:2)
Re:Why not BSD? (Score:2)
But its really not a big deal (in my opinion). If you want Bind 8 on your OpenBSD box you can just install it.
My Slashdot Observation...
What really funny though, is how the same general questions show up on every BSD related article on slashdot. "Whats the difference between Linux and BSD, which is better...." Someone should just make a Slashdot FAQ for this and be done with it.
will the clustering extensions work on !x86? (Score:2)
macbsd (netbsd/mac68k) runs on my LCII.
LCIIs can be had at the local surplus auction for $5 apiece. Most of these are formerly lab machines, and have ethernet already.
i think a cluster of 25 of these low profile 16mhz monsters could fit on a desk, _maybe_ put out the MIPS of a PII (and only about twice the heat
hmm.. for $10 i can get powermac 6100s by the truckload, and freebsd/ppc...
Re:I believe... (Score:2)
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:2)
Re:will the clustering extensions work on !x86? (Score:2)
Re:Linux 8 Node Cluster for $250 @ Purdue (Score:2)
The point of ACME is to solve a few very hard (yes, NP-hard) problems. We don't particularly care the form of ACME in the end as long as we can solve the problems at hand.
One of my gripes about the typical
Re:Purpose? (Score:2)
FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:2)
Re:I believe... (Score:2)
Read more of the article first...
From the news page: I think that the tide still says that the power is in the almighty dollar$$$$
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Re:Clustered BSD - with added Mach and Aqua? (Score:2)
Apple uses proprietary licensed stuff in many of the features of Aqua, so it couldn't be open-sourced. I'm sure a watered down version of Aqua could be created, but lacking the PDF windows and openGL programming, it'd be no more then the Aqua theme which I use with gnome.
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Missing components? (Score:2)
Interesting start, but they've still got memory, motherboards, and some other stuff to go. That's going to crank the price tag at least a couple thousand dollars...
Motherboards not shown in budget (Score:2)
Cost is misleading (Score:2)
It is still really a great price, and I can't believe what they paid for the racks.
-k
University Advantage. (Score:2)
Re:University Advantage (Score:2)
1, 2, 3...15, 22. (Score:2)
Is it just me?--or does anyone else see 22 computers in that rack.
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Hot Setup (Score:2)
ACME currently consists of sixteen Pentium class computers, each with 450 MHz AMD K6/2 processors and at least 32 MB of memory.
I have two 450 Mhz Amd boxes in a small room, and they sure pump the heat up there..
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Re:1, 2, 3...15, 22. (Score:2)
YABC (Yet Another Beowulf Cluster) (Score:3)
It's a kind of high-performance massively parallel computer built primarily out of commodity hardware components, running a free-software operating system like Linux or FreeBSD, interconnected by a private high-speed network.
http://www.dnaco.net/~kragen/beowulf-faq.txt
Re:University Advantage. (Score:3)
Second, good quality motherboards are basically there for the salvage -- on the news page they mention a an ASUS P55T2P4, which is, I believe, a 430HX board. But there's a big integer compute difference when it's outfitted w/ a 500MHz K6/2 vs the (likely) P133 that used to be sitting there.
Thirdly, they mention that the machines are outfitted with at least 32MB of memory. This is not 128MB. You don't need 128MB to do a lot of tasks on either *BSD or Linux -- as long as you're doing things that have a <32MB resident set, you're going to be fine on either. FreeBSD is particularly good in low memory situations (its swap performance is better than Linux in my experience), but i'm pretty sure that this isn't important, because they are looking for big integer performance first and foremost. Otherwise, they're probably better served with fewer, faster nodes w/ K7s or PII/IIIs.
Note that the machines have local HDs, so they can do local swap -- they don't need to keep shells, etc. swapped in over a network drive, either.
So this sounds good, for the right task. there are obviously a bunch of tasks that would be better served by other styles of clusters, or other resource allocations, but for doing fast integer calculation on the super-cheap, this is a great way to go.
Re:FreeBSD v. Linux (Score:5)
Subject: Re: Why FreeBSD?
Any response to a question like this is bound to upset someone. I'll
answer with the caveat that this is my opinion that developed over the
past three years following them both as well as other commercial OSs.
Those of you offended in any way by this, please cat flames >
That said -- the differences between FreeBSD and Linux can best be
understood in the context of American politics. There are essentially two
philosophies: Republican (FreeBSD) and Democrat (Linux).
The FreeBSD organization is a republican structure -- we have our say as
users, but the final decisions devolve to the core team who take the final
responsibility for their decisions. FreeBSD takes a conservative approach.
In other words, better things should work correctly at the expense of a
minorities desires, than to please all of the people all of the time and
have unexpected components of the OS breaking on a regular basis. We are
free to vote our approval or disapproval by changing our OS.
