Free UNIX derivative DragonFly 2.0 released

Version 2.0 of the FreeBSD spin-off, DragonFly BSD, is available for immediate download. The eighth major release of the project contains a new filesystem along with better hardware support, bug fixes and new software.

One of the highlights of the new version is the Hammer file system, which can handle snapshots and includes features like undo and rollback. Hammer also removes the need to run fsck after a crash.

Developers have worked hard with improvements in the drivers for network and WiFi cards. There are also improvements to the Bluetooth stack, and the FreeBSD driver for the Omnikey CardMan 4040 smartcard reader is now integrated into DragonFly BSD.

The system is available on an installable live CD that lets users first test compatibility with their hardware. DragonFly BSD can then be installed on a hard drive using either a command line installer or a still experimental browser-based installer. The project provides detailed installation instructions in the read-me file.

DragonFly BSD started in June 2003 when it split off from the FreeBSD project. Matthew Dillon of the FreeBSD team who started DragonFly, callied it the "logical continuation" of the 4.x FreeBSD series. As a spin-off of FreeBSD, DragonFly BSD is one of the free UNIX derivatives based on the free 4.4BSDLite2 release. Some of the best known representatives of these BSD systems are OpenBSD, FreeBSD, and NetBSD.

(djwm)