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This article will focus on DragonFly BSD. An overview of some specifics of DragonFly BSD will be introduced, too, as well as the most important differences between FreeBSD and DragonFly BSD. DragonFly BSD is more unknown than the FreeBSD giant, yet both are the giant operating systems, both are FreeBSD and everybody can use them at no cost. FreeBSD is often characterized as "the unknown giant among free operating systems". A few IT experts helped to promote this characterization. FreeBSD is extremely fast; it runs on some of the largest servers on earth and yet it is unknown. FreeBSD is the giant among giants. It started from the 386BSD project, which had existed before Linux. It has a different philosophy and because of this it has received less marketing. A Few Notes On What Is BSD BSD is the kernel and userland (operating system software that does not belong in the kernel). Linux is the kernel only. In the BSD world, packages (third-party software) are visibly separated from the kernel and userland. The BSD code is undoubtedly better but there is almost no marketing behind BSD projects. Although DragonFly BSD is FreeBSD, people behind the development of FreeBSD at freebsd.org take responsibility for the development of OS called FreeBSD, which is why DragonFly BSD, although FreeBSD, is called differently. DragonFly BSD has some unique features that FreeBSD does not have yet (at the time of writing this article) - for example, excellent implementation of virtual kernels that run as an isolated OS with its own userland (users can create the root image). Virtual kernel (vkernel) is a very good thing for VPS (Virtual Private Server). Today, Virtual Private Servers are very popular with web hosting companies and their popularity is increasingly growing (security, administrators have root access, etc.). The other unique feature of DragonFlyBSD is HAMMER - a modern, high performance file system with built-in mirroring and historic access functionality. It recovers instantly on boot after a crash (no fsck). DragonFly BSD differs from the present FreeBSD also in that respect that it uses a different package system called PKGSRC. FreeBSD uses ports and the difference between the two is that packages in ports (actually only makefiles and patches) can only be used on the platform they are maintained for; PKGSRC is actually a platform independent system - you just run a few scripts in the PKGSRC tree and you will make PKGSRC work on OpenBSD, FreeBSD, etc. - that is, almost everywhere in compatible Unix-like systems. The advantage of PKGSRC is that developers working on different platforms do not have to maintain the large number of third party applications on every platform separately. Although readers mostly know me as the author of religious (see the resource box) and esoteric (www.freebsd.nfo.sk/esoteric) articles, the good news is that you may use the operating systems such as DragonFly BSD for such a work - that is, for writing articles. You may install tons of packages in it and have the full-blown desktop. I often work with Windows 2000 in emulators such as Virtual Box. DragonFly BSD is a unique operating system that companies on the web hosting market may immediately deploy at no cost. It is even more unknown than FreeBSD, although both are giants and both are FreeBSD. The Dragonfly is one of the fastest-flying insects in the world. Google it and join the fast flight. Juraj's karma with Garuda, just another fast flying creature
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DragonFly BSD, Linux, VPS, virtual kernel, vkernel, MaheshaDragonBSD, FreeBSD, BSD, LiveCD, LiveUSB, PKGSRC, 386BSD, De Raadt, server, webhosting, ftp,
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