PC-BSD, the desktop-oriented FreeBSD variant, has released version 7.1, dubbed Galileo. In case you don’t know, PC-BSD is a FreeBSD distribution with lots of customisations focussed on the desktop user. Its most defining features is the Push Button Installer, a self-contained package format with handy installers/uninstallers. PC-BSD 7.1 comes loaded with changes and updates.
It comes packed with the latest version of KDE4, KDE 4.2.2, as well as X.org 7.4. As the version number suggests, PS-BSD 7.1 builds on the FreeBSD 7.1-STABLE branch. The most important changes:
- The new KDE 4 printer applet enables users to easily add and manage printers and print jobs without using the CUPS web interface.
- The Add / Remove Programs tool and the Update Manager have been consolidated into “Software & Updates.”
- The Updater Tray has been modified into a small tray-only applet that shows users when updates are available. This is far less taxing on the CPU than its previous versions.
- FreeBSD ports and packages can now be created by utilizing the ^aEURoerunports^aEUR command.
- Greater stability for Flash 9 allows users to get higher quality from Flash sites such as Hulu and Youtube.
- Enhancements have been made to PC-BSD’s System Installer, including upgrade functionality for those who wish to install PC-BSD while preserving their user data.
- Fixes have been made to bugs in the Wi-Fi and Networking tools, as well as to previous Linux Emulation problems.
It also comes with Warden, a graphical frontend for FreeBSD Jails functionality. “The Warden makes jail creation and management accessible to a greater number of users, and provides a secure and isolated environment for all sorts of uses, such as a mail server, database server, or webserver, to name a few. Warden configurations, called Inmates, can be used to instantly load pre-configured jails into the Warden.”
Kris Moore, PC-BSD Software Development Manager at iXsystems, and founder of the project, is happy with the new release (really?). “Galileo utilizes the latest KDE developments to bring style and functionality to the PC-BSD operating system,” he says, “New KDE visual effects accent the stability and security of the Galileo Edition of PC-BSD. With new printing features and improvements to the Push Button Installer and Warden utility, PC-BSD 7.1 is now even easier to use.”
You can download the new release from the download page.
Downloading it now. I have yet to find a really functional KDE 4 distro, and I’ve always liked FreeBSd, hopefully this will be the one.
It’s here: http://www.osnews.com/thread?357713
Thanks for the link, but I prefer apt based distros if I am going to use Linux, currently using Debian Lenny.
I have always preferred apt based systems too Jake, but the URPMI system in Mandriva is actually rather good.
I’ve been playing with Mandriva 2009.1 for a few days now and I have to say I am very impressed with it.
I think Mandrake 7(??) was the last time I used it back in 2001. It has improved a great deal since then.
URPMI beats YUM hands down and is very close to the standard set by APT.
http://wiki.mandriva.com/en/Urpmi
sidux.com may an alternate for you
Have you tried Linux Mint KDE CE? Truly stunning!! Check it out here: http://www.linuxmint.com/blog/?p=731
You mean like truly broken: http://www.flickr.com/photos/19616885@N00/3358984527/in/set-7215760…
“and using PBIs to install apps is pure genius, succeeding where Linux fails.^aEUR
Criticising Linux seems rather arrogant of them.
The person who said it is Arthur Koziol, a regular community member. He isn’t part of the PC-BSD team.
http://www.pcbsd.org/content/view/103/11/
Why? It’s not arrogant to have an opinion, or to be proud of your group’s achievements.
Constructive criticism is always a good thing. That is not actually arrogant, but a statement of fact. To be fair Linux *has* come a long way, however it still has ways to go. PBI’s work the way a software installer should work.
What is so great about PBI’s?
In Arch Linux, for example, if I want something I just type:
pacman -S something
What is so difficult about that, except that it’s less similar to the way Windows and MacOS do it?
(I’m not trying to bash here, I really don’t understand it, please explain…)
typing anything (or deveation from something as simple as double clicking something) is a problem with gaining wide spread addoption. I am not saying its the best aproach (though i like it the best) but its the reality of teh situation.
The good news is, when you control the market or you do have a good chunk in it, you can change things at will and your customers will follow you blindly. Some out of not knowing any better (windows users) others (Apple users) because their god told them too and Jobs, errr I mean god is apparently infallible in their eyes.
