96 lines
4.1 KiB
Text
96 lines
4.1 KiB
Text
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2//EN" [
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<!ENTITY date "$Date: 1999-01-19 20:34:08 $">
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<!ENTITY title "About FreeBSD's Technological Advances">
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<!ENTITY % includes SYSTEM "includes.sgml"> %includes;
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]>
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<!-- $Id: features.sgml,v 1.7 1999-01-19 20:34:08 wosch Exp $ -->
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<HTML>
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&header;
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<H1>FreeBSD offers many advanced features.</H1>
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<blockquote>
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<P>No matter what the application, you want your system's resources performing
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at their full potential. FreeBSD's advanced features enable you to do just
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that.</P>
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</blockquote>
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<HR ALIGN=LEFT NOSHADE WIDTH="100%"><FONT COLOR="#FF0000"><FONT SIZE="+1">A
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complete operating system based on 4.4BSD.</FONT></FONT>
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<blockquote>
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<P>FreeBSD's distinguished roots derive from the latest <b>BSD</b>
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software releases from the Computer Systems Research Group at the
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University of California, Berkeley. The book <I>The Design and Implementation
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of 4.4BSD Operating System</I>, written by the 4.4BSD system architects,
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thus describes much of FreeBSD's core functionality in detail.</P>
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<P>Drawing on the skills and experience of a diverse and world-wide group of
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volunteer developers, the FreeBSD Project has worked to extend the
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feature set of the 4.4BSD operating system in many ways, striving constantly
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to make each new release of the OS more stable, faster and containing new
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functionality driven by user requests.</P>
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</blockquote>
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<HR ALIGN=LEFT NOSHADE WIDTH="100%"><FONT COLOR="#FF0000"><FONT SIZE="+1">FreeBSD
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provides higher performance, greater compatibility with other operating
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systems and less system administration.</FONT></FONT>
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<blockquote>
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<P>FreeBSD's developers attacked some of the more difficult problems in
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operating systems design to give you these advanced features:</P>
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<ul>
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<LI><B>Bounce buffering</B> gets around a limitation in the PC's ISA architecture
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that limits direct-memory access to the first 16 megabytes.<P><I>Result:</I>
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systems with more than 16 megabytes operate more efficiently with DMA
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peripherals on the ISA bus.</LI>
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<LI><B>A merged virtual memory and filesystem buffer cache</B>
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continuously tunes the amount of memory used for programs and the disk
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cache.<P><I>Result:</I> programs receive both excellent memory management
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and high performance disk access,
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and the system administrator is freed from the task of tuning cache sizes.</LI>
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<LI><B>Compatibility modules</B> enable programs for other operating systems
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to run on FreeBSD, including programs for Linux, SCO, NetBSD, and BSDI.
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<P><I>Result:</I> users will not have to recompile programs already compiled
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for one of the compatible OS's, and will have access to a greater selection
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of off-the-shelf software, like the
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<a href="http://www.microsoft.com/FrontPage/">Microsoft FrontPage Server</a>
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extensions for BSDI or
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<a href="http://linux.corel.com/linux8/index.htm">WordPerfect</a>
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for SCO.</LI>
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<LI><B>Dynamically loadable kernel modules</B> allows new filesystem types,
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networking protocols or binary emulators to be added to the kernel at
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runtime without having to generate a new kernel image. <P><I>Result:</I>
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Much time can be saved and 3rd party vendors can deliver complete subsystems
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as kernel modules without having to distribute source or have lengthy
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installation procedures.</LI>
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<LI><B>Shared libraries</B> reduce the size of programs, saving disk space
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and memory. FreeBSD uses an advanced shared library scheme which offers
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many of the advantages of ELF, and the current version offers ELF compatibility
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for both Linux and native FreeBSD programs.</LI>
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</ul>
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<P>Naturally, since FreeBSD is an ongoing effort, you can expect newer
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features and higher levels of stability with each release.</P>
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</blockquote>
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<H2>What experts have to say . . .</H2>
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<blockquote>
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<P><I>``FreeBSD has an outline-structured visual configuration editor ...
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you can enter the configuration of every device the OS supports and can
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therefore get a successful installation on the first try almost every time.
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IBM, Microsoft, and others would do well to emulate FreeBSD's approach.''</I></P>
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<DIV ALIGN=right><P>---Brett Glass, <I>Infoworld</I>, April 8 1996.</P></DIV>
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</blockquote>
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&footer;
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</BODY>
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</HTML>
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