In 1985, a team of Sony engineers embarked on a project that would shape the company's future in computing. Led by Tadashi Doi, they developed the NEWS workstation, a UNIX-based machine that rivaled offerings from Sun and DEC but at a lower cost. The first prototype was ready in six months, and by 1987, the NWS 800 series was launched, gaining traction in universities and R&D labs. The project was initially treated as an internal venture, separate from Sony's core operations, and it recouped development costs within two months of launch. The NEWS series ran from 1987 to 1995, during which Sony introduced various models, including the NWS 1850 and the NWS 3860, the latter featuring a MIPS R3000 processor. This shift to MIPS architecture was significant as it laid the technological foundation for the original PlayStation.
The Valuable News weekly series provides a summary of news and articles related to UNIX/BSD/Linux systems. This edition includes updates on FreeBSD 14.3-RC with Docker-ready images, a critical look at various BSD installers, and the implementation of X11 support in the Rust-based Redox OS. Additionally, it covers topics such as the replacement of Heimdal Kerberos with MIT Kerberos in FreeBSD's base system, the introduction of the bemgr tool for managing ZFS Boot Environments, and the release of LibreOffice 25.2.4.
The article discusses the OpenBSD filesystem foundation, focusing on VFS, UFS, and FFS. It highlights the lack of user-accessible optimizations, particularly after the removal of softdep. The author introduces dirhash, a feature that creates an in-memory hash table for large directories, significantly improving file lookup speeds. The article suggests adjusting the dirhash cache size using sysctl to optimize performance, especially for systems with many files. The author shares their experience of increasing the dirhash_maxmem value to 50MB on a desktop system with 32GB RAM, which improved performance without significant memory impact.
The FreeBSD Foundation's Laptop Support and Usability Project made significant progress in April 2025. Key updates include improved wireless support with updated Realtek drivers and enhanced TKIP Wi-Fi performance. Graphics and audio enhancements are underway, with Linux 6.7 graphics driver patches nearly complete and automatic audio switching implemented. Power management and installer updates have also seen progress, with improvements to suspend/resume behavior and pkgbase installation support on FreeBSD 15.0-CURRENT.
The article discusses the author's experience with the AOOSTAR GEM12 Pro MAX Mini-PC, highlighting its powerful laptop technology and compatibility with OpenBSD. The author initially purchased a ThinkCentre M715q but was impressed by the AOOSTAR GEM12 Pro MAX's specifications and decided to upgrade. The article includes a detailed dmesg output, showcasing the hardware components and their recognition by OpenBSD. It also provides a summary of the current OpenBSD support for various hardware components, noting that most features work well, except for Bluetooth, hibernation, and suspend/resume. The author concludes by recommending the machine for OpenBSD users, praising its performance with KDE Plasma Desktop and Firefox, as well as its compile times.
The FreeBSD Foundation presents three quick methods to try FreeBSD in under five minutes. The first method involves using Qemu on an Apple MacBook to run the Arm version of FreeBSD, with steps including installing Qemu, downloading the FreeBSD VM image, and expanding the image filesystem. The second method uses Amazon Lightsail, which allows users to launch a FreeBSD instance in about 20 seconds, although it uses a UFS root filesystem instead of ZFS. The third method involves using Terraform to simplify the process of running a ZFS root image on Amazon EC2, which can be more complex due to the interface. The article also mentions the use of Ansible playbooks to customize and enhance the basic FreeBSD images. The Foundation encourages users to explore these methods and stay tuned for more practical use cases and tutorials.
The article discusses the development and impact of the BoxyBSD project, initially aimed at providing free VPS hosting with IPv6 support for beginners and small open-source projects. The project evolved significantly, contributing to the Proxmox ecosystem through various tools and innovations. Key contributions include ProxLB, a dynamic resource scheduler for Proxmox, an Ansible module for Proxmox cluster management, a Proxmox cloud image with cloud-init support, and a Terraform-based workflow for deploying FreeBSD VMs. Additionally, the project has fostered a Proxmox self-service portal and an education platform for BSD and IPv6. The article highlights the community support and sponsorships that have helped BoxyBSD grow, emphasizing the importance of open-source principles and collaboration.
FreeBSD has significantly enhanced its Wi-Fi support in 2025, addressing long-standing issues with slow speeds and outdated defaults. Developers are now enabling easy porting of modern drivers from Linux, including the iwlwifi driver, which improves support for recent Intel wireless chipsets. The core net80211 wireless stack is being updated to support newer protocols like WPA3 and upcoming 802.11 standards. Testing across various laptops and hardware configurations has improved reliability and performance. Users can expect up to 10x faster Wi-Fi speeds in FreeBSD 14.3, making it a viable option for daily use on laptops and desktops.
The Hidden Costs of Stagnation: Why Running EOL Software is a Ticking Time Bomb, Maintaining FreeBSD in a Commercial Product – Why Upstream Contributions Matter, LLMs ('AI') are coming for our jobs whether or not they work, Implement Anubis to give the bots a harder time, erspan(4): ERSPAN Type II collection, Just my memory here is how I've configure OpenBSD and FreeBSD for a IPv6 Wifi, and more.
The article discusses how to build reliable, cost-efficient storage using ZFS and commodity hardware. It highlights that ZFS shifts the focus from hardware to software, providing strong data protection and enterprise-grade performance. Key points include the benefits of ZFS features like end-to-end checksumming, self-healing, and snapshots, which ensure data integrity and availability. The article also emphasizes the cost savings and flexibility of using commodity hardware with ZFS, as opposed to expensive, vendor-certified hardware. Additionally, it provides best practices for building dependable storage systems, such as deploying ECC memory, architecting for redundancy, and actively monitoring disk health.
GhostBSD is everything you need straight out of the box, but say you need to make your own Community version using KDE, or change the defaults for your own use? Well, there is a script - and this video will have a look at it.
In 1985, a team of Sony engineers embarked on a project that would shape the company's future in computing. Led by Tadashi Doi, they developed the NEWS workstation, a UNIX-based machine that rivaled offerings from Sun and DEC but at a lower cost. The first prototype was ready in six months, and by 1987, the NWS 800 series was launched, gaining traction in universities and R&D labs. The project was initially treated as an internal venture, separate from Sony's core operations, and it recouped development costs within two months of launch. The NEWS series ran from 1987 to 1995, during which Sony introduced various models, including the NWS 1850 and the NWS 3860, the latter featuring a MIPS R3000 processor. This shift to MIPS architecture was significant as it laid the technological foundation for the original PlayStation.
The article provides a detailed critique of NetBSD's installer, sysinst, as of 2025. It highlights both the strengths and weaknesses of the installation process, comparing it with other BSD installers. The author appreciates the hotkey system and the configuration options post-installation but points out several areas for improvement, such as network autoconfiguration and the lack of a global progress bar during installation. The analysis is based on multiple installation attempts, including standard and extended partitioning methods, and discusses the challenges faced, such as system panics and read-only filesystems. The article concludes with a hopeful outlook on NetBSD's potential and a promise to explore DragonFly BSD's installer next.