whats the difference?

without going into the stability issue ( because a decent win2k box is just as stable as a good linux box IMO )

the best way to look at it is from a package point of view :

Linux --> PHP, Perl, MySQL

Win2k --> ASP, MS SQL

Other than that.....not a lot [1]

Cheers,




[1] when i say 'not a lot', its loosly phrased :)

win = crap
linux = god of OS's

Originally posted by OKIHost
win = crap
linux = god of OS's

FreeBSD = Ultimate OS

Originally posted by Kyle Babich


FreeBSD = Ultimate OS

lol :stickout

[QUOTE]Originally posted by jonny b
[B]without going into the stability issue ( because a decent win2k box is just as stable as a good linux box IMO )

I guess if you dont get into that there really is no issue is there..

Originally posted by OKIHost
I guess if you dont get into that there really is no issue is there.. [/B]

Quite true. Stability is the issue, well and security in the case of Code Red and the like. I certainly wouldn't rely on Microsoft to come out with a patch as soon as it's needed.

the differences are
price, stability, reliability, ease of use....

the only one that w2k comes out on top is : ease of use

Unix, FreeBSD, Linux, Macintosh: Great OS's

Windows/Microsoft Junk: Junk

half u guys with the utlimate OS and bashing microsoft, aren't really describing differences. I'm not biased or anything but I would go with linux because it's cheaper and it has free apps. Not that I pay for the apps cuz I'm not host. I just want to know the difference for a person who wants a host.

all microsoft products are unstable in nature and hard to use....basically the true difference is stability...unix & linux are very stable OS's where as Windows is very unreliable, crashes often, and have major issues...every day i hear about some new problem with it...did you hear about there security glitch...the most "secure OS in the world" wasn't secure at all.....basically Microsoft rushes products and that causes major issues..if your hosting you want Unix or linux for stability and reliablility!

I run all Linux on my servers, but for the development company I work for it's a 100% Windows datacenter, we have around 18 Win2K/Compaq machines. Previously, I did contract work for the State of South Dakota on a project that set up websites and email for every teacher and staff in the state on one central system, around 45 machines, all Win2k/Compaq. In my experience, the machines run for months at a time between reboots, and it's usually a hardware upgrade or software development that require the reboot. And when you run a cluster that's 100% enterprise windows products, it just works.

I have to agree with Jonny B that a well-run Windows server is as stable as a well-run Linux server. Most of the problems blamed on Windows that you hear about come from poor server management. It's common for a standalone Windows server to have NO administrator at all. A Linux server tends to have a knowledgeable tech behind it.

Any Linux machine can be set up horribly unstable, any Windows machine can be set up rock solid. It's irrelevant.

Like Jonny said, it's all preference and budget. ASP or PHP, MySQL or MSSQL, etc.

But with a subject line like "w2k vs unix", you could have just as well tried "God vs Allah" or something! :rolleyes:

The only case you'd want a W2K box for web serving is when you need ASP, MS-SQL or MS Access database. Even ASP is available on Linux, however most ASP programmers are not comfortable with 'cultural change' of moving from Windows to Linux.

If you don't need any of those specific requirement, Linux (or FreeBSD) is way to go. It is more stable, more secure, easier to admin, much more cost effective, has loads of 3rd party free software available.

Even if you know ASP, MS-SQL/Access, there is a whole bunch of nice replacement in Linux/FreeBSD, you can replace ASP with PHP, MS-SQL/Access with MySQL/PostgreSQL. More often than not, these replacements are generally better than their Windows counterparts.

I recommend to stay away from Windows whenever possible.

Originally posted by 21inchguns
the differences are
price, stability, reliability, ease of use....

the only one that w2k comes out on top is : ease of use

Well, it is certainly not easier if you need to admin a W2K box on the other side of the world :D

lol....i knew this thread would go this way ;)

In fairness though....we do majority win2k hosting and our machines only ever need rebooting when a service pack or security patch comes out.....

These days...it isnt too often so you'll probably get a couple of months without a reboot....

As for Linux...its like a duracell battery...it just keeps going on and on which cant be bad ;)

Thing is, in the UK, the majority ( argument time ) of the market wants windows hosting ( now whether they actually want it or just think its better is another issue ) we get very little demand for Linux boxes at all!

