Ars Technica article on FreeBSD new user experience

[Rick Macklem]

Mike Remski wrote:
>On Thursday, April 9, 2020 5:39:45 PM EDT, Rick Macklem wrote:
>> Ed Maste <emaste at freebsd.org> wrote:
>>> Jim Salter has an article in Ars Technica discussing his experience
>>> with FreeBSD 12.1 as a desktop:
>>> https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/04/not-actually-linux-distro-review-freebsd-12-1-release/
>>>
>>> There are some points in there that might involve misunderstanding,
>>> but there are also a number of real issues raised about the experience ...
>> Since this is a public mailing list, I'll repost here...
>>
>> One thought here that I'll throw out (I have no idea if others
>> have suggested
>> this before)…
>> What about creating a separate release for desktops/laptops that installs
>> X Windows etc from a simple installer "out of the box"?
>> --> To keep it simple, don't try to support all hardware, just
>> stuff that is widely
>>       available and already well supported by the drivers in FreeBSD.
>>       Obviously amd64 only plus a few widely available display
>> chip sets that work
>>       well, etc and so on...
>>
>> If it doesn't support the hardware someone has, then they can go the regular
>> release/install route. (It would be nice to maintain an up to
>> date list of what
>> hardware it supports, but it might be easier to just have it
>> start up live CD
>> style and then see if the hardware it needs is there.
>> --> Sorry, can't do this display chipset to that sound chip or...
>>
>> Just an idea, rick
>> ps: I am not volunteering to help do this. I run FreeBSD on laptop/desktop
>>       systems, but bare bones. No X Windows...
>
>Something like what old PCBSD did?  How about FuryBSD as a starting point?
>Joe Maloney is layering either XFCE or KDE (2 different ISO/install media)
>on top of a FreeBSD install, so out of the box, the install gives you
>FreeBSD with either XFCE or KDE.
Yes. I'll admit I didn't know FuryBSD existed until now, but if the web page is
accurate, it would be fine.

Maybe all that should be done is a reference to it on FreeBSD's web page.
"If you are new to FreeBSD and want a desktop system, you could try..."
FreeNAS should be mentioned as well, for people who want a NAS server, imho.

Although I said a new FreeBSD release, I don't see why it needs to be done by
the FreeBSD project itself, just that I didn't realize others were currently doing this.

Maybe someone should ask the author of this article to try FuryBSD?

>Disclaimer:  I've been using FreeBSD with X as a daily driver for a long
>time and honestly never found it that difficult to set up.  Hardest was
>when everything started to need the drm-kmod bits, but once I understood
>what I needed to do, it's not been an issue.
I feel about the same w.r.t. NFS servers.
However, I've known good technical people who just haven't used FreeBSD
who have found FreeNAS worked just fine whereas setting up a server using
a FreeBSD release didn't work for them.

rick

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