Linux is a democratic group. There is no single authority to accept final
responsibility except for Linus as it relates to the kernel. Linux adopted
early on a consensus approach (POSIX, etc.). In a sense, Linux is much
like current Democratic politics -- the mob pretty much rules. The end
result is that there is really no such thing as Linux -- there are
distributions that use the Linux kernel and from then on you have
essentially different operating systems. Slackware, for example, doesn't
look at all like Red Hat. Describing Linux is much like describing Mach.
(There isn't much - both are just micro kernels. _Anything_ can be
implemented over them.)
So as I see it, it comes down to this: vote for the philosophy that
appeals to you. I use FreeBSD because I rely on my machine for many other
uses besides tinkering with operating systems. FreeBSD doesn't change the
world on me every 6 months. Linux is in constant change. New things are
showing up all the time. If you like tinkering with operating systems and
having things that used to work break, Linux may be your answer. If you
don't know Unix -- pick one and get started. You'll learn how to pick the
best choice. No matter which one you pick, it will be infinitely better
that Micros**t anything.
Enjoy.
-- Jay
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Subject: Re: Why FreeBSD?
And the clouds parted on 21 Mar 97, and Jeff Roberts
said:
>On Fri, 21 Mar 1997, Bob Dole wrote:
>
>> Hi, I plan on changing to UNIX and I wonder wether I should take Linux or
>> FreeBSD...
>> Both seem to be an excellent choice, so you can't say one is better than
>> the other. But in what are they different, in what is each specialized?
>
Then try them both: they're both "free", but you'll have to pay something
for you Internet connection or CDROM distribution, depending on your
circumstances. The following is not impartial, as I don't play with Linux
much, but when I did I wasn't as happy as I am now 8).
[opinions on]
Linux is SysV-flavored (barely); FreeBSD is BSD-flavored (definitely).
Linux's kernel is authored by one person (Linus Torvalds); FreeBSD is
authored by (essentially) the core team.
Linux addons come from pretty much everywhere; FreeBSD's get submitted from
a lot of places also, but have to pass review to be included as part of the
release.
Linux has multiple releases (based on who's packaging), all somewhat
different from each other, and somewhat inoperative as well. There's only
one release to FreeBSD (per major version)
Linux tends to be more cutting-edge and trendy, and tends to work with more
hardware (to some degree), partly because of the "arrangements" made with
vendors. FreeBSD requires that source code be freely obtainable for
(nearly?) all it's parts, which scares some vendors into not cooperating,
or at least not as well. The hardware that _is_ supported tends to be done
pretty robustly.
Linux is snappier for low-user-count systems, depending on what you're
trying to do. FreeBSD tends to shine under real load (like WWW/FTP
servers), and I don't really know if any major sites base such Internet
services on Linux; quite a few seem to be using FreeBSD, particularly
Walnut Creek CDROM, which carries quite a load on a consistent basis.
There are far more books on Linux than FreeBSD per se, something I draw no
conclusions on.
The support on the Linux list(s) is something I haven't any personal
experience with; the support on the FreeBSD lists is exemplary.
[opinions off]
Please correct any sins of commission and ommission you find above; I don't
do this often enough to be any good at it.
your mileage may vary, and best wishes,
larry
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Subject: linux vs freebsd testimonial
A few weeks ago, my single linux box fried. I replaced both the hard
drive (with an identicle one) and linux with freebsd 2.1.5.
The machine runs majordomo, ftp, apache, and an irc server.
The performance is way up there! Under linux it would frequently slug
down to a crawl. under FreeBSD it just keeps zipping along.
There is a very definite noticable difference in response and load
handling.
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ubject: Re: linux vs freebsd testimonial
Since we've gotten along fairly well in our migration from Linux, I
thought I'd share my experiences as well...
We currently run on FBSD:
1 Shell/user www (was NetBSD 1.0)
1 DNS/mail/dialup auth/syslog (these two are sharing mail spool over NFS)
1 utility/backup/freebies
1 DNS/mail for seperate, wacky project
2 virt www servers (3 are still Linux)
2 co-locate www servers (www.firstview.com 3.6G/day, www.villagevoice.com)
These have been the most trouble-free machines we've worked with. Some of
the recent security problems were a bit tough (lots of cvsup-ing), but
nothing compared to the nasty Slackware Linux Bug-o-the-month. The only
reboots *any* of these machines have seen were intentional, which is
something I just can't say about Linux. Performance is much better, and
the "out of box" configuration is a lot more sensible than Slackware. A
few of these machines really get beat on hard, and they just ask for more.
We have to keep one Linux web server for compatibility with some odd
sourceless C cgi's, but the other two will be history soon. Our news
server is running Linux, but it's being replaced with a machine to be
named "fridge" which will have 3 SCSI busses and 15 drives, and of course
be running FBSD.
I must say, this has made my job much easier. Linux is just too
unpredictable when you don't have the time to play the
"kernel-of-the-week" game. One of the Linux boxes still does the routine
of freezing with no log entries or other hints; which is extremely
frustrating. FBSD just seems like it was meant to be in a production
environment...
Thanks to all involved,
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