

FreeBSD 10.1 released - tachion
https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-announce/2014-November/001603.html

======
qopp2

      gpg: Signature made Fri Nov 14 11:08:36 2014 PST using RSA key ID 478FE293
      gpg: BAD signature from "Glen Barber <gjb@FreeBSD.org>"

~~~
edwintorok
The mailist list software changed the announcement (for example 'gjb@' to 'gjb
at'). The original one is here:
[https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/announce.asc](https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/announce.asc)

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ezequiel-garzon
Now that BIND has been removed from the base system [1], what DNS server is
FreeBSD shipping with (if any)?

[1]
[https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.0R/announce.html](https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.0R/announce.html)

~~~
X-Istence
FreeBSD is not shipping any DNS servers, there is a recursive DNS resolver
available in the way of unbound.

If you want a DNS server you may of course install one of your choosing from
the pkg repository. I would recommend NSD if you are familiar with BIND.

~~~
ezequiel-garzon
Thanks, I guess I'm used to OpenBSD's model of including these major
components in the base system.

------
Gracana
The new console sounds pretty cool. Features include UTF8, double-width
characters, and kernel modesetting.

~~~
dschiptsov
If they would allow to set up a nice ttf font, like Source Code Pro via
libfontconfig, like fbterm does I would fall in love immediately.)

------
arh68
Wow. I remember reading about Hotmail servers running BSD back in the day, but
not quite like this.

    
    
        FreeBSD 10.1-RELEASE is also available on these cloud hosting platforms:
            - Amazon(R) EC2(TM) FreeBSD/amd64
            - Microsoft(R) Azure(TM) FreeBSD/amd64,  FreeBSD/i386

~~~
ams6110
Well hotmail was not owned by Microsoft originally. The urban legend is that
after they acquired it they had to keep running it on FreeBSD a lot longer
than they wanted to because Windows was not up to the task at the time.

Edit: After a moment's thought... wasnt Hotmail originally running on Solaris
or SunOS?

~~~
teh_klev
"Hotmail initially ran under Solaris for mail services and Apache on FreeBSD
for web services, before being partly converted to Microsoft products, using
Windows Services for UNIX in the migration path."

[0]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outlook.com#Launch_of_Hotmail](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outlook.com#Launch_of_Hotmail)

------
josteink
I see the release-notes mentions "initial" UEFI support, but FreeBSD usually
seem pretty modest about things, so it's hard to tell what to expect.

Has anyone here tried it? If so, how mature would you consider it? Usuable,
but with warts? Or completely fine?

I'm curious, but I don't want to nuke my server-box just yet :)

~~~
emaste
The main issues are:

    
    
      * Does not work with certain hardware / UEFI firmware implementations
        (due to bugs in either our implementation, or the firmware).
      * No support for UEFI nvram variables.
      * No integration or documentation for dual-boot configurations.
    

Basically, if you can boot the UEFI-enabled USB stick image, UEFI booting an
installed FreeBSD should also work fine.

~~~
cperciva
_Basically, if you can boot the UEFI-enabled USB stick image, UEFI booting an
installed FreeBSD should also work fine._

I remember seeing a bug report about a system where the BIOS treated USB and
non-USB disks differently resulting in one working and the other not. There's
really no guarantees when you're dealing with broken BIOSes...

