Big thanks go to @jan for making it possible to install a new dependency (python-isal) and to @stefano for hosting brew.bsd.cafe where the homeassistant rc script is now located.
Any comments, suggestions, or corrections - please let me know.
#Podman has been ported to #FreeBSD. And it can run Arch Linux for me.
Linux containers in FreeBSD can start through the old good #Linuxulator - which does not support complex features like cgroups or namespaces, which means I probably can't run a container inside a container. Yet.
But this Linux layer is actively supported in FreeBSD for almost 20 years and is rock-solid! It started in 2006 at Google, based on Linux kernel 2.6 and today it shows up as 5.15-compatible!
As a proud member of the open source community since 1995, as being part of the OSS revolution as a #RedHat, #Canonical and #SuSE employee, with regrets I have to admit @geerlingguy is not totally wrong:
@txt_file Didn't you know, to build software you absolutely need npm, cargo, nuget, pip, .... and MAKE SURE to always specify EXACT VERSIONS, you can easily deploy all that stuff with snap, appimage, flatpak, or better play it safe and just deploy docker images!!!!
How can I be up-to-date with current developments of all #bsd without following their mailing lists? I'd love to know what they are cooking (got or graphical installer for example) but without following dev discussions, as those are too low-level for my needs.
I finally did it and moved to a more appropriate "home realm" for a #FreeBSD enthusiast. Thanks @stefano for offering this!
Moving followers worked flawlessly, restoring all my settings was pretty quick, but of course all my old toots are left on https://techhub.social/@zirias 🙈
So I guess I'll introduce myself here by writing a little thread, adding a few of my works that someone might find interesting. But first a bit of "who am I":
I'm a "professional" software architect/developer (mostly #dotnet platform in the day job), FreeBSD hobby-admin and ports committer, #C64 fan (and occassionally coder and even musician), and apart from computers also interested in music (playing a few instruments myself), traveling, cooking, sometimes sports, sometimes politics ... but probably won't toot about any non-technical stuff (or, very very rarely).
One of my "dream projects" (maybe after retirement 🙈😁) would be to create yet another :commodore: #C64 OS. One that works on a vanilla unextended machine.
There are quite a few around of course. To make something meaningful, you have to think about what could give #retrocomputing enthusiasts an excuse to use their breadbin once in a while 😏
I think it should just support very basic #Internet service clients, like Email, IRC, BBS (via TCP), ... of course this means to require one hardware extension (apart from your obligatory floppy drive): Some #ethernet (or wifi) hardware. There are a few around, so "drivers" for those would be needed.
This sets the baseline of features required. Multitasking will probably be unavoidable (clients need to be able to do stuff "in the background", like e.g. respond to IRC PING messages). There's already a LOT of complexity attached to that requirement. You'll need an executable format with relocation info, and a program loader doing the relocation on startup of a new process. You'll need a concept how to deal with the tiny hardware stack (partition it, relying on apps not to overflow? copy it around on each context switch?). You'll need a concept how to dynamically allocate memory (probably just page-wise). And so on.
A windowing system IMHO makes no sense at all on that machine. The UI should focus on text (maybe a set of virtual consoles?). Support for GUI apps might be possible, but then only "full-screen". 🤔
Recently got a cheap 128 GB SSD to see how BSD would run on my main machine, and this weekend threw FreeBSD on it. I'm sending this toot from the working system, and aside from the general configuration joy of being an Unix nerd, finding almost everything I need to know in the FreeBSD Handbook is a great perk on the second joy: reading docs and being able to flow acting on them.
> FreeBSD is working on a graphical installer. Finally.
"finally" what? like, what is the actual benefit to users here?
bsdinstall could definitely do with some improvements to its workflow (which people are working on) but it's already pretty intuitive and easy to use.
if you install FreeBSD with a graphical installer, you finish the install, and then... you end up with a "login:" prompt on a text terminal. so you didn't gain anything from having a graphical installer.
if the idea here is to make FreeBSD easier to install/use, then the focus should be on the post-install system (e.g., installing DRM/X/Wayland/etc. by default), not on the installer itself.
@lw and they could even take an inspiration from Linux in this point. Debian's installer works text-based (graphical is basically the same thing, but with a mouse) and offers clear and easy options to add popular DEs and other goodies post base install (which again I tend not to use). Just a matter of marking and pressing Enter.
Need to see your routing table on #macOS or #FreeBSD or #Linux ? Type:
netstat -rn
The entry with the "G" flag is your gateway. #Linux users may want to use the ip command (look for "default" entry which is your gateway):
ip route show
I'm trying to figure out the best browser combination for my needs. Generally, Firefox covers almost everything I need, but it's slow on Android and drains a lot of battery. I've tried Vivaldi, Chrome, and Brave. Of these, only Brave has the features I need, like full history sync (not just typed URLs), and the ability to send tabs to other devices. However, with its focus on crypto and AI, it seems too hype-driven for me. Also, none of them work on FreeBSD without using a Linux jail.
I use Firefox Focus to open all links by default. It does a great job of deleting everything after it's closed so I don't have to worry about cookies or trackers.
I use Firefox when I want to open a website I need to login to or have cookies for, which happens a couple of times a day. It's synchronised with my desktop. I swipe it away when I'm done so it doesn't keep running in the background.
Jim ported your FAT filesystem driver to Haiku here https://review.haiku-os.org/c/haiku/+/7660 using a compatibility layer, to replace the previous driver we had inherited from BeOS sample code that was not working great.
I appreciate your input on how to handle this, maybe you're open to making/upstreaming some changes to the driver to make it easier to port? Maybe your driver is as bad as ours and you already plan to rewrite it? Anything else we should check?