Not having a green start menu hinders wide-spread adoption. I couldn’t care less. Their computer probably came with Windows and I make plenty of money solving their issues.
Wahhhhh…. you use a new product you might actually have to “learn something” and have a basic understanding of computers. Trying to mimic learned tasks on Windows does no good with other OS’s and I take offense to taking UNIX and making it more Windows-like.
The fact that UNIX isn’t Windows-like or DOS-like is one of the reasons I’ve stuck with it since WinNT 3.51 was still in beta.
Hmmm…. a decent UNIX with a BSD userland and easy access to a good CLI shell of your choice…. check
a GUI environment that is far more efficient and performs better than X11 especially with modern games….. check
X11 environment for network-transparent or legacy apps….. check
The same GCC toolchain everyone uses….. check
A desktop environment that is well-integrated, friendly, powerful and doesn’t feel like it’s in perpetual beta….. check
Vendor-supported apps and games from major brands like Adobe, Strata, etc….. check
A price more reasonable than ANY commercial UNIX vendor regardless of intended usage?….. check
Gee, what’s not to like? The fact they won’t give you Aqua source code you most likely wouldn’t be able to interpret or ever really utilize anyway?
Just because it’s closed, commercial and won’t install without heavy patching on a piece of shit bottom-of-the-barrel Dell celeron-based POS doesn’t mean it sucks, grow up.
Ah, I thought you were referring to PCBSD
Not taken as bashing. I know you can type those commands, and installing the software is easy. The difference in using a PBI is there are no dependencies to worry about, everything is in the package. You also don’t have to install as root, as everything can be installed in the home directory. Yes, that can be done on Linux if comiling from source, but when using the repos you need to hope that all the repos are up and running. With a PBI, once you get it, you can install it while disconnected from the net, as there is nothing else to get and no dependencies to download.
Well okay, it does sound like a rather good system. Though I still prefer good old pacman.
I do too, but I’m afraid all those people, who find constant “MD5sum invalid – package corrupt – update failed” messages annoying, might see it different.
Not taken as bashing. I know you can type those commands, and installing the software is easy. The difference in using a PBI is there are no dependencies to worry about, everything is in the package. You also don’t have to install as root, as everything can be installed in the home directory. Yes, that can be done on Linux if comiling from source, but when using the repos you need to hope that all the repos are up and running. With a PBI, once you get it, you can install it while disconnected from the net, as there is nothing else to get and no dependencies to download.
As said, the downside to PBI is that the dependencies are taking extra space. But I didn’t notice any mention of another, bigger, issue; the dependencies included could be out-of-date and as such may contain security holes. I personally don’t like either of those things.
It’d be wonderful if you could combine those things: the application would be downloadable with all of its dependencies included, but those would only be installed and used if those weren’t already provided by the system. That’d remove the duplicate dependencies AND allow the system to manage security fixes and updates to libraries while still allowing you to install the app even without internet connection.
I agree completely. You just hit the best case scenario
the other side of that argument is how you can only guarantee a certain quality with the components you tested with, so mixing and matching components can cause problems
All of the things that can lead it not to work. No internet connection, bad/old 3rd party software not working because of some problem with dependency x (rename, merged, marked unsafe by disro maintainers), typing errors, etc… While you don’t have any problems, an unacceptable amount of people will have the problems and it just isn’t compatible with that “it just works” feeling. (Also the source of “internet front-end” descriptions.) It’s not difficult, it’s just not that likely to work once you want the latest open source stuff that isn’t in the repository or 3rd party software.
In a standard FreeBSD environment, you usually type
pkg_add -r something
to install from a precompiled package, or, for example,
portinstall category/thing
if you wish to compile yourself. This will retrieve dependencies needed.
The goal of PBI is that the package already contains the dependencies.
The fact that PBIs are usually obtained using a web browser for first manually downloading them onto the hard disk and then executing them in order to start the installation is, in my opinion, a means to make “Windows” users feel comfortable. They’re usually not used to a central means of searching, installing, deinstalling and upgrading software – that’s what FreeBSD has its Ports Collection for. No, they know how to search for software on the web, using search engines and then downloading things from web pages. So PC-BSD allows them to keep it their way while installing a UNIX application, even involving things like “yes, ok, next, next, next, finish” to occupy you with activity during the installation that forces you to be present at the machine.