Cheers,

Originally posted by jonny b

Thing is, in the UK, the majority ( argument time ) of the market wants windows hosting ( now whether they actually want it or just think its better is another issue ) we get very little demand for Linux boxes at all!

Cheers,

in India also situation is similar. people want windows hosting, may be they don't know about security flaws in windows or they just don't care about it. :(

as a administrator if you are hosting a Linux server, I can assure you for peace of mind and you will sleep well in night. :)

also, if you have hared about code rad and other worm attacks through IIS, which brought down many internet servers. :angry:

even my linux server running apache received millions of hits from IIS worms looking for windows files. :mad:

Windows is good, simple, costly but not very secure. Windows codes are not open where Linux codes are open source and patches are released very fast even within days of finding flaw and they are immediately available on distributors web site at no cost. Where as in windows if patch is found Microsoft takes months to release the patch. ;)

Also, best hosting control panels are available for Linux and not for windows. :look:

so i guess still LINUX rules the server market. :o

P.S.: Soon you may receive error while browsing your web site hosted on windows servers like "Your subscription to use windows is over. Please contact Microsoft Sales or Support"

:D

Lets put it this way:
A W2K box with decent hardware and proficient management is just as stable and linux.. and just as safe...

now you may all bash me with code red and IIS5 and all:
well, a win2k box alone is crap... honestly
but if you are a good w2k admin who also installs 3rd party security software, get the patches as soon as they are out, and put attention to security in windows just as much as in linux then you should not have more problems than in a *nix server...

The fact is a patch that prevents what happened in code red was released 5 months before code red existed... only the administrators who didnt get it and didnt care as they should for the management of their w2k server got punished... (without talking about the heavy load on the internet code red caused... for windows AND linux servers...).

A not-so-well runned windows box is a lot more often than a linux one for one simple reason: Windows is simple to install and simple to 'Secure' (not so correct - but thats my point), while a linux box is as stable and as secure as the person managing it. so you will get into more oftenly a not-well secured windows box or a not well managed windows box....
windows crashings and attacks are blown out of all proportion when possible... just like with Windows 98 (the drivers made it unstable, but all the blame went to microsoft, not that im saying win98 is excellent, it just got much more blame than it should have), just like with the 'MAJOR PNP BUG' that was advertised everywhere and mentioned by the FBI - that actually was a much less of a threat then maken of (and i will not get into it why... just read one deep, detailing and objective article about when that security hole can hurt you and you will be surprised).
Also - microsoft worries much more to the security of their clients than linux does - I promise you that if all windows costumers would move now to linux they would see so many people hacking into their computers like never before - for one simple reason - linux is as safe as the person behind the box with it.
so because of all those reasons windows computers are more 'hackable' and more 'unstable', but if you run into a good win2k system admin who gets the patches intime (before the release of a worm exploiting them), that monitors the box at need and also uses some 3rd party security software - you should run into just as much problems as in linux...
only in win2k of course... other windows os's are not talked about here (except for some examples).
so stop bashing windows, ok?

the best way to look at it is from a package point of view :

Linux --> PHP, Perl, MySQL

Win2k --> ASP, MS SQL

Other than that.....not a lot [1]


PHP and Perl (except for Pl scripts with embedded languages like C++ and the like) can be used on a W2K server

ASP can be used on a *nix server

Personally, my limited web experience has been done a *nix platform, so I'm biased and tend to think that it's the best platform. All the GNU GPL applications available tend to make me biased even more.

I don't have the patience to learn how to config a site on a W2K server. I kept submitting TTs to my webhost complaining about my CHMOD not working or about getting sendmail errors on my scripts (for those of you who are W2K gurus don't laugh!) But ultimately, the reason why I can't use a W2K server is because some advanced Perl scripts (including one of my important scripts) only work on *nix servers.

It's kinda like doing an algebraic expression, there are many ways to go about it, and you can use different tools, but any way you go about it, you're still going to come up with the same equation...

W2K server = Homepage on my dog spot

*nix server = Homepage on my dog spot

Hope that info helps.

ochiba

I was collecting statistical information based on support requests from my clients,
This is the data from about 500 server:
60% of them Linux RH or Mandrake, kernel 2.4.x
20% of them FreeBSD 4.x
20% of them Win2000

What we see is:
There are more cases of reboots & crashes for win2000 servers than linux servers (even not considering difference in numbers). Yet, otherwise
it is fairly stable.

