Questionable statement in article

[Remko Lodder]

Ceri Davies wrote:

> On Mon, Aug 09, 2004 at 01:39:40PM -0400, John Baldwin wrote:
> 
>>On Monday 09 August 2004 01:29 pm, Joel Dahl wrote:
>>
>>>Mon 2004-08-09 klockan 14.07 skrev Ceri Davies:
>>>
>>>>On Mon, Aug 09, 2004 at 01:40:28PM +0200, Devon H. O'Dell wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>Okay, this is getting really ridiculous, and the statement is false. It
>>>>>would be rather simple to figure out which syscalls FreeBSD was unable
>>>>>to translate and thereby make a certain piece of software fail to run
>>>>>on FreeBSD. For instance, there are certain socket options in Linux
>>>>>that are not avaialble on FreeBSD and cannot be emulated. Software that
>>>>>makes use of these options will _not_ run on FreeBSD.
>>>>
>>>>Firstly, I'll note that the article is talking about BSD, not FreeBSD.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>A more accurate statement would be:
>>>>>
>>>>>FreeBSD_Compilable_Code + FreeBSD_Binaries + FreeBSD_Emulatable(Linux)
>>>>>
>>>>>>Binaries(Linux)
>>>>>
>>>>>You can't blindly make this statement, however, without first proving
>>>>>the following:
>>>>>
>>>>>Binaries(Linux) - FreeBSD_Emulatable(Linux) < FreeBSD_Compilable_code +
>>>>>FreeBSD_Binaries.
>>>>>
>>>>>Now, once you factor in the SVR4 compatibility and others, this
>>>>>statement gets exceedingly difficult to make. When somebody wants to
>>>>>audit the amount of binaries that will run on FreeBSD and get a number,
>>>>>let me know.
>>>>
>>>>Since SVR4 gets bundled on the right hand side of the equation above,
>>>>along with BSDI, IBCS2, Interactive Unix, SCO Unix, SCO Xenix, and
>>>>Solaris (this selection just from the i386 NetBSD port and excluding
>>>>other free BSDs), the statement becomes slightly easier to make, I
>>>>think.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>Also, it's interesting to note that OpenBSD will do the same -- it has
>>>>>Linux syscall translation as well -- it will also run FreeBSD binaries.
>>>>>Does this mean that OpenBSD has a conceviably larger amount of binaries
>>>>>that will run on it than FreeBSD?
>>>>
>>>>Well, yes.
>>>>
>>>>Ceri
>>>
>>>Whoops, my intention was not to cause any hard feelings with my original
>>>question about the statement. I'm just trying to make our docs correct.
>>>
>>>:)
>>>
>>>As I see it, the statement can't be confirmed as true OR false, and
>>>should therefore be removed, if someone with commit privileges agree. To
>>>remove the "As a result, more software is available for BSD than for
>>>Linux." -part would be perfectly sufficient. :)
>>
>>FWIW, it seems to me that the statement has more downside potential ("FREEBSD 
>>LIES ON ITS WEBSITE, FILM AT 11" (if we are ever caught out on it b/c, in 
>>fact, there are Linux binaries that FreeBSD doesn't run or at least run well) 
>>than upside.
> 
> 
> I've discussed this with Devon offlist - how do people like this patch?
> 
> Index: article.sgml
> ===================================================================
> RCS file: /home/ncvs/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/explaining-bsd/article.sgml,v
> retrieving revision 1.12
> diff -u -r1.12 article.sgml
> --- article.sgml	8 Aug 2004 13:43:54 -0000	1.12
> +++ article.sgml	9 Aug 2004 20:13:07 -0000
> @@ -529,9 +529,11 @@
>  	</listitem>
>  
>  	<listitem>
> -	  <para>BSD can execute Linux code, while Linux can not execute BSD
> -	    code.  As a result, more software is available for BSD than for
> -	    Linux.</para>
> +	  <para>BSD can execute most Linux binaries, while Linux can not execute BSD
> +	    binaries.  Many BSD implementations can also execute binaries
> +	    from other UNIX-like systems.  As a result, BSD may present an
> +	    easier migration route from other systems than
> +	    Linux would.</para>
>  	</listitem>
>        </itemizedlist>
>      </sect2>
> 
> Ceri

Hi Ceri, rest,

I can live with this patch...

Cheers!

-- 
Kind regards,

Remko Lodder                   |remko at elvandar.org
Reporter DSINet                |remko at dsinet.org
Projectleader Mostly-Harmless  |remko at mostly-harmless.nl