Comment by wolvoleo

*everything. I've really been using it since 4.x. Imagine this: being able to upgrade a system in-place with freebsd-update from minor to major to minor version without everything breaking or having to say a prayer before. And that's just one thing I love about it. Clear separation of userland (/usr/local/etc), rock-solid stability in networking, zfs on root.

I had to do 'bonded' interfaces on Debian the other day. It's what, 5 different config files depending on which 'network manager' you use. In FreeBSD it's 5 lines in /etc/rc.conf and you're done.

And don't even get me started on betting which distribution (ahem CentOS) will go away next.

I love several things about it:

- Stable OS coupled with rolling packages. I am on the previous FreeBSD version (14.3-RELEASE, while 15 is out) but I have the very latest KDE.

- A ports collection where you can recompile packages whenever you're not happy with the default settings. Strict separation between packages and core OS. Everything that is from packages is in /usr/local (and this separation is also what makes the above point possible).

- ZFS on root as first-class citizen. Really great. It has some really nice side tooling too like sanoid/syncoid and bectl (the latter is part of the core OS even).

- jails for isolation (I don't really use it like docker for portability and trying things out)

- Clear documentation because there are no different distros. Very good handbook. I like the rc.conf idea.

- Common sense mentality, not constantly trying to reinvent the wheel. I don't have to learn a new init system and I can still use ifconfig. Things just work without constantly being poked around.

- Not much corporate messing around with the OS. Most of the linux patches come from big tech now and are often related to their goals (e.g. cloud compatibility). I don't care about those things and I prefer something developed by and for users, not corporate suits. No corporates trying to push their IP onto the users (e.g. canonical with their Mir, snaps etc)

- Not the same thing as everyone else has. I'm not a team player, I hate going with the flow. I accept that sometimes comes with stuff to figure out or work around.

I think that's about it.