There is a problem with disk quota on Linux -
it gets corrupted, and has to be fixed from time to time.

FreeBSD - no reboots, no problems what so over. I don't think we had any OS related problems with FreeBSD.

Before the data was actually compiled, I was leaning toward RH 7.x as "ultimate" shared hosting platform, but the disk quota made my preferences to swing to FreeBSD.
Overall stability & security of FreeBSD is also impressive.

Originally posted by iseletsk

There is a problem with disk quota on Linux -
it gets corrupted, and has to be fixed from time to time.

Before the data was actually compiled, I was leaning toward RH 7.x as "ultimate" shared hosting platform, but the disk quota made my preferences to swing to FreeBSD.
Overall stability & security of FreeBSD is also impressive.

What version of RH do you use? I never encountered any quota problem on my 6.1 to 7.2. I don't use 7.2 however.

The problems are only with versions 7.x. (7.0, 7.1, 7.2).
I think it is related to new kernel/new quota (aquota) system. As this problem is not visible
RH 6.2

I have both OS and like both, I can see that someone getting into the business would go for W2k because of ease if they happen to have some money. You can run almost any language on either machine.

The knowledge curve has to go to Linux, you need to learn more with Linux OS and command line instructions. People for the most part are more familiar with Windows do to point and click.

My opinion is you can get started at a low cost with Linux by more than half of what a W2k box would be. Grab some books and learn how to use Linux.

Check out the prices on software to run each of them such as Email servers, Control Panels, SQl servers and such and you would have to agree than Linux wins (no play on words)

Stability: I have had great luck with both, I think the Linux box runs faster and for a server environment Linux is the best.

Originally posted by bluebeard
I The knowledge curve has to go to Linux, you need to learn more with Linux OS and command line instructions. People for the most part are more familiar with Windows do to point and click.

My opinion is you can get started at a low cost with Linux by more than half of what a W2k box would be. Grab some books and learn how to use Linux.

Check out the prices on software to run each of them such as Email servers, Control Panels, SQl servers and such and you would have to agree than Linux wins (no play on words)


Your thread exactly prove my point :)
People think that W2K as a server requires less experience because it is so user friendly and already-configured like - which is a complete false. windows 2000 requires just as much experience and knowledge to run well as linux.... you - as a host saying that win2k is easier to manage - just proves my point that a lot of hosts see w2k as easier to manage - and because of that learn a lot less than they should. if a server admin intends to use linux he MUST learn linux well to prepare even to the slightest threat - in windows it is supposedly aint so (but the point is that it is!).

you are right about the bundled software - but I have to disagree with you about SQL and the overall point of that paragraph you posted.
While a lot of linux-bundled (sometimes even not bundled) software is free, if you have the money the software for microsoft servers does worth it.
MS SQL (IMO) is better than MySQL, Access databases (as intensive-proccessing consumers as they are) are only avaliable in windows, same thing with intensive ASP applications Usage, smoother run of ASP, ASP.Net at all, and all that.
And saying you can replace ASP with PHP is bull****...
Im not saying that ASP is better than PHP, but some things can be achieved with ASP and ASP.Net and not with PHP and its modules.
And also, you can use C/C++ Programming-Used scripts in Windows as far as I know.

and one other thing - I dont know if this has to do with this thread (Because its about servers...) but I run in my machine WinXP, Windows2k Pro and Slackware Linux 8, and this is what I have to say:
I hate windows xp
I love windows 2k (it runs very smoothly, its fast, its the most stable machine i have ever used (crashed to me less than redhat)).
Slackware 8 is sweet - not as good as win2k (IMO) but I cant really say as I dont use it often... I can just say that from my experiences windows 2k only crashed twice to me, once because i tried to run an ancient DOS game and once because of some hard disk problem (corrupted clusters or something)... no complaints here, while redhat crashed to me 4 times (Version 7.0) and slackware none - but I used redhat more often and I barely use slackware (i just find it un-neccesary, I just installed it to learn linux a bit, and for the experience).