PBIs could be offered for third party software by different vendors, that wouldn’t be a problem because the tools to create PBI files are free. PC-BSD has its own “PBI shop” where you can search for things and download them.
It’s worth mentioning that their PBI directory doesn~A"t cover all the software that’s available via Ports or packages, for example teTeX. But those who want LaTeX on their machine, instead of using KOffice, are usually smart enough to “pkg_add -r teTeX”, which is again no problem even if you’re using PC-BSD.
PC-BSD offers what most “Windows” users – who I think is the main target audience – are familiar with. And yes, I really think downloading software from the web and then manually installing it is old fashioned.
Edited 2009-04-10 20:53 UTC
Yep, that’s the problem
Yet another problem you pointed out here.
See…What is easier for you is not necessary for someone else.
Show me how to install software without doing any keytroke – without any. And show me masses of people doing so.
By the way, it’s not even possible to install “Windows” without touching the keyboard. If you define the fear of touching a key as a min habit of the average user… good luck. The “Windows” installer invites the user to “press the Enter key to continue” – in fact, I’m not sure what it says in English, but in German, it says to press the “input key” (Eingabetaste) which is a major problem for computer newbeies, because there’s no such key (labeled) on the keyboard, the german version has the “arrow down and left” and “Enter”, but no “Eingabe”.
Keyboards are not so complicated as some people wish them to be. In the past, computer newbies made their way through C64s and through DOS, Do you want to tell me that people have gotten more and more stupid over the years?
I do support some FreeBSD systems in my family and for friends. When they ask me something, I can simply tell them: “Open a terminal, type ‘sudo fsdb -aF’ and everything is fine.” When I hear my uncle giving someone his “professional” “Windows” advices, do you know how it sounds? He describes pictures, like in a picture book, like you read to children: “See the tiny litte blue orb? Click on this, no no, the other blue thing that looks like a letter. Fine. Now click on the green thing in the upper left, no, no in the upper left of the window, not the desktop. Which window? What do you see at the moment? Describe it to me. No, you’re wrong, start again. Now enter the letters A B C, then the a with the circle around it, it’s it’s… press Alt, then Gr, then Q. No result?”
And I can even write someone a simple mail titled “Enter this at a terminal” and they can copy + paste it (using the middle mouse button, no keystrokes involved).
Or for diagnostics, I can advice “type ‘(dmesg; pciconf -lv; usbdevs -v; camcontrol list) | mail -s diags [email protected]“. Can you do so in “Windows”? Can you mail someone a list of files as an answer to the questions “Which files do you have there?”
The keyboard is still the main input method for computers. Even newbies should arrange with this fact. It isn’t nothing bad per se. It’s just how you learn to drive a car.
Don’t scare people off the keyboard, and don’t try to imply that the mouse is generally more easily to handle. The best solution is to combine them, and to learn how to use them.
Remember people stepping on mice like a foot peal? Or putting the mouse onto the screen? Yes, it’s so easy.
Find out more here, if you like:
http://www.rinkworks.com/stupid/cs_mice.shtml
http://www.rinkworks.com/stupid/cs_icons.shtml
And I may repeat: Keyboards aren’t complicated. They offer a more direct interface to the computer, giving the user the ability to formulate what he wants, instead of making choices out of a previously generated subset (which may not contain what he’s searching for).
Individuality. That’s why there’s PC-BSD for those who are familiar with the concepts “Windows” made them learn.
A statement indeed, one to which I agree. PBI is the way to go. apt-get is good and practical but PBI is more reliable and user friendly. Reliable by means of not requiring a constant network connection, user friendly because it works and behaves as one would expect (one coming from Windows) which also happens to be their target audience. PBI is unique, leave it alone. If you don’t like it, use ports but do not limit freedom. After all, don’t you all say it is all about freedom?
Then why criticize freedom, you are free to choose and go for FreeBSD if you wish, the choice is here and yours to make.
Edited 2009-04-11 05:10 UTC
PBIs have their problems. Biggest hurdle I see is the lack of proper global library installation.
If you need a program which creates other programs (compiler, framework etc.) you NEED those libraries installed globally. PBIs don’t do that, they only install locally for given program. In cases like these you either have to resort to hacks (make the PBI install scripts add libs to global paths) or ports/packages.
