Netflix Open Connect Network: FreeBSD, Not Linux

[kraftman]

Guy's really? Why does it seem like every time there is a story about FreeBSD there is a bunch of Linux fan boy's screaming how crappy it is. Yea maybe it doesn't have the fan base that Linux has but but I bet if look closely you'll find a lot of products that you interface with that use FreeBSD code. Aside from the fact that most of you are using MAC's that are running OSX right? guess what that's actually based on FreeBSD. Anyone heard of Juniper, JunOS? yea that's FreeBSD based. Cisco and NetApp both use a large amount of FreeBSD code in their product. If you move on from FreeBSD to the other BSD's you'll find a lot of code has move into Linux from the BSD community. OpenSSH is a product of OpenBSD community. And what, a couple of years ago some Linux programmers were trying to re-brand the a wireless driver that the OpenBSD community wrote? So the next time you feel get the urge to sit there and go BSD sux, BSD sux, BSD sux, please do us all a favor. Take your laptop outside and put 7 .45 hollow point rounds into it and take up farming because all your doing is waisting our time and showing you don't deserve all the work that our open source fore barres have provided. For the rest of us maybe it's time to look at FreeBSD again and see what Netfilx, Yahoo, Cisco, Juniper, and Apple are seeing.

This is just a proof FreeBSD doesn't serve community, but companies. Why would any sane dev from FreeBSD camp would be proud of supporting closed source operating systems BSD license allows us to do what we want, so next time when someone takes BSD code just shut up. You should be proud Linux took an Atheros driver from you the same as you're proud when OS X and Windows uses your code. The only thing I wish from you is to serve us better.

[kraftman]

Linux is great.
FreeBSD is great.

Linux is open source, and FreeBSD is open source.
They are both open source. So they are open source friends!

That's a whole of bullshit. They were never friends. Linux is friendly to Open Source Community. FreeBSD uses anti-community license which mainly serves companies and closed products. MS and Apple are laughing from idiots who think Linux and BSD have the same purpose and goals. Their Open Source is much different.

[kraftman]

FreeBSD serving some serious data? That seems about right. HPC appliances like Panasas blades run FreeBSD to push 40 gigabit infiniband traffic. Do you really think these guys are "Good ole boys?" That would make for an interesting comparison: Lustre versus Panasas.

Yeah, MS embracing FreeBSD ... right. What about the Novell pact they have? Remember those 30 some odd Microsoft patents Linux violates (EDIT: allegedly)? If you sign with SuSE you're immune! How about Moonlight and Mono (which are open source)?

FreeBSD is very friendly in general.

I don't see what you're trying to say here. They simply don't exist in HPC, so stop kidding. Yes, MS, Apple and any other company that's anti Linux. Novell is just a part of Linux and we know Novell sucks. It doesn't really matter if Moonlight (which seems to be dead now) and Mono are Open Source. Their made by MS fanboy or employee Icaza. No, they're usually friendly to MS and Apple, but hostile to Linux and real Open Source community.

[locovaca]

Sounds like you need better lawyers, it's quite clear that GPL only affects distribution of binary code, this is the very reason FSF added another licence (AGPL) which prevents this should the code author not want to allow the 'application service provider' loophole (used by Google and many others) which exists in GPL. But it's up to the code author to explicitly prevent this by choosing AGPL (or any other licence which prevents this).

You are a technical person. Try explaining to a judge and/or jury who's technology experience consists of Facebook that installing compiled software on a set of servers ISN'T distribution. Maybe they'd get it, maybe not, but it's not a risk they were willing to take.

GPL has existed for over 20 years and the only lawsuits brought against offenders have been those who have distributed GPL-licenced _binary_ code without providing the source code.

You mean the only people who have been caught. Just because there isn't a cop gunning doesn't make going 15 mph over the speed limit legal either.

[nslay]

I don't see what you're trying to say here. They simply don't exist in HPC, so stop kidding. Yes, MS, Apple and any other company that's anti Linux. Novell is just a part of Linux and we know Novell sucks. It doesn't really matter if Moonlight (which seems to be dead now) and Mono are Open Source. Their made by MS fanboy or employee Icaza. No, they're usually friendly to MS and Apple, but hostile to Linux and real Open Source community.

Nobody is kidding here. Just because you don't see FreeBSD on HPC doesn't mean it's not there. FreeBSD runs on Panasas blades and serves the high performance PanFS to Linux clients over infiniband. It's strong evidence that it's extremely capable of pushing serious data ... and that's exactly what Netflix does except that it doesn't use 40 gigabit low latency connections.

