What’s the point of it?

OpenBSD = Security

FreeBSD = The main UNIX-like

NetBSD = ???

Based on the name of have assumed it’s be used in things like network appliances but in 20 years I’ve never seen a single device use it.

  • Ramin HonaryEnglish
    431·
    9 months ago

    Yes, it is mostly appliances, but an (informal?) stated goal of NetBSD is too run on all computing hardware.

    • FreeBSD = user-friendly free Unix (plus ZFS and jails 😀)
    • OpenBSD = very secure free Unix (no ZFS 🙁 but has the VMM hypervisor 😀)
    • OpenIndiana = user-friendly free Unix that runs old Solaris software (plus ZFS and zones 😀)
    • NetBSD = runs on any computer chip ever built within the past 40 years (some ZFS support, but no zones, jails, or VMs 🙁)

    Naturally, that makes NetBSD a good choice for appliances, especially ones that might only have limited memory.

    (Here is a quick explainer on the difference between Jails, Zones, Containers, and VMs)

    EDIT1: someone pointed out to me that ZFS is not supported on OpenBSD. Sorry about that everyone.

    EDIT2: there is a ZFS driver for NetBSD

      • whoami@lemmygrad.ml
        2·
        9 months ago

        No, but I think someone made read only support for ZFS available on OpenBSD. Freebsd is obviously the best for ZFS. It works on NetBSD too.

      • Ramin HonaryEnglish
        1·
        9 months ago

        Thanks, I had to double check that but you’re right, ZFS isn’t on OpenBSD. What a shame. Anyway I edited my above post.

      • Ramin HonaryEnglish
        1·
        9 months ago

        According to the wiki, ZFS “works well” but doesn’t seem to be as stable as in FreeBSD or OpenIndiana, and is not enabled by default so you have to update your rc.conf file to build the ZFS drivers.