To summarize my points:
-PHP is good, ASP is good, you can't replace one with another
-Win2k is stable, Linux is stable, but you cant be complacent while runnning win2k as a server because it is so 'easy' to manage and user friendly.. just like in linux, you must be very aware and experienced to run a good win2k server (that is from my experience - I know a win2k admin who is really good and experienced and the only times he had to reboot is while he changed some hardware/software (he also runs IRC on that machine))

So - Acquire good 3rd party software, good experience, good knowledge about running a win2k server, and good compliant software (a windows server should be stronger than linux) and your win2k machine should run just as good, just dont be complacent

But... About Price and bundled and/or free software - Linux comes 1st, no doubt

if I wasn't to open an ASP/MS SQL ran website I would use a *nix server - no doubt - cheaper, and usually the people who run it know linux more than windows...

Slow down cowboy, What I was saying is that more people getting into this is they know more about windows OS than Linux and yes you need to know more about the back end of a windows server but it takes less know how to do this or maybe it's just me.

I also think you are right about ASP vs. PHP I love writing scripts with ASP you can manipulate things with ease most of all with databases.

As far as MS SQL vs. MySQL again hands down to MS but for the price attached to it my vote goes to MySql in which performs great.

Due to most everyone learning on a computer very few start of with Linux because of the popularity and ease of use and therefore does take less to figure out the workings.

I hated XP, I think it's a joke I do like 2K and will stay with that for years to come on my admin computer.

gota love the way people slag off microsoft to their hearts content without actually answering questions.

to be blunt, it doesnt matter if you hosted site is on ms or linux, php will run on both, as will mysql etc etc etc. i even think you can get a linux version of asp.

the only factor you really need to think about is your host, lets face it... if you have 1 host with linux (more stable) running on a p3 550 (dont laught you will be suprised) rebooting every hour or so because its overloaded with 100 different websites with a t1 link and the other host is running ms running a 2gig with 20 websites and a oc3 link on a what would you go for?

do some research on your host to be, dont just jump at the first one you see and dont believe everything you read in the forums about how good they all say they are, i mean lets face it. if you run a webhosting company wouldnt you employ people to log onto different forums pretending to be customers praisg the socks off their supposed host.

find some 'real' customers, get some web addresses of the forums and go visit the sites.

hope this helps.

p.s. An OS is only as good as the admin that sets it up and looks after it.

Assuming both OS has competent administrator (install patches as soon as it released, etc), I think Linux still wins hands down here. With Windows, you depend on Microsoft for releasing timely patches. With Linux you could install the patches yourselves without waiting for RedHat, even RedHat itself is fast at releasing patches, so in most cases it would be unnecessary to patch the system by yourself. While there is quite a lot of improvement the past years, Microsoft hasn't quite reached the promptness of Linux community when releasing patches. In some cases it took as long as 1,5 months. On Linux, there is usually less than 2 days time between a found vulnerability and a vendor erratum. When the vendor is not up to it, you could make the patches by yourself. For example, last year RedHat was very late in releasing patch for ptrace root vulnerability, it took like 2 weeks, which is considered a very long time for community to release a patch, we didn't wait for that long, we were able to patch the kernel ourselves.

The second reason, there is a lot of choice in Linux, you can replace insecure compontents of the system with secure ones. For example: WUFTP has bad security records, so we replaced it with ProFTPD, BIND was too insecure and too unreliable, so we replaced it with tinydns, and so on.

However, the reason that convince us to pick Linux over Windows is flexibility. We are able to make the system behaves the way we want. With Windows, in contrast, if I can't find a button that do the thing you want, then I'm out of luck. With Linux I am usually able to work around things to make it work better.

Another reason is price, but I think this won't be an issue on some other countries. Here, a full featured Windows 2000 box ready for web hosting costs about a year (maybe more) salary of an average technician. The cost is simply way too high. And this doesn't include any security related 3rd party software.

I have been doing private hosting on my W2k Server since W2k Came out, I went a whole year without a reboot, I started out hosting 16 domains on that one server, I had survived hack attempts and viruses that have been floating the net. W2K has been rock solid for me to this date. and I plan on upgrading my box to a major one soon. I am very surprised that my sdsl line is handling the upload traffic pretty well. I have thought about taking my hosting company public but I think I will do that when I have two dns server's

Originally posted by getweb
Most of the problems blamed on Windows that you hear about come from poor server management. It's common for a standalone Windows server to have NO administrator at all. A Linux server tends to have a knowledgeable tech behind it.


