diff --git a/FAQ/misc.sgml b/FAQ/misc.sgml index 57428b709f..f953a40c1e 100644 --- a/FAQ/misc.sgml +++ b/FAQ/misc.sgml @@ -1,332 +1,332 @@ - + Miscellaneous Questions FreeBSD uses far more swap space than Linux. Why?

FreeBSD only appears to use more swap than Linux. In actual fact, it does not. The main difference between FreeBSD and Linux in this regard is that FreeBSD will proactively move entirely idle, unused pages of main memory into swap in order to make more main memory available for active use. Linux tends to only move pages to swap as a last resort. The perceived heavier use of swap is balanced by the more efficient use of main memory.

Note that while FreeBSD is proactive in this regard, it does not arbitrarily decide to swap pages when the system is truely idle. Thus you will not find your system all paged out when you get up in the morning after leaving it idle overnight. Why use (what are) a.out and ELF executable formats?

To understand why FreeBSD uses the a.out format, you must first know a little about the 3 currently "dominant" executable formats for UNIX:

The oldest and `classic' unix object format. It uses a short and compact header with a magic number at the beginning that's often used to characterize the format (see for more details). It contains three loaded segments: .text, .data, and .bss plus a symbol table and a string table. COFF

The SVR3 object format. The header now comprises a section table, so you can have more than just .text, .data, and .bss sections. ELF

The successor to FreeBSD tries to work around this problem somewhat by providing a utility for branding a known for more information.

FreeBSD comes from the "classic" camp and has traditionally used the format, a technology tried and proven through many generations of BSD releases. Though it has also been possible for some time to build and run native In FreeBSD's case, our shared library mechanism is based more closely on Sun's SunOS-style shared library mechanism and, as such, is very easy to use. However, starting with 3.0, FreeBSD officially supports Yes, but why are there so many different formats?

Back in the dim, dark past, there was simple hardware. This simple hardware supported a simple, small system. a.out was completely adequate for the job of representing binaries on this simple system (a PDP-11). As people ported unix from this simple system, they retained the a.out format because it was sufficient for the early ports of unix to architectures like the Motorola 68k, VAXen, etc.

Then some bright hardware engineer decided that if he could force software to do some sleazy tricks, then he'd be able to shave a few gates off the design and allow his CPU core to run faster. While it was made to work with this new kind of hardware (known these days as RISC), In addition, program sizes were getting huge and disks (and physical memory) were still relatively small so the concept of a shared library was born. The VM system also became more sophisticated. While each one of these advancements was done using the However, as time passed, the build tools that FreeBSD derived their build tools from (the assembler and loader especially) evolved in two parallel trees. The FreeBSD tree added shared libraries and fixed some bugs. The GNU folks that originally write these programs rewrote them and added simpler support for building cross compilers, plugging in different formats at will, etc. Since many people wanted to build cross compilers targeting FreeBSD, they were out of luck since the older sources that FreeBSD had for as and ld weren't up to the task. The new gnu tools chain (binutils) does support cross compiling, Why won't chmod change the permissions on symlinks?

You have to use either `` and man pages for more info.

without any options and follow the symlink with a trailing slash (``/''). For example, if `` chmod 555 foo/

With the trailing slash, will follow the symlink, `` Why are login names

You'd think it'd be easy enough to change In FreeBSD 3.0 and later, the maximum name length has been increased to 16 characters and those various utilities with hard-coded name sizes have been found and fixed. The fact that this touched so many areas of the system is why, in fact, the change was not made until 3.0.

If you're absolutely confident in your ability to find and fix these sorts of problems for yourself when and if they pop up, you can increase the login name length in earlier releases by editing /usr/include/utmp.h and changing UT_NAMESIZE accordingly. You must also update MAXLOGNAME in /usr/include/sys/param.h to match the UT_NAMESIZE change. Finally, if you build from sources, don't forget that /usr/include is updated each time! Change the appropriate files in /usr/src/.. instead.

Can I run DOS binaries under FreeBSD?

Yes, starting with version 3.0 you can using BSDI's if you're interested in joining this ongoing effort!

For pre-3.0 systems, there is a neat utility called in the ports collection which emulates an 8088 and enough BIOS services to run DOS text mode applications. It requires the X Window System (provided as XFree86). What is ``

stands for Software Update Protocol, and was developed by CMU for keeping their development trees in sync. We used it to keep remote sites in sync with our central development sources.

SUP is not bandwidth friendly, and has been retired. The current recommended method to keep your sources up to date is How cool is FreeBSD?

Q. Has anyone done any temperature testing while running FreeBSD? I know Linux runs cooler than dos, but have never seen a mention of FreeBSD. It seems to run really hot.

A. No, but we have done numerous taste tests on blindfolded volunteers who have also had 250 micrograms of LSD-25 administered beforehand. 35% of the volunteers said that FreeBSD tasted sort of orange, whereas Linux tasted like purple haze. Neither group mentioned any particular variances in temperature that I can remember. We eventually had to throw the results of this survey out entirely anyway when we found that too many volunteers were wandering out of the room during the tests, thus skewing the results. I think most of the volunteers are at Apple now, working on their new ``scratch and sniff'' GUI. It's a funny old business we're in!

Seriously, both FreeBSD and Linux uses the `` Who's scratching in my memory banks??

Q. Is there anything "odd" that FreeBSD does when compiling the kernel which would cause the memory to make a scratchy sound? When compiling (and for a brief moment after recognizing the floppy drive upon startup, as well), a strange scratchy sound emanates from what appears to be the memory banks.

A. Yes! You'll see frequent references to ``daemons'' in the BSD documentation, and what most people don't know is that this refers to genuine, non-corporeal entities that now possess your computer. The scratchy sound coming from your memory is actually high-pitched whispering exchanged among the daemons as they best decide how to deal with various system administration tasks.

If the noise gets to you, a good ``fdisk /mbr'' from DOS will get rid of them, but don't be surprised if they react adversely and try to stop you. In fact, if at any point during the exercise you hear the satanic voice of Bill Gates coming from the built-in speaker, take off running and don't ever look back! Freed from the counterbalancing influence of the BSD daemons, the twin demons of DOS and Windows are often able to re-assert total control over your machine to the eternal damnation of your soul. Given a choice, I think I'd prefer to get used to the scratchy noises, myself! What does 'MFC' mean?

MFC is an acronym for 'Merged From -CURRENT.' It's used in the CVS logs to denote when a change was migrated from the CURRENT to the STABLE branches. What does 'BSD' mean?

It stands for something in a secret language that only members can know. It doesn't translate literally but its ok to tell you that BSD's translation is something between, 'Formula-1 Racing Team', 'Penguins are tasty snacks', and 'We have a better sense of humor than Linux.' :-)

Seriously, BSD is an acronym for 'Berkeley Software Distribution', which is the name the Berkeley CSRG (Computer - Systems Research Group) chose for their Unix ditrubtion way back - when. + Systems Research Group) chose for their Unix distribution way + back when.