So can anyone point what is are the most negative things about BSD, and DragonFlyBSD in compared to Linux, OSX and Windows.
I'm really curious, and I would like to try it out - possibly on my Chromebook C7100 if it allows it so, or maybe my very old MBP (6 years), it's time to get rid of the dual booted Windows XP there.
The big wins are however: rock solid, wonderful documentation, entirely cohesive base system, small, big enterprise features (ZFS, mandatory access control, tracing frameworks, awesome network stack, security, ACL support and better hardware support.
When I say better hardware support, I mean the drivers all work rather better than their Linux counterparts rather than being plentiful and the supported platforms are plentiful and reliable.
I can drag a 17 year old SPARC64 machine out of the cupboard and just use it.
Whatsapp had an interesting presentation @ Erlang Factory worth considering -- http://www.erlang-factory.com/upload/presentations/558/efsf2...
Waiting for 10 before serious evaluation starts when pkgng is default. That and freebsd-update pretty much nail it then for me.
Something to consider, which I should point out because your new, is that without BSD you wouldn't have OSX. There's a little BSD in everything (even windows). Another worthy article you should definitely read which explains that BSD is the The single Greatest Piece of Software Ever, with the broadest impact on the world, was BSD
http://www.informationweek.com/whats-the-greatest-software-e...?
I'm pretty sure the ftp.exe client program had some BSD bits at one time. There might have been some small things like that. Nothing big.
There were a few little odds and ends that popped up with BSD license notifications over the years, like the ftp client IIRC. As you say, little utilities that don't amount to much. What is YOUR point?
OS X and others have leeched off BSD and made billions, yet every December, this year being the same, FreeBSD has to whip out the begging bowl to raise funding.
Yes, some large corporations employ some of the FreeBSD folk, but what would happen if they stopped employing them? Would FreeBSD be able to build a strong community of developers to accelerate development? I doubt it.
Linux is in a much healthier place and I attribute much of that to licensing as well as technical excellence. The GPL has helped foster an active community around Linux, one that does not allow corporate vultures to simply scavenge off the best bits and usurp direction of the project.
I think BSD lost momentum because of the AT&T litigation back in the early 1990s and that momentum helped and continues to help Linux achieve the success that it has.
It is possible to praise Linux without burying BSD.
I occasionally get caught by a difference between the BSD and GNU userlands so I've often contemplated giving one of the BSDs a go rather than my typical OS X/Debian/Ubuntu Dev/prod web server preference.