------
giancarlostoro
I always wanted to try FreeBSD, but during install, after I picked the
software I wanted it would ask me for disk 10, then disk 7, then disk 5... I
proceeded to giving up and installing Slackware instead (this was back in 2007
when I was new to Linux). I hope they've fixed this since, or maybe I did
something wrong, who knows? Oh well...

~~~
Zancarius
I suspect you probably selected CDROM at the time as your software source,
which can be confounding for new users. The best solution in this case is to
either install binary packages via selecting FTP as your source or (better)
via ports. Also, I generally avoid installing extra software outside the base
packages until after the system is installed, as this was a problem that could
crop up when installing earlier versions (not really a _problem per se_ as
much as if it's something you weren't familiar with, it may do unexpected
things).

If you install some of the tools in ports-mgmt (portupgrade, for instance,
which includes portinstall), you can make the ports collection far easier to
manage and use, and it might be more approachable for new users. Not that it's
difficult to do a make && make install from the port you want.

I haven't touched FreeBSD in years, so I'd imagine the installer is a bit more
forgiving now. That said, my experience with the ports collection was what
lead me to select Gentoo for my Linux preferences (later, and more presently,
Arch). But, I have _very_ fond memories of using ports, and I think everyone
has their preferred methods. The trick is to neither give in or give up and
play around with it until you're familiar and have picked tools you're
comfortable with (this holds true for almost anything)! I'd suggest giving it
another shot.

Edit: I lied. Apparently I have a FreeBSD 10 vm, so it hasn't been years. I
don't remember the new installation procedure at all, sadly.

~~~
jrapdx3
I have FBSD 10.x running in VM and production, and I'd agree it's probably
best to install the OS first before trying to add applications. In my
experience following this policy leaves fewer ways for things to get screwed
up.

Re: the ports collection, as a former Gentoo/Funtoo user I felt as you
describe. But I think the current FBSD package system is better. Unless
there's a special use case, it's generally quite satisfactory and a whole lot
easier to download and install apps using the "pkg" utility, rather than
messing with ports at all.

IMO the FBSD developers have been doing a terrific job of making the OS better
without making it tons harder to administer. There's still a learning curve
for sure (e.g., ZFS) but it's not insurmountable.

~~~
Zancarius
> In my experience following this policy leaves fewer ways for things to get
> screwed up.

Definitely. I _still_ do this for _exactly_ that reason. Unnecessarily
complicating the installation process is just a recipe for frustration unless
you have a well tested build script.

> But I think the current FBSD package system is better.

This is true. I don't have much experience with the "new" package system,
because I (mostly) stopped using FreeBSD ~5.x with some more recent usage in
the 8.x and 9.x series. I've dabbled in it since, rarely, but I think the old
habit of "install everything via ports" is so ingrained in some of us whose
FreeBSD use dates back that it's a bit difficult to overcome. :) I'll
familiarize myself with it one of these days, perhaps, but the disenchantment
with Gentoo is largely the reason I use Arch now and it'd be great to use
something similar under a _BSD. Rolling release + binary packages = vastly
nicer than waiting for hours for Xorg /KDE/Gnome/whatever to build. As a
fellow former Gentoo user, I hope that if you read this, I won't have
triggered unfortunate flashbacks or painful memories as a consequence of
mentioning this. ;)

If new(ish) users come across this thread, follow jrapdx3's suggestion and
learn pkg--it's supposed to be really nice and circumvents some of the old
ways of doing things. FreeBSD has, IMO, done a great job of mixing something
like a rolling release platform with a well-tested and stable
kernel/environment. It's almost the best of both worlds, though some things
might be a bit tedious to get running. (Is Java still a colossal pain?)

> IMO the FBSD developers have been doing a terrific job of making the OS
> better without making it tons harder to administer.

Here's another thing: FreeBSD is consistent. So much so that even if you
return to using it after years, things _still* work more or less the same, and
that old knowledge transfers well (within reason).

I can't really say the same for Arch, for instance, because there's usually a
hugely disruptive change every 6-12 months. I love Arch (I'm using it right
now), but sometimes the drastic changes can be ... surprising.

~~~
jrapdx3
> ... I've dabbled in it since, rarely, but I think the old habit of "install
> everything via ports" is so ingrained in some of us whose FreeBSD use dates
> back that it's a bit difficult to overcome. :) ...

Ports is still fundamental, but often enough a problem. Not only do some ports
take a long time to compile (like Firefox) but a little too often won't
compile--maddening when that happens 2 hours after entering "make".

