Here I'm republishing an old blog post of mine originally from April 1st 2015. The article has been slightly improved.
This post reveals a new Arch distribution: _ArchBSD/Open_!
The new distro's leaked logo (PNG)
I know that this comes unexpectedly, I was surprised, too, after all. In fact it was just by accident that I learned about the new project that will be officially announced on the OpenBSD Journal any day now.
Arch Linux is a Linux distro that is small, simple and light-weight. And it has pacman! This combination proves to be a real success story. Besides Arch Linux we have today: _Arch Linux|ARM_, _ArchBang_, _ArchHurd_ and probably even more Arches!
Right, one of these other ones is ArchBSD - I've blogged about it almost two years ago. It is still around, so it obviously managed to survive. It's a nice little distro but there's one thing wrong with it: The name! Why that? Because it is a FreeBSD distribution and even FreeBSD users admit now and then that this is not the only BSD system out there! Right now all other BSD systems are discriminated against. This is a situation both unacceptable and unbearable which must come to an end immediately! It is a matter of life and death? justin? _justice_!
To reflect the fact that it is not the only BSD, the project totally needs to change the name to _ArchBSD/Free_.
Promised some background, eh? Here's a daemon police wallpaper! (PNG)
A petition that will force the maintainers with tens of thousands of signatures will soon be started. Feel free to hop over to their forum (update: it's gone) and tell them that their project name downright sucks, if you can't wait. Explain why and start demanding that the project be renamed. And while you are at it, tell 'em that _ArchBSD/Free_ is so much cooler, anyway! It sounds more important, it's more precise, more fun _and more to type_!
There are three reasons why ArchBSD/Open was created. The first one is: With ArchBSD's name change to ArchBSD/Free the need arose to provide an ArchBSD/something because otherwise that addition to the name would just sound stupid and be superfluous.
The second one: The world needs more Arch!!
That and the fact that Puffy just loves pacman! (Well, everybody does, right?)
Well, while the distro itself is already completed, there's of course one little detail which blocks the publication. No, it's not even something technical. Or perhaps it is. Depends on how you look at it. The problem is: The webpage for it is not done, yet! Yeah, it's the simple things in life which can cause the biggest trouble.
So what's the release date? Unfortunately there's no release date currently. Why? Ok, ok, if you absolutely must know, I'll tell you. All technical difficulties of bringing Pacman to OpenBSD were solved rather quickly. But despite the team's best efforts, they have not been able to agree on the website design! Er, that is, there is no design, yet, which to agree on...
Think about it for a minute and you'll see why: FreeBSD's mascot is Beastie. He's a daemon with a fork (and rather _awk_ward shoes for whatever reason - probably he just likes them). That's an easy mascot to work with as it is not hard at all to imagine an _Arch daemon_: A bigger, badder and probably even redder version of Beastie. But OpenBSD's mascot is Puffy! Now what on earth does an _Arch Blowfish_ look like and how to come up with a nice theme where it fits in?!
There have been voices inside the team to just make a simple webpage for now and get the release done. The OS was more important than the theme after all. Those ignorants have been kicked off the team of course and their access revoked. That's a bit harsh? No, not at all! Sorry, this is _OpenBSD_ after all. You cannot make a release without high quality artwork!
Puffy shot first! An example of the very nice OpenBSD artwork (PNG)
Oh, stop complaining now, will you? If it weren't for one of the expelled, I wouldn't have learned about the project's existence and that means you, too, wouldn't. Now the big question is: Will ArchBSD/Open ever be released? *sigh* Frankly speaking, I don't know. I didn't manage to make contact with the project leader.
But after trying to get in contact _for weeks_ now there's one thing that I can say for sure: The whole team leaves a rather _fishy_ impression!
