Subject: Re: NetBSD momentum
To: Bruno <nc41530a@vizzavi.pt>
From: Andy Ruhl <acruhl@gmail.com>
List: netbsd-advocacy
Date: 12/20/2004 09:37:37
On Mon, 20 Dec 2004 16:19:33 +0000, Bruno <nc41530a@vizzavi.pt> wrote:
> Greetings,
> 
> I think NetBSD 2.0 could take advantage of this to get new users:
> 
> FreeBSD 5.3 is "stable" but not production-ready
> http://www.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=04/12/14/1518217
> 
> Benchmarks could show NetBSD beating FreeBSD in areas where FreeBSD was
> stronger, like performance. And gain some respect getting rid of the
> "NetBSD is for exotic platforms and old computers" logic once and for all.
> 
> We all make mistakes, but our mistakes can be the opportunity others need.
> FreeBSD developers and release enginners have done a great job and will
> again in the future, but this hiccup might as well be the opportunity
> for NetBSD to be considered a respectful competitor in the i386 platform
> in terms of performance on pair with FreeBSD and Linux.
> 
> What's your opinion?

I actually have quite a few comments here, but I don't have time right
now to respond.

What I can say is that FreeBSD can still be the right tool for the
job, and there are things in it that I wish NetBSD did better.
Consequently, this is why I still haven't converted my main server
over to NetBSD, even though I use NetBSD for most everything else.

I think it will be a natural process for people to start looking
elsewhere if they really believe the stuff in this article are true
roadblocks to them. And I think it will also be natural to start
looking at NetBSD if these people are true BSD followers, because
Linux and commercial unix don't fit the same niche that BSD people
often want.

There has been some good NetBSD press recently in some benchmarks, and
the 2.0 release seems to be good. No need to rub it in.

Andy