OTOH "pkg" is stable and convenient to use, lately showing no glitches,
certainly fewer complications vs. portage, rpm, dpkg, et. al. (Don't know
enough about Arch to comment on it.) On the whole pkg is pretty painless.

> (Is Java still a colossal pain?)

Yes and no. I installed openjdk 8.x the other day using 'pkg search', then
'pkg install'. Quite simple. However, if for some reason the Oracle version is
necessary, then you'd have the hassle of getting it from their site.

> ... I (mostly) stopped using FreeBSD ~5.x ...

Maybe I should feel a little embarrassed that I still have one DB server which
has been running FBSD 6.0 since 2005 (I think). And it's been running
continuously, only stopping here and there because of power outages. Haven't
changed any of the software, the only maintenance has been backing up the DB,
rotating logs, and so on.

I keep meaning to update that system but I don't seem to get around to doing
it. After 80,000 hrs on the job I guess we might call it "stable".

~~~
Zancarius
> Not only do some ports take a long time to compile (like Firefox) but a
> little too often won't compile--maddening when that happens 2 hours after
> entering "make".

I've only once tried using FreeBSD for a desktop machine, and lengthy
compilation times (followed by the occasional failure) were one of the reasons
I didn't, and another one of the reasons why I eventually dumped Gentoo as my
choice for workstations. I remember building Xorg overnight once on Gentoo
only to discover that it had failed about 30 minutes _after_ I went to bed.

I'm still a little upset over that, thinking back on it.

> (Don't know enough about Arch to comment on it.) On the whole pkg is pretty
> painless.

Arch is a rolling release distribution with binary packages; it seems that pkg
operates in a manner similar (identical?) to this. It really is the best of
both worlds: New packages, when updates are released upstream--usually within
days--without the need to compile.

Though, I wouldn't recommend Arch for much other than a workstation (partially
due to the nature of rolling releases--breakage happens), it has actually been
a fantastic distro for someone whose _nix history went something like OpenBSD
- > FreeBSD -> Gentoo. You update the system periodically, new packages are
downloaded and installed, and updates occur frequently. Compilation is mostly
limited to the AUR (Arch User Repository), but the benefit with Arch is that
its build tools create binary packages by default that you can then use on
other machines of the same architecture. Gentoo allows the same thing, but
IIRC it's not something it'll do by default and it's a bit fussier. If you do
have to build something, Arch will build the package first, then install from
that. But the main repositories have essentially everything you'd want, so
compilation truly is limited to less popular/common packages. Everything else
is just a download + install away.

But again, Arch is susceptible to some breakage at times, although I've had
pretty good luck avoiding this. I guess it's like anything else: If you're
careful and apply some meticulous scrutiny to the process, you're less likely
to break things in a manner that's difficult to fix. Updating regularly (as
with other rolling releases, like Gentoo) is also helpful. Too long between
updates can create a bit of a difficult situation to get out of.

> Yes and no. I installed openjdk 8.x the other day using 'pkg search', then
> 'pkg install'. Quite simple. However, if for some reason the Oracle version
> is necessary, then you'd have the hassle of getting it from their site.

Okay, that's not too bad. I _vaguely* recall it being painful back during
5.x-6.x, but I never had much need for Java on FreeBSD either outside some
odds and ends.

> Maybe I should feel a little embarrassed that I still have one DB server
> which has been running FBSD 6.0 since 2005 (I think).

NOPE! (I wouldn't.)

When I ran FreeBSD (all the way back through the latter 4.x days, probably
4.5-4.6 at the absolute earliest, but I think we had a 4.7/4.8 machine running
for a number of years), the _beautiful_ thing about it was _definitely_ its
stability. You could do exactly that: Go for ages without updating it and as
long as it wasn't Internet-connected, there wasn't really much you needed to
worry about. And even if it was, you could just update whatever software you
had listening on open ports, within reason, and not worry (I'd do this with
Apache or BIND). I know this goes counter to much of the philosophy here, but
sometimes if it ain't broke...

The curious thing regarding FreeBSD was the more conservative upgrade path
you'd often feel compelled to take, and you seldom felt guilty for leaving a
machine untouched. You could always take comfort in the fact that it'd Just
Work and remain fairly secure.

------
farawayea
Will FreeBSD start making releases like 10.1.1? Ubuntu and Debian always
provide updates to fix bugs, including kernel bugs.

