BSDi to Deliver Packaged BSD Operating System Through Mainstream Retail Outlets

New Desktop Operating System Package Includes FreeBSD, Applixware Office Suite and Partition Magic

Linux Business Expo, Atlanta, GA, September 26, 2000 - BSDi announced the new BSD Desktop Edition to fill the growing demand for packaged BSD operating systems. The BSD Desktop Edition will be available at retail outlets including BestBuy, CompUSA, Fry's, MicroCenter, Staples, and RCS as well as BSDi's http://www.freebsdmall.com/.

The BSD Desktop Edition includes the latest releases of the popular FreeBSD open source operating system; Applixware Office Suite from VistaSource, a complete desktop productivity package including word processor, html authoring, spreadsheet, presentation manager, e-mail, and graphics; and Partition Magic from PowerQuest for running multiple operating systems on the same personal computer.

"The demand for BSD operating systems in the retail channel is increasing enormously," said Mark Garver, BSDi's Group Executive, Internet Systems Division. "We're bundling the BSD Desktop Edition with Applixware and Partition Magic to address the growing demand for BSD as a personal productivity and Internet development platform."

The BSD Desktop Edition includes a native BSD version of Applixware Office Suite 5.0 as a fast, stable personal productivity system. Partition Magic Special Edition enables effortless switching between multiple operating systems, allowing the user to divide a hard drive into several partitions for efficient organization of operating systems, programs, and data.

FreeBSD 4.1 offers the latest operating system enhancements and contains a number of significant advancements. Key enhancements to FreeBSD 4.1 include industry standard IPv6 and IPSec (for both IPv4 and IPv6) implementations from the KAME Project. Among many enhancements, FreeBSD 4.1 supports raccoon, the KAME IKE daemon, which has been shown to interoperate well with other vendor IKE systems, meaning that FreeBSD 4.1 can be used in a heterogeneous IPSEC environment. Additionally, FreeBSD 4.1 can now be installed on an IPv6-only network, such that IPv4 is not required.

FreeBSD comes standard with:

• Over 3,700 third-party software packages.
• All standard TCP/IP (IPv4 and IPv6) networking services.
• Wide selection of web servers including Apache with PHP3 support, browsers including Netscape Navigator and Communicator, Mozilla, and Lynx; e-mail server software including Sendmail, POP3, IMAP, and LDAP; and e-mail clients including elm, pine, and mh.
• Comprehensive development environment including GNU, Java, C, C++, Perl, Python, Tcl and Emacs development tools and environments.
• Full source for the entire system with an integrated build environment.
• X Window System (XFree86 3.3.6).

Other new features in FreeBSD 4.1 include:

• New event notification facility, kqueue, added to the kernel.
• Support for Intel's Wired for Management 2.0 (PXE) added to boot loader.
• OPIE one-time-password suite updated to version 2.32.
• OpenSSH upgraded to version 2.1.0, including support for SSH2 protocol and DSA keys.
• Support for USB devices included by default and supported in installation.
• Automatic use of Enhanced Disk Drive BIOS extensions for booting beyond cylinder 1024 limit.

PRICING AND AVAILABILITY

The BSD Desktop Edition is priced at $129.99 and will be available in October, 2000.

About BSDi

BSDi delivers Internet infrastructure-grade systems, software and solutions backed by world-renowned professional services and support. BSDi systems power the Internet's most popular sites and highest-volume providers. BSDi customers include Internet service providers (ISPs), application service providers (ASPs), Web hosting, data, and communications centers, corporate intranets, Internet appliance developers, Internet application developers, and hardware/system manufacturers and integrators - including Yahoo, UUnet, Intel, About.com and countless others. Headquartered in Colorado Springs, CO, BSDi is located at 1-719-457-8400 or http://www.bsdi.com/.

BSD, BSD/OS, and BSDi are trademarks or registered trademarks of Berkeley Software Design, Inc. Other trademarks are property of the respective owners. BSD technologies were originally developed by the University of California, Berkeley and its contributors.