Ask HN: Why most developers are not contributing to BSD systems?
BSDs are really great operating systems but why less developers are interested in them despite them being very modular and easily customizable?
FreeBSD only recently got 802.11ac support and iirc it’s limited to certain Intel chipsets. I’ve had issues will all sorts of hardware on NetBSD from NICs to eMMC storage and DragonflyBSD just seems to lag behind FreeBSD (the main developer is a really nice guy though). I haven’t done much with OpenBSD, because some of its features are off putting too me. I did actually make a very minor contribution to the FreeBSD kernel some years ago to get a NIC working, but most issues I’ve had were much more involved.
I know that there’s some emulation for Linux software, I haven’t tried to myself, so I cant speak too much on it.
I do like the ports system. I was able to get CDE running on FreeBSD trivially, which I cannot say for Linux.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNIX_System_Laboratories,_Inc.....
Linux filled in the gap left by the litigation.
I don't know how "cathedral-like" the development of the BSDs is / was (vs. the "bazaar" of Linux.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar may have some relevance.
It's not clear to me why I should switch away from Linux. The switching cost is real, but the benefits are obscure if they exist at all.
There's not just the question of removing obstacles (missing drivers) but also the question of what real advantages of a particular x-BSD. Is it just that people don't like the GPL or is there some concrete reason I'm going to have a better experience with an x-BSD?