Otherwise I think it’s a nice end-user installer principle, considering todays RAM and disk sizes (because saving a few mb by sharing a .so isn’t really that important nowadays).
The fonts on this screen are really crappy: http://www.pcbsd.org/images/desktop71.png
Indeed. I wonder how they still by now, year 2009, haven’t got it fixed.
PC-BSD has succeeded where so few althernative desktop OS’s have failed. Any Windows user can use PC-BSD without much of a learning curve. installing software is easy, the aplications work as you would expect them too, honestly its just a great OS all around. Please keep up the good work guys, truely amazing stuff.
also (if you check the front page) it is not based on FreeBSD 7.1 STABLE but 7.2 (which in turn is based on 7.1 if you want to really get into it, but still.)
http://www.PCBSD.org
Edited 2009-04-10 16:41 UTC
PC-BSD reminds me Opera. It is to operating systems what Opera is to browsers. It’s an excellent piece of software that very few people know and use.
I still don’t understand why no one has exported the PC-BSD concept to Linux. There are already all pieces of the puzzle available (Ubuntu/openSUSE, Klik/Autopackage), people would just have to pack everything into an enticing distro. Those who aren’t familiar with Synaptic would feel comfortable with such a system.
I’m using Opera now, so I tend to agree with you .. for now but soon I’ll probably switch to Chrome: when Opera use 100% CPU it’s hard to know which website does it, with Chrome it’s easy.
The reason why I have not switched yet to Chrome is because it doesn’t have a flash blocker (the one I added to Opera is primitive, but it’s there).
I read on the Opera forum a few months ago that they would incorporate a process manager too.
Regarding the Flash blocker, there’s one for Chrome on the web.
Thanks for the information about Chrome’s Flash blocker!
I’m going to try it.
Just because PC-BSD isn’t made for me I won’t say its bad. My neighbor is very happy with it, and he’s not very computer literate. He has less problems with PC-BSD than he had with “Windows”. All stuff workes. And he doesn’t care how and why.
But please allow me a polite addition: The internationalisation of KDE was bad, the last time I tried it. If you live in an english speaking country, well, no problem. But you can scare any potential german PC-BSD user away with only one (!) english error message, such as some “ARTS error, could not open device /dev/blah”. And if you set up your KDE to be in German, it should be in German everywhere. Installed applications should honor this. As a counterexample I tried to install kmplayer on a german PC-BSD system – kmplayer was in English. That’s a big problem for german users, let me say this again!
From the standpoint of the completeness and quality of the german internationalisation, I always found that Gnome was better than KDE, but because I’m using neither of them (I occassionally give some Linux a try, but I don’t *use* it, honestly), my opinion may not be backed up very well, or even up to date.
According to http://www.freebsd.org/ the 7.2 release of FreeBSD is in BETA stage still. So how can PC-BSD be based on 7.2-R when it’s not out? The current development branch in 7 is 7-STABLE (not 7.1-STABLE) which has already passed 7.0-RELEASE and 7.1-RELEASE and is on its way to 7.2-RELEASE. You can find out more about what -RELEASE, -STABLE and -CURRENT mean from the FreeBSD web site.
taken from the front page of http://www.pcbsd.org, notice “the version 7.1 contains…”
PC-BSD 7.1 – Galileo Edition Released
The PC-BSD Team is proud to announce the immediate availability of PC-BSD 7.1 – Galileo Edition!
Version 7.1 contains a number of enhancements, improvements and bugfixes from the 7.0 series.
FreeBSD 7.2-Pre
KDE 4.2.2
The new KDE 4 printer applet enables users to easily add and manage printers and print jobs without using the CUPS web interface.
The Add / Remove Programs tool and the Update Manager have been consolidated into ^aEURoeSoftware & Updates.^aEUR
The Updater Tray has been modified into a small tray-only applet that shows users when updates are available. This is far less taxing on the CPU than its previous versions.
FreeBSD ports and packages can now be installed in a clean localbase by utilizing the ^aEURoerunports^aEUR command.
Greater stability for Flash 9 allows users to get higher quality from Flash sites such as Hulu and Youtube.
Enhancements have been made to PC-BSD’s System Installer, including upgrade functionality for those who wish to upgrade / repair PC-BSD while preserving their user data.
Fixes have been made to bugs in the Wi-Fi and Networking tools, as well as to previous Linux Emulation problems.