Novell and Panasas serve as big gaping holes in your silly conspiracy theory.

What you call the "real open source community" is hostile to anyone and anything not ascribing to GPL, even if it is also open source.

Ever give away any of your old stuff and say, "Well, it has to be used this way and that way" ... that's the kind freedom GPL offers. You can have my old shorts as long as you wear it with a black or blue shirt and they must be the same brand.

[XorEaxEax]

You are a technical person. Try explaining to a judge and/or jury who's technology experience consists of Facebook that installing compiled software on a set of servers ISN'T distribution. Maybe they'd get it, maybe not, but it's not a risk they were willing to take.

Not sure what you mean by 'they', Google and Facebook tons of others provide these services-online while not opening up their GPL-licenced modified linux versions they run in-house. I'd say they have pretty good lawyers which has done thorough interpretation on what their oblications are under GPL. Also FSF would not have created AGPL if they did not recognize that the GPL does not have any bearing on online services.

You mean the only people who have been caught. Just because there isn't a cop gunning doesn't make going 15 mph over the speed limit legal either.

Ehh, been caught? I'm not following, what else could they be 'caught' for other than not complying with the licence which they agreed on when distributing GPL-licenced code? It's simple, if you distribute binary code licenced under GPL you need to make the source code available to the recipients. If you do not then you are violating the agreement and can be sued for compliance.

Obviously very few GPL violations actually leads to a lawsuit, just like very few legal violations actually end up being penalized.
But since you are legally bound to supply source code when distributing binaries containing GPL licenced code, you as a rights-holder has the option of suing should someone use your GPL licenced code without complying with the licence.

[Ex-Cyber]

It's conceivable that some SaaS deployments could end up with copyright snags, if you're serving more than just a pure API. For example, a GUI might contain copyrighted elements, and if you served it as an HTML5 interface or something superficially similar (X/RFB/RDP), you could theoretically run afoul of copyright (via "broadcast" if nothing else). I'd think that would be an edge case, though, and I've never heard of it actually happening (and it seems like the press would make a big deal out of it considering the current hype about "cloud computing" and SaaS).

[vertexSymphony]

Awwww, madtrolls are mad that Netflix choosed FreeBSD instead of Linux for servers ... awwwwwww ♥

[vertexSymphony]

This is correct. While large companies like Facebook and Google do contribute code back to the Linux community, they aren't required to contribute back all of their modifications. It's great that they contribute back to the community, but you can bet that Facebook, Google, Twitter etc. haven't released *all* of their changes back to the community.

Netflix's decision to use FreeBSD for their CDN was based on the technical merits of FreeBSD and because the engineers in charge of that project like FreeBSD. It's a great operating system with solid performance. It just doesn't have the mindshare of Linux-based operating systems. I use FreeBSD and Linux-based distros, and each have their strength and weaknesses.

In addition, Netflix uses plenty of Linux. Just look at the job descriptions for the open positions.

-= Stefan

Best answer so far♥

[kraftman]

Nobody is kidding here. Just because you don't see FreeBSD on HPC doesn't mean it's not there. FreeBSD runs on Panasas blades and serves the high performance PanFS to Linux clients over infiniband. It's strong evidence that it's extremely capable of pushing serious data ... and that's exactly what Netflix does except that it doesn't use 40 gigabit low latency connections.

Nobody is saying FreeBSD is not able to work for them. They can use Solaris or Windows as well. The main point is their stupid announcement and another one the decision wasn't technical.

Novell and Panasas serve as big gaping holes in your silly conspiracy theory.

My theory is MS does everything to make Linux weaker - Novell pact, Xapian and their mono and moonlight, secure boot. Netflix has very close relation with MS, so they chose MS friendly and anti-Linux FreeBSD.

What you call the "real open source community" is hostile to anyone and anything not ascribing to GPL, even if it is also open source.

BSD community have nothing to Linux and GNU. People should realize only Linux and GNU are the right way. BSD licensed products just makes Community weaker. It's Linux and GNU that's the essence of Open Source and they're fighting against monopoly. On opposite - BSD just serves them.

Ever give away any of your old stuff and say, "Well, it has to be used this way and that way" ... that's the kind freedom GPL offers. You can have my old shorts as long as you wear it with a black or blue shirt and they must be the same brand.

That's the kind of Freedom stupid folks don't understand. It's not about the code being 'whore', so you can do what you want with it. It's about Freedom to use, modify, protect your software and what's the most important - compete. BSD is a 'whore' license while GPL is a 'virgin' one.