I would have to agree this is by far the biggest distinction, however there are far too many "wannabe *nix admins" out there that ruin this statement. Running control panels, insecure software and refusing to patch their OS'es and daemons. But as a rule of thumb, every unix admin I have ever met refuses to use win32 as a server solution. Not only are there license fees that can be avoided, but, unix is at it's base more secure then any win32 server will ever be. Unix allows you to have full control over ever single aspect of the operation of the server. You know exactly whats it's going to do, and how it's going to do it, because you have the ability to view and edit the entire source code. Something you never see in even third party apps on win32. On the comment that FreeBSD is the ultimate, check out BSDi, it beats it : ). But with out more $$ I happily use FreeBSD on production servers and my clients at home.

just my 2 cents.

Question for iseletsk,

Hi, you stated:

I was collecting statistical information based on support requests from my clients,
This is the data from about 500 server:
60% of them Linux RH or Mandrake, kernel 2.4.x
20% of them FreeBSD 4.x
20% of them Win2000

What we see is:

FreeBSD - no reboots, no problems what so over. I don't think we had any OS related problems with FreeBSD.

<end quote>

I'm a fan of FreeBSD. I'm curious...what do the 20% of tickets for FreeBSD relate to if there are no reboots or OS related problems?

Thanks! And please elaborate if you could. I'm in the process of learning FreeBSD!

Take care,

Louis

Mostly system misconfigurations, or failed apache server.

just as an attempt to sping more conversation on the subject. why has no one mentioned Solaris?

Hi iseletsk,

Thanks for the speedy reply! I've began learning FreeBSD. I program on mainframe computers for a living right now. FreeBSD just seems to *call* to me as the right *nix to learn....and use.

May I ask what types of system misconfigurations you feel are typical or common with FreeBSD? And, with Apache on FreeBSD, could you share what you think the typical causes are?

I'm really interested, since I want to learn FreeBSD well.

Thank you very much!

Louis

It was more related to our program, than "particular" misconfiguration that related to all FreeBSD systems.

Oh goody,
A religious argument.
The plain facts on the subject… they both pretty much do the same thing.
After you include man-hours, they both come out to about the same price.
Unix Variants are much harder to work with, and require an engineering degree just to set up properly. Once they’re setup however, they are good. Not great, but good. Unix variants are tricky. There are a lot of factors to consider, especially with Linux.
For example:
1. What distribution is it?
2. What Kernel build is it based on? If you happen to be very unlucky and get a specific version of a specific kernel that has an unstable kernel, you face everything from server crashes to security holes on a level not seen since front-page extensions on NT 3.5.
3. Are you running Apache, or some other server platform? All server platforms have their drawbacks and plus sides, but it’s an important one.
Then, when and if you can get it running without spitting out garbled characters that look like Japanese on a bad hair day, you have a server that may or may not stay running for any length of time. Linux may be free to buy, but the extended man-hours that go into just keeping the bugger running makes me cringe at the thought of putting any of my projects on said server type.

This thread has contained a lot of misconceptions about Microsoft.
1. That every Microsoft server is susceptible to things like code red, and numda. None of the servers in my care ever faced those problems. With the right configuration, a windows 2000 server can stay on for years without even so much as a reboot.
2. Microsoft=crap Unix=cool
Where do we find these people? Anyone who has worked effectively on both platforms will tell you that your server is mission critical. If all you want is to run inferior MySQL databases, then why do you need the power of Windows 2000? To these people I say, stay on Linux; you’ll never be a professional anyway.

Windows 2000 comes with more out of the box than most Linux strains do.
Servers are much easier to configure. You generally don’t have to tell them when you’re swapping drives or adding hardware like you do with some Unix varieties, and the interface is (in my humble opinion) more intuitive. I like a good familiar looking GUI.

But I’m not going to lie.
The biggest reason I like windows 2000 is because I get paid more to develop applications for it. As an ASP developer I get paid twice as much as a Perl Programmer and a third more than a PHP developer. Plus, since more mainstream businesses own windows servers, my skills are more in demand. Now, I can work in both languages mentioned above, and I have nothing against Perl. It’s a fine language. But you have to keep in mind that businesses are good. Even as web hosts, they are what keep us employed. Without them, we wouldn’t even be on this web site discussing this issue because no one would have invented the computer.

