[metalforever]

There are a few nice to haves that would really help me out with making an open bsd transition. I thought of writing them myself because I am getting very fed up with Linux for the above reasons.

- IDE support is an issue still

- Filesystem challenging when using a laptop that runs out of battery

- MATE lacking volume and WiFi controls

- This one is just me being picky but a GUI to help me gain a better understanding of the security settings or alternatively more up to date books.

- I am not exactly sure on how to correctly use virtualization and I need it to support docker workloads at work

[skydhash]

Your points are valid but I'd like to present counterpoints:

> IDE support is an issue still

IMO, languages and platforms that require IDEs, also leads to complex software that is hard to maintain. The only exception is smalltalk.

> Filesystem challenging when using a laptop that runs out of battery

Easily resolved by using apmd and it `-z` flag. I think there's a couple utility out there that you can script for monitoring battery level.

> MATE lacking volume and WiFi controls

One of the good strength of OpenBSD is that the cli utilities are quite nice that I've not installed gui replacements (I'm using cwm). I don't mind doing a few `doas ifconfig` every once in a while.

> but a GUI to help me gain a better understanding of the security settings

I'm with you on that one. But the man pages are truly extensive. And the OS code is fairly readable.

> how to correctly use virtualization

Current vm solution is very bare. For docker, you'll need a linux VM, but the installation process maybe troublesome. It only supports serial interaction, which can be disabled by default in some distros.

[lelanthran]

>> MATE lacking volume and WiFi controls

> One of the good strength of OpenBSD is that the cli utilities are quite nice that I've not installed gui replacements (I'm using cwm). I don't mind doing a few `doas ifconfig` every once in a while.

I also don't mind doing things like this for network, but for volume this is very much an instant always-there requirement. If I need to mute/lower/raise the volumne in a hurry, I don't want to hunt for the application playing the sound, then find the volume slider on it, etc.

This is literally a deal-breaker for desktop/laptop users.

What I'd like to know, if there are any OpenBSD people reading, is how hard is it to contribute a fix or similar to make the desktop environment's volume control work?

I can obviously fix it for myself with some gui script/keyboard shortcut/etc, but I'd rather have anything be in the default installation whenever I refresh the install.

[skydhash]

You can bind the command to a key on your keyboard easily. And I believe there are similar utilities in DEs (I use cwm).

[metalforever]

Hello, thank you for taking the time to respond.

“ IMO, languages and platforms that require IDEs, also leads to complex software that is hard to maintain. ”

The truth is that I (and probably other users) don’t always have the luxury of choice and a large portion of commercial codebases have a very large number of files. Sometimes, it is multiple codebases at once with a very large number of files .

“ Easily resolved by using apmd and it `-z` flag. I think there's a couple utility out there that you can script for monitoring battery level.”

Yeah but I don’t want to accidentally lose data if I shut the lid and accidentally forget to plug the thing in for a few days . “ One of the good strength of OpenBSD is that the cli utilities are quite nice”

I don’t want to enter and exit a cli tool in order to increase and decrease the volume . Ideally it’s a control in the top right or a keyboard mapping . What if something loud begins playing in a browser tab and I have to change the volume quickly?

[accrual]

Hello! Here are my thoughts on your totally valid concerns of using OpenBSD on a laptop.

> IDE support is an issue still

Yes, I agree. I enjoy using VSCode for most projects and there is no native support today in 2025 as far as I know. It is possible to use the web version (vscode.dev), but naturally, this lacks some features of the desktop application.

Typically I use some lightweight editor like Leafpad which has some basic IDE features. Not a replacement for a real IDE, but just an idea.

> Filesystem challenging when using a laptop that runs out of battery

Yes, OpenBSD uses FFS2 as the default file system. It's a solid filesystem with extensive history and testing, but it's not particularly tolerant of sudden power loss. In my experience most OpenBSD systems will come back online automatically after power loss, but there is a risk it will drop into single user mode if `fsck` wants a human in the loop.

There are some things one can do to help mitigate this, granted it's not very appealing coming from a more fault tolerant journalling FS: automated backups, using the `sync` option on your main data partitions (can affect performance), and of course monitoring power as mentioned.

IMO, this is a bit easier to manage on desktop or server roles where one can put everything behind a UPS.

> MATE lacking volume and WiFi controls

I haven't used MATE on OpenBSD. It's possible it's a combination of hardware + OpenBSD + MATE if it's not working. I know I have had working media controls on OpenBSD laptops in the past but I tend to stick with older laptops, Thinkpads, etc.

There are some in-base utilities to probe media keys and hook into X etc. if you're open to scripting a bit on your own hardware.

But yeah, after using Linux on laptops, it would be annoying for media keys to not Just Work after installation.

> This one is just me being picky but a GUI to help me gain a better understanding of the security settings or alternatively more up to date books.

Fortunately, there aren't too many security settings to change on OpenBSD. The most common one for laptops would be to enable SMT, e.g. enable hyperthreading on CPUs that support it. It is disabled by default as SMT is difficult to secure properly, but it does naturally improve performance. The command is `sysctl hw.smt=1`, or `echo 'hw.smt=1' >> /etc/sysctl.conf` to make it permanent.

> I am not exactly sure on how to correctly use virtualization and I need it to support docker workloads at work

Virtualization is a little unusual on OpenBSD. It's not quite as flexible as qemu, FreeBSD jails, bhyve, KVM, etc. The `vmm` and `vmd` systems were built in-house by the OpenBSD team. It is currently limited to just one core per VM the last I checked, and only supported serial and not VGA, so no way to run Windows under it for example.

I have had great success running Alpine Linux under OpenBSD and then running Docker on top of that, which opens the door for many tools and apps to run under an OpenBSD hypervisor.

There are also some VPS providers out there that fully dogfood OpenBSD and run their entire VM architecture on OpenBSD, such as OpenBSD Amsterdam, so it is totally viable depending on what one needs to virtualize.

Of course, one can run qemu on OpenBSD and virtualize whatever the heart desires.

---

That said, while OpenBSD can be a great laptop OS, it can require a bit more setup and understanding compared to a mainstream Linux OS. IMO it's still worth playing around with, even in a VM or on different hardware (desktop, Raspberry Pi, etc.) just to see the OpenBSD way of doing things, because it is truly a wonderful OS to use and learn. Other OSs start to feel a bit clunky to me after using OpenBSD for a while. :)

[lproven]

This reads to me like LLM output.

[f1shy]

> - IDE support is an issue still

I thought it was about the parallel ATA. And I tought "who uses that still?!" but is about IDEs for programming...

sorry about the topic deviation, but I laughed hard.

[metalforever]

Does everyone really just use vim? This one surprised me as a problem.

[skydhash]

You only need an IDE if you’re dealing with lots of symbols and a complicated module system (Java, .Net). That’s when you need a code indexing tool. For a lot of language, a text editor is enough.

[galangalalgol]

Vim with ale is pretty great in any language with a language server that I've tried.

[i-zu]

You are not the only one.

[thesuitonym]

> alternatively more up to date books.

One of the reasons you don't see a lot of books around OpenBSD (aside from the very small userbase) is that the built-in documentation is so good. The manpages are actually worth reading, and for the more complex services, include examples and additional reading.

But still, the rest of your points are very true. OpenBSD is really not for everybody, but I think that's one of its strengths. It works extremely well for the people it works for, because it's not trying to coax new users into the fold.

Also, you know, like you don't have to use OpenBSD for everything. I still have plenty of Linux servers, and Linux computers, because there are some things OpenBSD is not suited to.