IBU

English What We Are

• BSD - Unix developers & consultants & service providers & users, freelancers & employees & company owners, focusing & supporting & promoting local BSD-Unix usage, for FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, BSD/OS, (Apple's) Darwin etc.
• For all member's BSD personal & business benefit, for both the BSD fun & profit of members, & for the encouragment of increased BSD development & contribution back to the wider BSD communities.
• More than just a Berkeley monthly drinkers/ Stammtisch club, & more than just a BSD local chat list (though both those are provided too).
• We encourage BSD contacts in the wider community, & hold/attend periodic BSD English events.
• Jobs: If anyone finds BSD jobs through BIM, doesn't matter who & whether employee or freelancer: we're pleased for them: A more buoyant computer sector, & an expanded BSD sector in Munich is good for most people's BSD job security & career/ mobility prospects.
• English We provide certain Internet services in Munich for BSD systems & people, Examples:
  • Web server space for BSD compliant source code etc,
  • FTP server
  • Webmail & Cvsup server
  • Mail lists for BSD activities.
  • logins (not dial-ins) to BSD hosts, including compilers etc.
  • To minimise our (unpaid) support effort, BIM server users are required to interface to our facilities with BSD or at least Linux &/or public standards compliant systems
  • We have no time to waste on peoples Microsoft access problems, (unless you are willing to pay us, in which case we have consultants available at commercial rates).
• Open to all nationalities. Computer developers use English on international mail lists, but German is sometimes be used for issues of purely local scope (but best not for technical issues we may want to refer to international mail lists)
• Our monthly Stammtisch speaks a mix of both languages.
• (There are German language mail lists for non Munich-local stuff, available via majordomo@DE.FreeBSD.ORG).
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What We Are Not

• Linux ?

  Sorry, not as such. There is a good choice of Linux groups here (A few of our membership go to both BIM & Linux groups, & some BIM members work on Linux professionaly & BSD privately, etc). If you solely want to discuss the Linux base systems, excluding all packages. then a Linux group may appeal more, but do realise the Vast amount of commonality Linux & BSD systems share, eg GCC & ghostscript & other FSF & X11 & KDE & perl & vmware & tens of thousands of other public source packages that can run on both BSD and Linux. BSD & Linux on occasion also adopt portions from each others /usr/src, ideas &/or code, so we co-operate in that, as in also our common dislike of closed source, Microsoft, viruses & software patent problems etc. Our limited free time mandates a BSD-only approach to the base /usr/src systems support, (but of course we share an interest in Many apps with Linux people, etc ).
  • We also have some people who regularly go to both our Stammtisch & a Linux Stammtisch the same evening.
  • We also have people who work with Linux during the day, & switch to BSD in the evening.
  • We also discuss & use common things, eg FSF, GCC, X Windows, Qt, Tex , FVWM window manager, EXMH window manager, open office, & a ports collection of tens of thousands of packages, doubtless many of which will run on Linux too, some developed on Linux & merely ported to BSD, & some other way round).
  • We do of course discussing porting stuff to & fro between Linux & BSD,
  • What we do not't cover is Linux specific distro & interface etc stuff, leaving that to the Linux groups to discuss.
  • Linux magazines are also distributes at thhe the BIM Stammtisch, eg an article on TeX is equally valid for Linux & BSD.
  • Munich Linux User Groups
  • The English Munich Internet Verein support users of all operating system, including Linux. (Some of their servers are FreeBSD, some SunOS).

• Micro$oft ? NO ! We dislike the company, its products, & environment.

  
  
  • Either Convert to BSD (or Linux) ( available on many computers : ( alpha amiga arc arm32 atari hp300 hppa i386 kbus m68k mac68k mips mvme68k mvme88k pc532 pmax powerpc sparc sun3 vax wgrisc latest list on front right column of NetBSD),
    
  • Or Do All Of These:
    • Find some other club ( we have no interest in configuring access for Micro$oft software ).
    • Do Not Contact Us , we will not waste time on Microsoft compatibility problems. ( One reasons BIM was formed, was to avoid being bored & burdened by clueless Micro$oft users. .)
    • Ask your Micro$oft oriented ISPs, & Vendors For Help, Not Us ! There are lots of Micro$oft oriented ISPs & software & system vendors, some of whom made money selling you software & systems, so burden them with Micro$oft related problems, Not Us !
    • Look for Some Other Club that might help or interest you.