For a full list of changes, please refer to the changelog. Users who wish to upgrade from PC-BSD 7.0.x are able to do so via the upgrade / repair option during the installation.
Thanks, I see now: “7.2-Pre” refers to a development point in 7-STABLE prior to 7.2-RELEASE (because that’s not released yet), but it’s close to.
http://www.freebsd.org/releases/7.2R/schedule.html
When FreeBSD 7.2-RELEASE is out, maybe the PC-BSD developers offer a minor upgrade for the “OS part” of their system to catch up to the FreeBSD release.
thats the plan. how did this news article even get submitted with the wrong information in it what its right on the front page of PC-BSD’s site?
Read the actual press release. It reads:
“PC-BSD 7.1 is built upon the FreeBSD 7.1-STABLE operating system.”
So the OSAlert news item is perfectly correct.
It is, but FreeBSD’s terminology may be a bit confusing when you don’t know what STABLE means. In fact, it’s not a (one) certain release, there are many STABLE “releases”.
For those who are interested, I’ll explain:
Let’s say we start with FreeBSD 7.0. This is 7.0-RELEASE released at a certain date. Now development continues. This is 7-CURRENT. If you download the sources of 7-CURRENT at one point in time, it may not run, or it even may not compile. Because it’s the development branch, changes done may render the system unusabe or uncompilable. Such changes are undone. so if you download the sources of 7-CURRENT the next day, if may work completely fine. Development that is considered “good” is then put into 7-STABLE. This branch is not updated as often as 7-CURRENT, but it’s not experimental anymore. Out of 7-STABLE (which can be called 7.0-STABLE because it hasn’t reached 7.1-RELEASE yet, combined with a date such as 7.0-STABLE-20080811) security patches are made to upgrade 7.0-RELEASE systems with important security changes. A patched system would be 7.0-RELEASE-p1, indicating tttha it’s the 1st patch level. When 7-STABLE has been tested enough, it enters the beta phase for the upcoming 7.1-RELEASE, it’s 7.1-PRE then. When it’s done, 7.1-RELEASE will be released on a certain date. The development that follows will then be 7.1-STABLE. When a new branch is initiated, for example the beginning of 8-CURRENT, some development is backported to older branches, such as 7-CURRENT, which will be discontinued at some point in time, as it has been with the 4.x, 5.x and 6.x series already – they are called legacy releases and are only maintained for a restricted time.
PC-BSD is based on such a -STABLE version past 7.1-RELEASE and prior to 7.2-RELEASE, I’ll just emphasize again that there’s no “the” 7.1-STABLE version of FreeBSD.
For a comparison with more explainations refer to the excellent FreeBSD handbook, ch. 24.5:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/current-s…
As well as ch. A.7:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/cvs-tags….
Edited 2009-04-12 22:57 UTC
I have used PCBSD before, and always found it quick and stable but I wont really be able to see it shine until I change my computer for one with Nvidia or Intel graphics, or ATI drivers are supported for 3D, which I believe they are still not:
http://billmullins.wordpress.com/2009/04/04/pc-bsd-best-unix-for-be…
PCBSD has been under the wing of, and presumably been given a major boost by, iXsystems fir two-and-a-half years, so why no ramping up to ATI?
I understand ATI/AMD have come late to the game with opening up their graphics drivers but there does not seem to be any planning in the PCBSD team to accommodate ATI developments (but perhaps someone with more facts and knowledge can correct me – I would hope to be).
You obviously don’t realize that PC-BSD doesn’t develop their own video drivers.
You want accelerated DRI on PC-BSD with newer ATI cards newer than a Radeon 9200? Go bitch to X.org or ATI. PC-BSD has absolutely nothing to do with that.
Lets just assume the drivers are there but nobody has PBIed them yet. Will PC-BSD be responsible then? This is just a scenario, I don’t know if the drivers are there or not but when I custom built my PC I chose NVIDIA for this very reason (X.ORG) and has never let me down.
Either way, I have confidence in PC-BSD, I know if there are drivers for X, they will be packaged.
