NetBSD is a complete, free, secure, portable operating system, belonging to the BSD and UNIX family, available on many platforms, from 64-bit Opteron CPUs to desktop computers or embedded systems.
Its simple structure and source code quality make it very suitable for production environments, research, or dedicated systems.
System resources are available to any user. NetBSD has a packet repository called pkgsrc, which now contains over 6,000 packages.
Pkgsrc, short for package source, is a utility used to extract and install packages for all systems with the BSD kernel.
It’s based on the command line and is very powerful as it supports Dependency Tracking, platform selection, complex configurations to modify software resources and ease application installation. Binary packages that are produced by pkgsrc can be used without the need for compilation from source.
NetBSD already contains the tools required to manage binary packages and a list of packages, including links to binary packages, is available. Binary packages are available on ftp.NetBSD.org and mirrors in the /pub/pkgsrc/packages/ folder.
If the binary package management tools does not exist or are too old, they are provided with the binary packages in an archive called bootstrap.tar.gz, which should be extracted in the root directory.
In some platforms, you need bootstrap pkgsrc to get and install the management toolkit.
And only after that, you can run the pkg_add utility to install the binary packages.
The pkgsrc system is not limited to NetBSD, but it can run on Solaris, Linux, Darwin, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, IRIX, BSD/OS, AIX, Interix, DragonFlyBSD and OSF/1.
NetBSD is derived from the BSD and 386BSD operating systems.
The NetBSD project has emerged as a result of the 386BSD community’s dissatisfaction with the pace and direction of operating system development.
The goal of the NetBSD project is to provide a stable and fast operating system, be portable, interact well with other systems, and be compliant with standards.
NetBSD is the most portable operating system in the world and currently runs on 57 architectures, including 17 types of processors.
Characteristics:
1. Clean design
NetBSD supports a wide range of hardware thanks to its highly scripted code.
2. BSD License
Even if NetBSD uses GCC and other GPL-licensed programs, the kernel and many other utilities in the core components are under BSD license.
3. Security
NetBSD has the lowest number of bugs reported in public forums, such as bugtraq.
4. Mature and stable
NetBSD is used at NASA’s Numerical Aerospace Simulation because they need a stable operating system from which different dedicated projects can be made.
NetBSD is used on Microsoft servers that prefer it on its own Microsoft Windows Server (unverified information).
NetBSD was the first free operating system to implement the IPv6 standard, USB support, and 64bit architecture.
At source code level, NetBSD is approximately fully compliant with POSIX.1 (IEEE 1003.1-1990) and POSIX.2 (IEEE 1003.2-1992).
The project is hosted by Internet Systems Consortium Inc, Helsinki University of Technology, and Columbia University.