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- FreeBSD is one of the most stable OS on the planet.
- FreeBSD is even more challenging than Linux.
- You can download and install FreeBSD for free.
I won’t lie: I don’t give FreeBDS (or any BSD) the attention they deserve. The reason for this is simple: I’m a Linux guy.
But isn’t FreeBSD Linux? It looks like Linux, it smells like Linux…
That is not the case here.
FreeBSD is a Unix-like operating system derived from Berkeley Software Distribution. The first version of FreeBSD was released in 1993 and was developed from 386BSD, one of the first fully functional and free Unix clones on affordable hardware. Since its inception, FreeBSD has consistently been the most widely used BSD-derived operating system on the market.
FreeBSD maintains a complete system: the kernel, device drivers, userland utilities, and documentation. This is in contrast to Linux, which distributes only the kernel and drivers, while relying on third parties for system software.
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Think of FreeBSD as a more challenging version of Linux. This operating system doesn’t hold your hand, so you can learn a thing or two while you install it and get the software you need.
Even for a seasoned Linux veteran like me, FreeBSD can often be a head-scratcher.
There is an old saying which goes something like this:
BSD is what you get when a group of Unix hackers sit down to try to port Unix systems to PCs. Linux is what you get when a group of PC hackers sat down and tried to write a Unix system for PCs.
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Essentially, FreeBSD is Unix, where Linux is based on Unix. To that end, FreeBSD (and most BSDs) make wonderful server operating systems. If you ask anyone knowledgeable about server operating systems, they’ll probably say BSD is what you want. There really isn’t a more stable operating system on the planet.
And that’s one of the big attractions of FreeBSD: it’s as solid as they come.
Sure, I talk a lot about how reliable Debian is, but even Debian can’t touch the stability of FreeBSD.
Remember when I said earlier that FreeBSD maintains an entire system, while Linux is really just the kernel and drivers (though I often deny that claim)?
Imagine two companies that make cars. A company outsources all of its components from other manufacturers and assembles them in its own warehouse. The other manufactures all its components and also assembles them in its own warehouse.
As you might assume, cars from another manufacturer probably work and perform better than the first because he knows every piece that comes together to make the car, and can make all kinds of adjustments to improve every aspect of it. On the other hand, the first manufacturer has almost no control over how those components are manufactured.
FreeBSD is the manufacturer that builds everything in-house.
Once you have FreeBSD up and running, you can rely on it completely.
Getting it up and running is the issue.
Before I get into this, I’ve covered a different flavor of BSD, GhostBSD, which was actually much simpler to use than FreeBSD. GhostBSD is to BSD what Ubuntu is to Linux, while FreeBSD is to BSD what Arch is to Linux.
installing freebsd
Although the FreeBSD installer is strictly command-line, it’s not hard. In fact, once you start the installer, you can accept almost all the defaults by pressing Enter on your keyboard. Yes, you’ll have to type/verify a root password and then create a standard user, but that’s the gist of the installation.
However, once the installation is complete, you are left with an operating system without a GUI. These are all the commands at this point.
Naturally, I decided to ditch and install the KDE Plasma desktop environment on my FreeBSD installation, and it wasn’t as easy as Linux. These are the steps I had to take to add KDE Plasma to FreeBSD.
- Install all required packages with pkg install kde plasma6-sdm-kcm sdm xorg.
- enable/start dbus service debus enable && service debus start,
- Enable/Start Login Manager enable service sddm && start service sddm.
Once this was taken care of, I had a usable KDE Plasma desktop.
However, upon glancing at the Start menu, there were very few apps installed. So, I turned on KDE Discover, but found out it wouldn’t work. The reason for this is PackageKit, an open-source software suite designed to simplify the installation and management of software packages on Linux systems. Simplify being the operative word.
Unfortunately, PackageKit crashed constantly, which meant KDE Discover was useless, so installation of all apps had to be done via the command line. Given that I’m very comfortable with the command line, this is absolutely fine.
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Suddenly, I decided to install GNOME, but the GDM login manager did not start, so I decided to stick with KDE Plasma.
there is a lot to learn
In conclusion, I learned a lot after my experience with FreeBSD. First and foremost, FreeBSD is definitely not Linux, but my Linux skills definitely came in handy. Also, it takes some extra effort to get FreeBSD up and running as a desktop OS, but the stability you get for the time spent is worth it.
FreeBSD is also really fast. I’ve seen Linux perform incredibly well, but FreeBSD puts it to shame.
Having said all that, am I ready to make the jump from Linux to FreeBSD? Probably not. The biggest reason for this is the simplicity of Linux. Everything I do in FreeBSD takes much longer than in Linux. Given how busy I am these days, I don’t have time to spare to turn on the desktop, especially when on Linux it “just works.”
However, whenever I come across a situation where stability is absolutely critical, you can bet that FreeBSD will be my first choice.