Edited 2009-04-11 07:06 UTC
Although I’ve used PC-BSD before I’ve always gone back to generic FreeBSD and ‘rolled my own’ desktop so to speak, however the following feature does look like something worth investigating:
“PC-BSD Galileo also features a native version of the Warden utility for server installations (on your desktop, you can double click the warden icon to install it). The Warden is a graphical front end to FreeBSD jails, or virtualized FreeBSD installations. The Warden makes jail creation and management accessible to a greater number of users, and provides a secure and isolated environment for all sorts of uses, such as a mail server, database server, or webserver, to name a few. Warden configurations, called Inmates, can be used to instantly load pre-configured jails into the Warden. “
While PBI’s offer a way for users to install software without downloading extra dependencies or offline package installation, it also has a drawback. Every package you install comes with all their dependencies and you will end with a lot of space spent in duplicate libraries. So while efficient at ease of installation, is inefficient at disk space usage.
But for people coming from Windows and Mac worlds it’s a very good alternative.
It would be a small price to pay for someone who downloads 3 pieces of the same package for some operating system and is told twice that the dependencies weren’t satisfied. At that point, the person might just delete all 3 pieces and look for the partition editor.
In a way true. People either don’t know how to install a computer or don’t care to install one. They just want something that works.
But in a way is not that true anymore. These days, how many programs are not included in the distribution’s package management systems? You can find most of the stuff for your distribution as either a main or community supported repo.
What Linux and BSD needs is a way to install easily (and not by ./configure, make, install) external software, that is for example, included in a magazine CD. A wizard that can do that action without user knowledge of the complex process would be nice.
Edited 2009-04-15 04:20 UTC
Please see the implication: Let’s say programs A, B and C depend on library L, and due to a security update L has been updated to L’. On a regular FreeBSD system, you would update L to L’ and everything’s fine. On PC-BSD, it isn’t that easy. PBI maintainers would first have to create PBI packages A’, B’ and C’ that include L’ instead of L, and then you would need to download and install them – manually.
But I’d like to say that the averade desktop user (the main target audience of PC-BSD in my opinion) would not care for such updates.
I’d say that’s no problem today, hard disks are large enough. Furthermore, you’ll need a quite up-to-date PC to run PC-BSD, so there will be a huge hard disk inside.
Yes, it is. And they get a full-featured UNIX under the hood. Wait a moment, isn’t that what Mac OS X users already have?
This is why the PCBSD maintainers included a very nice, user-friendly PBI update utility. The system periodically checks for updates. When updated PBI’s are found, the user is notified and the PBI’s can be automatically downloaded.
No manual work needed on the user end.
The potential difficulty you point out with multiple updating of applications versus single updating of the affected library is real, and has been mentioned several times in connection with PC-BSD’s approach.
The approach taken by PC-BSD (outlined in the other response to your post) is one way of trying to ensure that all occurrences are updated painlessly.
But I also wonder just how much the situation you describe occurs in practice. Usually, library code is written by more experienced (and hopefully more careful) coders. It is also the most examined. Not saying they don’t have vulnerabilities, obviously they do. But at a far lower rate than applications.
For example, take a look at FreeBSD security advisories:
http://www.freebsd.org/security/advisories.html
Not too many instances of library problems, almost entirely application code. So I don’t think the PC-BSD vulnerability is that much greater than a regular FreeBSD system. Of course, if a popular library is affected, then the potential exposure is far greater, as you point out.
The introduction text:
With expansion: Free Berkeley Software Distribution distribution.
Wouldn’t “FreeBSD variant”, “FreeBSD extension” or “distribution based upon the FreeBSD operating system” be better, in terms of technical correctness? I’m aware of the fact that the phrasing “FreeBSD distribution” is good to understand, but it reads a bit strange…
I never tried PC-BSD before because I am well used to just install FreeBSD on my desktop, and because PC-BSD always came with KDE3. I have been wanting to try on KDE4 too… so this one’s it for me.
I tried the release candidate, and this is the worst ubuntu wannabe i ever tried. I think a regular FreeBSD might not have been so screwed up!
Its awesome to see that there is a desktop distribution based on FreeBSD but it would be great to see a point where FreeBSD has access to pretty much internet necessities like a native Flash plugin – Maybe in the future Gnash will be mature.
Just as an unrelated issue; there is a move to get LLVM with the CLANG to the point of being able to compile FreeBSD; it’ll be interesting to see how FreeBSD will benefit from the huge amount of work Apple is contributing to LLVM given that LLVM might result in higher performance from the new approaches to compiler technology.
doesn’t it come with a flash plugin? at least that’s what it says:
ceterum censeo: flash has gotta die!
