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posted by martyb on Tuesday November 06 2018, @03:57PM   Printer-friendly
from the maybe-you-CAN-take-it-with-you? dept.

Software developer Cullum Smith has written a detailed blog post as a guide to a secure and streamlined installation of OpenBSD 6.4 on a laptop. He goes through installation, networking, initial configuration and advanced customization, getting started with the graphical interface, and adding packages including the Chromium web browser. He also touches on multimedia and battery questions as well as updates. As usual, OpenBSD lives up to the do it well or not at all philosophy.

It's been almost a year since I've posted any articles, and I'm afraid I have a confession to make...I've joined the dark side! Most people know my site from the How to Run a Mail Server post, which targeted FreeBSD. A few months ago, I converted all that infrastructure to an automated OpenBSD platform. Turns out OpenBSD was so much easier, I decided to run it as a desktop too.

You won't find nearly as many online resources about setting up OpenBSD, because honestly, you really don't need any. Unlike much of Linux and FreeBSD, the included manuals are high quality, coherent, and filled with practical examples. You also need very little third party software to do basic tasks—almost everything you need is well-integrated into the base system.

[Years back, I'd read of issues with laptops and entering/exiting hibernate/suspend modes, driving internal/external displays, and limited run-time on battery power; how well have these been straightened out? What laptops are BSD/Linux-friendly and what distribution do you run on yours? --Ed.]


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  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday November 06 2018, @06:06PM (1 child)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday November 06 2018, @06:06PM (#758609) Journal

    Exactly what legal foundation is there for canceling such a license for a licensee who has flawlessly adhered to their part of the contract,

    We should get with Facefook and Tweeter on that one.

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  • (Score: 2) by Immerman on Tuesday November 06 2018, @10:42PM

    by Immerman (3985) on Tuesday November 06 2018, @10:42PM (#758727)

    Why? I'm quite certain that buried somewhere around page 37 of their terms of service it says they can do anything they want, you have no rights whatsoever, and by using their service wave any rights the law might otherwise confer upon you, and agree to binding arbitration for any disagreement that might otherwise be settled in court. Oh, and that they own anything you post.

    That last bit might be argued in court, if you hadn't waved your right to do so, especially in the case of sharing materials to which you do not own the rights, and thus can't give to them.

    Linux has very few such problems - the GPL2 is short, clear, and to the point. it might be argued that someone, somewhere contributed code they had no right to contribute, especially during the early days. However, as I recall in response to the SCO debacle they've gotten much more rigorous about demanding explicit oaths that you have the right to contribute any code submitted, and done a great deal to clean up the ownership trail from early code that's still in the codebase. There's still plenty of "landmines" of unattributed code I'm sure - but they could be easily replaced as soon as anyone tries to make an issue of it.

    As I recall the SCO lawsuit also established solid precedent that once you distribute your code under the GPL, you cannot revoke that license. Those wannabe parasites and their high-power lawyers squirmed and twisted for years any way they could, trying to lay some claim on the Linux codebase, and it all came to naught, destroying their own company in the process. And with as much precedent as was established in that case it's unlikely anyone else will ever want to try.