Solaris was mentioned.
I really like Solaris. I don’t consider it in the same class with Linux varieties because it’s smarter, faster, more intuitive, and it supports a ton of great features. Solaris is to operating systems what oracle is to databases. The best of the best.

Some of the new machines running Solaris are so powerful that they go into PetaByte drive capacity. This blows my mind.

But realistically,
I couldn’t afford a Sun Server if my life depended on it.
Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve even worked on one recently.
Odd.

But yeah,
I really don’t like Linux.
It’s as close to pure evil as an OS could get. And I was so excited about it when it made the main stream. A shame really.

That’s just my trip though.

Well, I'd like to consider myself someone who has more experience then most dealing with different operating systems.
Without even going into what I run on computers outside of my own home. I current have and run, Windows 2000, FreeBSD 4.5, NetBSD 1.5.2 (PPC), YellowDogLinux 2.0, Red Hat 7.2, Solaris 2.7 & 8, MacOS 9.2 & 10 (yes, all on different computers that I actually use). Othen then just those listed above I've tested Windows 2000: Server, Advanced Server, Data Center Server, Active Directory, FreeBSD 4.0+, Red Hat 6.2+, Immunix 7, Slackware 8. I think thats it... And from all that testing, usage, and fixing (yes, I break on purpose). My favorites are Windows 2000 Professional for clients, and, clients only. Best end user programs you will find anywhere, and FreeBSD 4.x (5.0 will be very nice) for servers. I have found FreeBSD to not only offer the most stable enviorment of an OS I've seen to date, but their "ports" collection makes not only administration easier, but security as well. Moreover I perfer the system logging and IDS' availible on *nix to any I have seen on win32 or even *cough* Mac. Also, once FreeBSD 5.0 is out, it will, by far, kick any *nix distrobution. In any event, we could all go on and on about the issue. Many people have sited good reasons why they like one over the other. But I'll say it first, we all are far to bias to give good opinions. If you have the time, and the money. Please by all means do some testing yourself and see which one you like.

Originally posted by sam.moses
Oh goody,
A religious argument.


hah, and yea man, thats as close to one as your going to get in the computer industry : )

Hi sam.moses,

Your points on the multiple versions of Linux -- and kernel versions -- is quite important. In addition, the directory and file layout, libraries and lots of other stuff differs quite a lot between various versions of any one distro (think version X, Y and Z of Red Hat for example) -- let alone between different distros of Linux. No fun for administering servers!

That's one reason I think FreeBSD is a better choice than any version of Linux for the servers a hosting company is going to have and operate. There is, from a practical standpoint of production servers, ONE version of FreeBSD -- 4.5 RELEASE -- period (except for those folks running an older RELEASE version that still runs just fine and who don't feel a need to upgrade!).

FreeBSD has, has had and will continue to have a very consistent directory and file layout. Once one learns it, one knows where stuff is supposed to be. Knows where to find programs, their configuration files and whatever else one is looking for. Nice -- and a time saver.

And not much if anything is going to change as new RELEASE versions come out. This is what is so nice about FreeBSD; FreeBSD is a very consistent complete OS, not just a "distro" of the Linux kernel with a buch of stuff globbed on by Red Hat or whom ever -- that they can change to make your life harder than it needs to be version to version keeping up with the changes in what their definition of "Company X Linux distro" happens to be version to version.

Plus, as noted above, the ports system of FreeBSD, where one manages and maintains all the source code for one's system, is very important and valuable. It allows one to compile from scratch every program on your server -- from the FreeBSD OS itself to Apache to whatever other 6000+ program from the ports system one is using -- on THAT particular server with the defaults/optimizations appicable for THAT server -- be it Intel or AMD. Sure one CAN do this with Linux, but with FreeBSD it's fast, easy and works without a bunch of version/library "gotchas" common to Linux distro to distro.

FreeBSD is considered to be one of if not THE most stable, reliable and capable server OSs on Earth. Since it's much easier and less time consuming to maintain over time once one learns it, why not choose FreeBSD for one's server OS?

The only two reasons I hear a lot are.... 1) the GPL licence over the BSD licence; this is a "religious war" type argument -- I prefer the BSD licence myself....and 2) Because Linux is more popular with more books and help resources available.