It uses the Linux based plugin along with the Linux compatibility layer which ultimately introduces a whole new level of complexity which isn’t a particularly nice experience based on past experiences. I’d love Adobe to official support FreeBSD but given their refusal in the past to support alternative platforms I guess future releases will be reliant gnash for reliable and native Flash support.
I’d love flash to die, but I don’t want to see the old system come back when it involved having Media Player, Real Player, Quicktime plus numerous other formats requiring their proprietary players installed. The best one can hope for is for Moonlight to eventually get to 2.0 and start to see more people move their online video hosting technology to Silverlight or atleast offer one or the other.
I don’t have problem with Flash per se, but more with the fact that it’s such a badly coded program. My PowerMac Dual G4-450Mhz can play large QuickTime and .avi files in fullscreen, including streaming, with no issues and hickups, but a normally-sized YouTube video brings it to a screeching halt and will stutter and hickup.
That’s really unacceptable. Flash is a total and utter disaster, and the coders working on it today over at Adobe should be FIRED.
For all I care, the entire world switches to a patent-encumbered uber-closed source Flash replacement written by Adolf Hitler – if it doesn’t require a quad core machine just to play a stamp-sized video, I’d be happy.
Edited 2009-04-11 14:14 UTC
Whoa, finally such a statement! But I agree. I had “Flash” installed for few days and finally kicked it off the disk because it’s really bad quality-wise (set into relation to hardware requirements and overall speed).
Well, I think there are already opensource alternatives that could accomplish that. If something with the functionality of “Flash” would be included in the bew browser – including the ability to switch it off, just like Opera handles images (can show them, can be set no to show them); now that would be great.
Can you imagine a web where you need a proprietary program (that isn’t available for your platform) just to see text, to see images? Like a plugin for JPG, another for PNG and a third one for text, typeset for block mode and with the ability to scale the font size? And where you need an update every few months to keep the same functionality? And where web developers do their coding so poorly (or even leave it to some stupid application) so if you want to enter a specific web page, you won’t even know if you’re on the correct page because you’re missing an up-to-date plugin?
Of course I would like to see PC-BSD to have all the things that average users “depend on” right from the start, including a “Flash” player (and if it’s “only” a Linux variant) and all the media codecs. I know it’s possible to install them afterwards, but for some users, it’s even too complicated to download the PBIs and install them. I’m aware of the fact that there may be legal issues with including all the codecs, but that is what matters to users: Legal restriction? No, I don’t care, I want to see the dancing elephants! So why not include everything? This would really make life easier, because users see the ability to play any kind of video a “basic functionality”, not an “add-on functionality”.
Ah yes, and if Adolf Hitler would really create the uber-closed “Flash” replacement, all the english speaking countries wouldn’t use it, because they cannot understand “Fehler von in den Blitzen Spieler #45: Heben Hand auf den Mausen und Klicken das Nopf!”
Moonlight and Mono? Isn’t there still those patent-issue? Let’s better go with Gnash.
Edited 2009-04-11 22:34 UTC
No there isn’t. Novell has an agreement with Microsoft regarding that. Btw, you think that flash isn’t patented? you think that the technology in Flash such as h264 and so forth isn’t patented?
Moonlight requires users to download the closed source “Microsoft Media Pack” (or whatever it’s called).
Avoiding patent threats by using “proper licensed” closed source codecs? No, that can’t be the final solution.
There are really free technologies that today make a powerful team: JavaScript, SVG, CSS, and Dirac can replace most Flash/Silverlight features.
I would sooner see a movement away from Silverlight and Flash but unfortunately due to Internet Explorer holding a large position in the marketplace – unless Internet Explorer implements it, web developers won’t take advantage of many things that have been developed. Its unfortunate, however, that the whole internet is held up due to a particular software vendor dragging their feet to extend their monopoly beyond office and windows.
Is there a Citrix Client for Free BSD? Has anyone used it?
% cd /usr/ports
% make search name=citrix
[…]
Port: citrix_ica-10.6_1
Path: /usr/ports/net/citrix_ica
Info: Citrix(R) Presentation Server(TM) client
I think this is what you’re searching for.
Yes, many years ago.