I first of BeOS in "Boot"(Nov.'97). I'm curious as to where one would find it? Is it on CD? Perhaps I'll install it along OS/2 and Linux. Regards, Bob lunaslide wrote:

At 06:55 AM 12/26/98 -0500, you wrote:

...

I was just wondering........

How does Linux stack up against BeOS?

I mean't in the terms of let's say a server or a http server.

Is is possible to adminsiter BeOS as a good server of any kind?!

Now? No. In the future? Definitely.

There are a couple of different issues:

Applications: It is very easy to port UNIX apps over to Be, so eventually, people wanting to use it as a server for whatever will be able to. Also, the programming interface is *really* nice, so before long, some GUI implementations of http, ftp, NFS, samba and other servers should be avilable, making system admin a snap. But for now, the apps aren't there yet.

Security: Currently, Be is only a single user OS. The engineers tell us that the foundation for a multiuser enviornment is already in the OS, but they have chosen to hold off on it for awhile, probably due to debugging and programming issues. Also, there is no empasis on network security that I know of. If there truly isn't any security in it like UNIX, this automatically means that it is unsuitable for a server to the outside world.

Drivers: Very limited at this point. Each release brings more. R4 is the first version I can run on my dual processor machine because SCSI support is finally here.

Networking: It's networking is immature, but sure to improve. At the moment, I would guess that linux has the faster networking by a mile.

Performance: It screams. It totally puts linux to shame in terms of raw speed. There are several reasons for this:

a) a 64 bit journaling filesystem which behaves like a database when searched or queried

b) an application and windowing structure that are tuned for performance and take over most of the functionality of an application, leaving it to do it's intended purpose

c) a kernel that was written on multiprocessor systems and takes advantage of more recent advances in multithreading theory and application.

d) an application support layer that allows even non multithreaded applications to be threaded by the kernel.

There are many other reasons. The short answer is that its a new OS, unconcerned with legacy issues and therefore built on the newest OS technologies for the most recent archetectures.

The downside of that is that it's not mature yet and needs apps. I believe the apps will come because its such a fine OS that people will want to write for it just because (sound familiar?). It is not open source, but it is extremely well documented for programmers.

I don't believe it will supplant linux for many reasons. Linux is not just about performance and speed. It's about Free Software. Linux is a far more mature OS with thousands of apps to make it suitable for many types of jobs.

I still suggest you try Be, though. Look at the supported hardware carefully first.

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