~~~
Lammy
They already do that. Right now I'm running 10.0-RELEASE-p12. See the UPDATING
file for the 10.0 branch for example:
[https://svnweb.freebsd.org/base/releng/10.0/UPDATING?view=lo...](https://svnweb.freebsd.org/base/releng/10.0/UPDATING?view=log)

~~~
farawayea
Isn't that like a security patch?

~~~
cperciva
Security patches and errata updates. The criterion I set down when I was
security officer for what would go into this was "people should be able to
install these blindly without ever worrying that it will break anything".

~~~
farawayea
This is why Ubuntu and other Linux distributions are still better. They
actually get bugs fixed.

I sometimes have to patch the sources with change sets from HEAD or STABLE to
get bug fixes.

~~~
icantthinkofone
Of course things get fixed. And they don't bring the system down like they do
in Ubuntu and other Linux distributions.

~~~
cbd1984
> And they don't bring the system down like they do in Ubuntu and other Linux
> distributions.

They don't bring the system down in Linux, either. Stop spreading FUD.

~~~
farawayea
No, they're right. Linux systems don't panic because of broken drivers after
an update, they keep running properly.

FreeBSD sometimes completely stops booting on your hardware or turns unstable
for no good reason. (search on google for posts from people who can't boot
FreeBSD 8.x on hardware which was running 6.x or 7.x without the slightest
bug)

FreeBSD can crash your system because of an unstable driver after a major
upgrade like 9.2 to 9.3.

You can see they're right, "FreeBSD doesn't take your system down like Linux",
it's much worse.

------
teh_klev
I must give FreeBSD another spin. The last time I used it in anger was circa
2000 (4.0) to build a route collector for a small internet exchange point
using GNU Zebra [0].

[0]:
[https://www.gnu.org/software/zebra/](https://www.gnu.org/software/zebra/)

------
UglyFont
Fonts are still looking extremely ugly after install. How can I get clean
fonts for typographic work?

~~~
gdwatson
You don't give a lot of detail to work with, but my best stab in the dark is
that in X by default the font renderer will sometimes use bitmap fonts (and
stretch them) when what you really want are vector fonts. You can edit
fonts.conf to avoid this, if you like. (Unfortunately, I'm booted into Windows
at the moment so I can't copy and paste my configuration.)

Or perhaps you've got something else going on entirely. It's hard to say from
your post.

------
mp3geek
Any reason for the lack of DVB drivers in FBSD?

~~~
UNIXgod
Has them. You caould watch your family home movies which you haven't uploaded
to the cloud yet with mplayer and the dependencies that install when you
compile it! It also has aalib and libcaca if your so inclined to geekout with
seeing your flick directly in the terminal console.

~ Happy Hacking

------
emaste
The actual release announcement itself is here:
[https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-
announce/2014-No...](https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-
announce/2014-November/001603.html)

~~~
dang
I guess that's a slightly more canonical article, so we changed the url to
that from
[https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/relnotes.html](https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/relnotes.html).

~~~
edwintorok
And the announcement were the GnuPG signature actually verifies is here:
[https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/announce.asc](https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/announce.asc).
(linked from
[https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/announce.html](https://www.freebsd.org/releases/10.1R/announce.html))
Maybe the announcement itself should include a link to the URL considered
canonical by the project itself to avoid confusion :)

------
_nickwhite
Does this release include systemd?

 _ducks_

~~~
_nickwhite
wow, sarcasm is really missed on this crowd!

