> OpenBSD devs go out of their way to delete unused and crufty code.
I noticed this first hand in while submitting a patch for my macbook's touchpad to FreeBSD's wsp driver and then comparing to OpenBSD's driver... The approaches between FreeBSD's and OpenBSD's driver couldn't be more opposite: FreeBSD's is big, explicitly listing each hardware revision/model (hence the reason I had to go in there and add mine), OpenBSD's very minimal, implicitly inferring all hardware revision options so users don't have to add each and every one, it's also very neat and tidy which I think is an underrated quality in source.
Admittedly this is only one file from one small number of devs, far from the whole of FreeBSD, but the contrast matches much of what i've heard of OpenBSD's approach: minimise cruft and bad code, if it's shit and not easy to re-write then delete it, better to be minimal than buggy and insecure.
Full Disclosure: My comment may well be outdated since I moved away from FreeBSD for my desktop 2 years ago, I have nothing against it, I just needed (other) working drivers.
I noticed this first hand in while submitting a patch for my macbook's touchpad to FreeBSD's wsp driver and then comparing to OpenBSD's driver... The approaches between FreeBSD's and OpenBSD's driver couldn't be more opposite: FreeBSD's is big, explicitly listing each hardware revision/model (hence the reason I had to go in there and add mine), OpenBSD's very minimal, implicitly inferring all hardware revision options so users don't have to add each and every one, it's also very neat and tidy which I think is an underrated quality in source.
Admittedly this is only one file from one small number of devs, far from the whole of FreeBSD, but the contrast matches much of what i've heard of OpenBSD's approach: minimise cruft and bad code, if it's shit and not easy to re-write then delete it, better to be minimal than buggy and insecure.
Full Disclosure: My comment may well be outdated since I moved away from FreeBSD for my desktop 2 years ago, I have nothing against it, I just needed (other) working drivers.