The Definitive Guide to PC-BSD Frugal Unix for Power Users

PC-BSD first began back in early 2005 with a simple beta release, which only provided a basic graphical installer to get a system loaded with FreeBSD 6 and KDE 3. This release was simply to test out the functionality of our installer and to begin laying the groundwork for a new method of package management for the open source desktop. However, the biggest drive for creating PC-BSD actually began in the years prior to the first release, as I had begun to dabble in open source desktops on our family computers. Our first experience with open source on the desktop was very mixed. Naturally, not all hardware would work properly, and after some initial struggles we ended up with some fairly stable systems. However, as we began using the systems on a daily basis, we quickly ran into other problems in the area of package management that could not be easily solved. By design, the various open source systems would simply treat every software package as a part of the core desktop. Thus, when we wished to perform updates to a particular application, the software manager would determine which other packages on the system needed to be updated to complete the task. While this would usually work without a hitch, too often for our comfort something would end up getting changed or broken in a (seemingly) unrelated piece of software just from doing something simple such as trying to update a small desktop application.