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    <h2>Experience the possibilities with FreeBSD</h2>
    
      <p>FreeBSD can handle nearly any task you would expect of a &unix;
	workstation, as well as many you might not expect:</p>
    
    <h2>FreeBSD is a true open system with full
	source code.</h2>
    
      <p>There is no doubt that so-called open systems are <i>the</i>
	requirement for today's computing applications.  But no commercial
	vendor-supplied solution is more open than one which includes full
	source code to the entire operating system, including the kernel and
	all of the system daemons, programs, and utilities.  You can modify
	any part of FreeBSD to suit your personal, organizational, or
	corporate needs.</p>

      <p>With its generous <a
	  href="&base;/copyright/freebsd-license.html">licensing policy</a>,
	you can use FreeBSD as the basis for any number of free <i>or
	  commercial </i>applications.</p>    

    <h2>FreeBSD&nbsp;runs thousands of
	applications.</h2>
    
      <p>Because FreeBSD is based on 4.4BSD, an industry-standard version of
	UNIX, it is easy to compile and run programs.  FreeBSD also includes
	an extensive <a href="&base;/where.html">packages collection </a>and <a
	  href="&base;/ports/index.html">ports collection</a> that bring
	precompiled and easy-to-build software right to your desktop or
	enterprise server.  There is also a growing number of <a
	  href="&base;/commercial/software.html">commercial applications</a>
	written for FreeBSD.</p>

      <p>Here are some examples of the environments in which FreeBSD is
	used:</p>

      <ul>
	<li><b>Internet services. </b>Many Internet Service Providers (ISPs)
	  find FreeBSD ideal, running WWW, Usenet news, FTP, Email, and other
	  services.  Ready-to-run software like the <a
	    href="http://www.apache.org/">Apache</a> web server or the
	  <a href="http://proftpd.org/">ProFTPD</a>
	  FTP&nbsp;server make it easy to set up a business or
	  community-centered ISP.  Of course, with FreeBSD's unbeatable <a
	    href="&base;/internet.html">networking</a>, your users will enjoy
	  high speed, reliable services.</li>

	<li><b>X Window workstation. </b>From an inexpensive X terminal to an
	  advanced X display, FreeBSD works quite well.  Free X software (<a
	    href="http://x.org/">X.Org</a>&trade;) comes with the
	  system. <a href="http://www.nvidia.com/">nVidia</a> offers native
	  drivers for their high-performance graphics hardware,
	  and the industry standard
	  <a href="http://www.opengroup.org/motif/">Motif</a>&reg; and
	  <a href="http://www.opengl.org/">OpenGL</a>&reg;
	  libraries are supported.  Both the <a
	    href="http://www.kde.org">KDE</a> and <a
	    href="http://www.gnome.org">GNOME</a> desktop environments
	  enjoy full support and provide office suite functionality, with
	  further good functionality available in the <a
	    href="http://www.openoffice.org/">OpenOffice.Org</a> and
	  <a href="http://www.softmaker.de/tml_en.htm">TextMaker</a>
	  products.</li>

	<li><b>Networking. </b>From packet filtering to routing to name
	  service, FreeBSD can turn any PC into a Internet firewall, email
	  host, print server, PC/NFS server, and more.</li>

	<li><b>Software development.</b> A suite of development tools comes
	  with FreeBSD, including the GNU C/C++ compiler and debugger.
	  &java; and Tcl/Tk development are also
	  possible for example, and more esoteric programming
	  languages like Icon work just fine, too.  And FreeBSD's shared
	  libraries have always been easy to make and use.  You can also
	  choose from a wide range of popular and powerful editors, such as
	  XEmacs and Vim.</li>

	<li><b>Net surfing.</b> A real UNIX workstation makes a great Internet
	  surfboard. FreeBSD versions of <a
	    href="http://www.mozilla.org/firefox/">Firefox</a>
	  and <a href="http://www.opera.com/">Opera</a> are available
	  for serious web users.  Surf the web,
	  publish your own web pages, read Usenet news, and send and receive
	  email with a FreeBSD system on your desktop.</li>

	<li><b>Education and research.</b> &nbsp;FreeBSD makes an excellent
	  research platform because it includes complete source code.
	  Students and researchers of operating systems or other computer
	  science fields can benefit greatly from such an open and
	  well-documented system.</li>

	<li><b>And much more. </b>Accounting, action games,
	  MIS&nbsp;databases, scientific visualization, video conferencing,
	  Internet relay chat (IRC), home automation, multiuser dungeons,
	  bulletin board systems, image scanning, and more are all real uses
	  for FreeBSD today.</li>
      </ul>
    
    <h2>FreeBSD is an operating system that will grow with
	your needs.</h2>

      <p>Though FreeBSD is free software, it is also <i>user supported
	</i>software.  Any questions you have can be posted to hundreds of
	FreeBSD developers and users simply by e-mailing the <a
	  href="mailto:freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org">freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org</a>
	mailing list.</p>

      <p>FreeBSD also has a worldwide group of programmers and writers who fix
	bugs, add new features and document the system.  Support for new
	devices or special features is an almost constant development process,
	and the team keeps a special eye out for problems which affect system
	stability.  FreeBSD users are quite proud of not only how fast but how
	reliable their systems are.</p>
    
    <h2>What experts have to say . . .</h2>
    
      <p><i>``FreeBSD handles [our] heavy load quite well and it is nothing
	  short of amazing.  Salutations to the FreeBSD team.''</i></p>

      <div align="right"><p>---Mark Hittinger, administrator of WinNet
	  Communications, Inc.</p></div>

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