Attached is an article from the Wall Street Journal Online Edition.
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September 10, 1999
Beyond Linux, Free Systems
Do Their Bit to Build Web
By LEE GOMES
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Here's a little-known fact about the world's busiest Web
site: It runs on a piece of free software. And it isn't the
free operating system called Linux.
To serve nearly 80 million people each month, Yahoo!
Inc. operates about 1,000 computers that run on
FreeBSD, a program distributed without charge over the
Internet. FreeBSD is the most popular in a trio of free
operating systems -- all historically linked to the
University of California at Berkeley -- that are quietly
playing a major role in the evolution of the Internet.
Among operating systems, the
internal engines that run
computers, Linux has stolen the
spotlight lately, as supporters
hope it will eventually challenge
the dominance of Microsoft
Corp.'s Windows. The initial
public offering of Red Hat Inc., the Linux software
vendor, was one of the hottest deals on Wall Street this
summer.
But the role of FreeBSD and its cousins shows how free
programs keep changing the software world and creating
headaches for big established players. Sun Microsystems
Inc., a leader in managing big Web sites, is carefully
watching the growth of Linux and other free programs.
And Microsoft faces a particularly significant challenge,
since the Redmond, Wash., company wants its
forthcoming Windows 2000 to dominate the "dot-com"
world where the freebies are strong.
"With Linux capturing the public imagination, the BSDs
have gotten lost in the noise," said International Data
Corp. analyst Dan Kusnetzky. "But they are very
sophisticated technologies that do a lot of work in the
world, even if people don't know about them."
The BSD programs and Linux actually share a common
lineage, a collective development process and a
rambunctious cast of characters.
The free programs are all variants of the venerable Unix
system invented by AT&T Corp. And they aren't just
running Yahoo. While Microsoft almost never talks
about it, its own Hotmail free e-mail service runs not on
its flagship Windows NT but on FreeBSD.
In fact, one recent survey showed that BSD accounted
for nearly 15% of all server machines connected to the
Internet. Linux leads the pack with 31%,and is the only
major operating system making any gains. Windows had
24%.
The Linux saga is already
the stuff of modern legend.
In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a
21-year-old student in
Helsinki, began writing an
operating system
essentially from scratch so
he could have something to
use on his home computer.
The programs FreeBSD,
NetBSD and OpenBSD, by
contrast, are the
descendants of code
written in the late 1970s
and early 1980s at UC
Berkeley.
Factional battles and online fusillades between and
among the various BSDs and Linux are common.
OpenBSD was started in 1995 by Theo de Raadt, a
mountain biking 31-year-old Canadian after being kicked
out of the NetBSD movement.
'Open Source'
BSD buffs like to think of themselves as a slightly more
grown-up version of the "open source" movement, which
distributes underlying programming instructions so users
can study and modify software. While Mr. Torvalds has
full control of Linux, for example, FreeBSD is overseen
by a 15-person group called the "Core." What's more,
the various BSDs say that their software, by virtue of its
head start on Linux, is more mature and stable.
"We didn't write most of this code, so we don't have a
lot of ego involved in getting people to use it," says
Jordan K. Hubbard, 36 years old, an evangelist for
FreeBSD who many people credit for its popularity.
David Filo is one fan. The co-founder of Yahoo says he
tried several operating systems before settling on
FreeBSD. Now, Yahoo has become a major sponsor. At
FreeBSD's first users' convention, to be held next month
in Berkeley, Yahoo is paying to fly in some key
developers. Mr. Filo said he would still use FreeBSD if
he could do it over again, since his team now has so
much experience with the software. But for someone
starting out, he says, he might recommend Linux. "Right
now, there seems to be more energy and resources
behind it," he says.
Such sentiments make some people wonder what the
future is for the BSDs in a world where Linux is getting
most of the "mindshare."
Mr. Hubbard says the ranks of FreeBSD users continue
to swell. One reason is that all BSDs are distributed
under a license that lets users do almost anything with
them -- including put the software into traditional
commercial products. The Linux license, by contrast,
requires users to make any use of the software -- such as
a piece of specialized computer networking gear --
freely available to everyone else. That restriction that
keeps many companies from using Linux in key products.
It might well make sense for the BSDs to put aside their
differences and unite under a common set of specs. But
peace may be too much to expect in the free software
world. Two of the BSDs tried to merge a few years ago,
recalls Charles M. Hannum, a programmer with the
NetBSD project. But at a meeting between the two
camps, "while everyone agreed it was a good idea," he
says, "no one wanted to give anything up, and it just fell
apart."
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