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What is FreeBSD? (gentoo.org)

FreeBSD is a free (license), Unix-like operating system. Back in 1993 when development of 386BSD stopped, two projects were born: NetBSD, commonly known to run on a huge number of architetures and FreeBSD which focuses mainly on the x86 platform. FreeBSD is renowned for its stability, performance and security, thus being used from small to huge companies all over the world. FreeBSD’s current production release version is 5.3, which is also used as the foundation for the Gentoo/FreeBSD project.

FreeBSD and Linux

Users migrating from Linux to FreeBSD commonly consider the two operating systems “almost the same”. In fact, FreeBSD really shares a lot of similarities with Linux distributions in general. Nevertheless, it has some key differences that are worth noting:
  • Contrary to Linux, which actually only refers to the kernel, FreeBSD is a complete operating system, consisting of a C library, userland tools and much more. This development approach makes the overall system very consistent.
  • Contrary to the Linux kernel, FreeBSD development is not led by one person, but instead managed by a small group of people called “Core Team”.
Besides that, FreeBSD also has some technical differences which set it apart from Linux. Some of them are very important to know, even if you don’t plan on developing for Gentoo/FreeBSD:
  • Dynamically linked executables are not linked against libdl, like in Linux + glibc systems. Instead they are linked against libc.
  • FreeBSD doesn’t have an official tool for kernel compilation, thus you’ll have to resolve feature dependecies on your own.
  • FreeBSD uses UFS/UFS-2 as its filesystems and has no support for e.g. ReiserFS.
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Is FreeBSD A Superior Server Operating System?

This article is a little bit old and covers FreeBSD 4.1 mostly, but it does address many of the questions and issues people face when looking at FreeBSD vs. Linux as a server operating system.

FreeBSD: About

Debian vs FreeBSD

Which is better, FreeBSD or Debian, as a web server?

FreeBSD: About

Wikipedia Description

Wikipedia has a pretty good run down of the operating system, its history, and other interesting facts about it. In particular, they're good at describing how it relates to other OS projects and listing the basic structure. There's also a neat picture of the BSD daemon (originally drawn by Marshall Kirk McKusick).

FreeBSD: About

A Linux user Reviews FreeBSD

Gabe has been using Linux for seven years and recently wrote down his experiences installing and running FreeBSD. In general, his time with the BSD flavour was quite positive, although he worried that it might be frightening for beginners.

FreeBSD: About

A FreeBSD Review from DistroWatch

The DistroWatch people sat down and played with FreeBSD and wrote up their experiences with it. In general, they enjoyed the operating system and found it fun to play with, although its usability as a viable GUI desktop operating system is questionable.

FreeBSD: About

How OS X and FreeBSD are Related

This is a well written article (actually one in a series) describing the various flavours of BSD Unix available today, including Darwin, the muscle behind Apple's new OS X.

FreeBSD: About

A stable, secure, Open Source operating system.

Briefly, FreeBSD is a UNIX operating system based on U.C. Berkeley's 4.4BSD-lite release for the i386 platform (and recently the alpha platform). It is also based indirectly on William Jolitz's port of U.C. Berkeley's Net/2 to the i386, known as 386BSD, though very little of the 386BSD code remains. A fuller description of what FreeBSD is and how it can work for you may be found on the FreeBSD home page.

FreeBSD: About

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