True. However, there are plenty enough resources -- and very good ones at that -- available for FreeBSD to enable the system administrator to maintain his or her systems just fine. Just the online FreeBSD handbook is enough to get the newbie started; that's what I used. Chapters 1-5 are all a newbie needs to get up and running with FreeBSD so he or she can then move on to learning the finer popints of system administration and server security.

Since the resources ARE perfectly adequate -- and mostly online at that, this becomes a non issue to me. Yes, Linux has MORE, but so what? One doesn't need the MOST, just plenty enough which FreeBSD has.

One more point. Linux is the kernel, not the/a distro. That Kernel is controlled by one person -- Linus. If he goes bonkers or something -- or just decides to take Linux down some weird path for some reason, Red Hat, all the other 200 + distros and everybody using them have three choices -- follow him over the cliff like good little lemmings, stagnate at whatever kernel version they were at before Linus took Linux in the "wrong" direction -- or just switch to FreeBSD or another OS, which is controlled by a group of elected (by their peers who are technically savy enough to choose/vote well), qualified people exercising peer review and consensus over which direction FreeBSD as a complete OS -- not just a "distro" -- is going to go.

Don't get me wrong. I don't hate Linux or anything. I'm just saying I think FreeBSD is the *better* choice of which OS to run your server with. If I couldn't use FreeBSD (no reason for that, but just to make the point), I would choose Linux over Windows for a lot of reasons I won't bother to mention. In that case, I would learn how to secure and administer my box as well as I could. I would rather have the power, flexibility and control of a configuration file based *nix OS rather than be limited to the point and click options of a Windows OS.

Take care,

Louis

We used to host on commercial BSD, but it was quickly becoming outdated, as development wasn't being nearly as fast as some of the open source OSs. So we decided to go open source.

We chose Linux over FreeBSD, because of it's popularity. It's popularity has led to it being developed faster than FreeBSD, and more new utilities are coming out developed on Linux than FreeBSD.

If we were using FreeBSD, we would have to port a lot of stuff over to it. There have only been two things that we have needed to port from FreeBSD.

Louis argues "Linux has MORE, but so what? One doesn't need the MOST, just plenty enough which FreeBSD has."

Well why use FreeBSD, when Linux has more, and works plenty well enough?

Anyway, this thread has gotten way off topic. The original questions was what the differences were between Windows 2000 and UNIX. Well, the simple answer is. Everything is different.

Well, several things:
1) Stability: FreeBSD is rock solid. Linux 2.4.x kernel is not.
Quota support is constantly failing (that is my main complain about 2.4).
While 2.4.9 & 2.4.17+ kernels are stable, the rest should be used at all (for stability issues).
Anything from 2.4.0-2.4.9 has major problems with virtual memory, and the kernels after that sufferent bunch of problems & frequent updates until 2.4.17. 2.4.17 kernel is the first one that might be compared agains FreeBSD kernel on the level of speed & stability.

If you would take 2.2.x series, while pretty stable - under heavy load it tends to crash (unlike FreeBSD), it is also slower then FreeBSD.

From what I read, FreeBSD is much better designed kernel then Linux, yet it is pretty hard to say, if thats true.

Anyway, I want to switch to GNU Hurd :) It should be the next best thing.

stlouislouis
Thank you for the elegant point-by-point argument. It's rare that anyone is ever willing to talk about this issue (myself included) without getting steamed.

I have no beef with FREE BSD. It was actually one of the first system types I worked on. One of the things I liked about it was that you could set it to do directory permissions dynamically, like windows does by default, and nothing falls apart. It makes app development much easier when nothing falls apart.

I don't like any of it's interfaces, but that is not the operating systems fault. It's a personal preference.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say BEOS is also a great platform for running a server. It's robust, fast, interface is easy (comparable to windows, GNOME or MAC), there are releases of most open source app platforms like Perl and PHP for it, and it's free (now anyway. didn't use to be). I like the concept of running a 128 bit OS on a server. I'm running it on one of my home servers now. I haven't even had trouble with it interfacing with windows boxes on the network. It's been on for a month without so much as a program freezing up. They have a word for that, but I can't remember what it is. Too tired.

In any case,
I'm going to get some rest.
Have a good one all.