FreeBSD Working To Establish An AI Policy After Polling Developers (www.phoronix.com)

submitted 1 day ago by SocialistVibes01@lemmy.ml to c/opensource@lemmy.ml

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The FreeBSD Project published its Q3'2026 status report on Tuesday that outlines a number of development initiatives to ongoing work around an AI policy for this BSD operating system.

FreeBSD polled their developers on the usage of AI and LLMs as a hot topic for the quarter. An overwhelming 88% want the FreeBSD Project to adopt an AI policy. 35% of those polled want AI-assisted code to be disclosed while 22% felt it should be treated just like any other code contribution and only 16% want AI generated code to be rejected outright. 65% of the respondents were in favor of AI-generated documentation with human review.

FreeBSD has established an AI working group to work on drafting an AI policy. Final reports are expected in Q4.

FreeBSD developers have also had to spend a lot of time preparing for the EU's Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) such as around Software Bill of Materials (SBOM) support.

FreeBSD has also seen work on a GUI for the Bhyve hypervisor written in Freepascal/Lazarus. This Bhyvemgr GUI is coming along well to help in managing of Bhyve VMs:

https://www.phoronix.net/image.php?id=2026&image=bhyvemgr_med

Meanwhile on the web management/UI side, Sylve continues looking quite slick as a unified system management platform for FreeBSD from the web browser. Adding in the past quarter were new storage options, data center / cluster features, and more.

https://www.phoronix.net/image.php?id=2026&image=sylve_med

FreeBSD also continues seeing work to enhance desktop installations of the operating system and more polishing of the desktop experience. Related have also been more suspend/resume and audio stack improvements.

Some other FreeBSD happenings include improving zoned storage support, debugging enhancements, a variety of scheduler improvements, and enhancing the bootloader.

More details on these FreeBSD improvements made during Q3 can be found via FreeBSD.org.

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[-] Imnebuddy@lemmy.ml 6 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago)

So originally this comment suggested an alternative to FreeBSD that takes an Anti-AI stance called CoffeeBSD. It's specifically a fork of FreeBSD 13.0, which is a bit odd since the untainted commits to FreeBSD occur in later versions. It removed the lua bootloader interpreter and added a few md files and hasn't received updates in a few months. I suggested this as I thought it would be interesting to keep an eye on, but as for now it seems yet another fork with not a lot of support and could likely die off. It's created by a contributor of the AI-less fork of vim, EVi, as well as other projects.

35% of those polled want AI-assisted code to be disclosed while 22% felt it should be treated just like any other code contribution and only 16% want AI generated code to be rejected outright.

I find it depressing that many developers don't want to even bother taking the time and care to disclose when AI assisted some code contributions. I'm tired of most software eating its own tail and not taking precautions in case legal issues occur which would lead to reverting the AI assisted commits.

[-] strawberry_enjoyer42@lemmy.blahaj.zone 14 points 1 day ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

More confirmation that NetBSD is the right choice for me :3

[-] onlooker@lemmy.ml 1 points 14 hours ago

How so?

[-] halm@leminal.space 5 points 14 hours ago

https://linuxiac.com/netbsd-new-policy-prohibits-usage-of-ai-code/, probably.

[-] fuzzy@beige.party -4 points 14 hours ago

@halm thanks.

The Linuxiac headline is titillating, but false. Maybe based on disinformation.

It's fairly well-known that NetBSD has not banned AI-generated code.

I gained a balanced answer from Anthropic Claude a few weeks ago, to help tackle misinformation in Reddit. 2026-10-17:

https://claude.ai/share/a6b7b467-db4e-4c8c-972e-7c22d26b1d6a

Cc @onlooker

#NetBSD #AI #misinformation

https://claude.ai/share/a6b7b467-db4e-4c8c-972e-7c22d26b1d6a

[-] halm@leminal.space 7 points 11 hours ago

Oh, you asked Claude. That settles it then 🙄

[-] tfb@mastodon.bsd.cafe 3 points 13 hours ago

@fuzzy The Linuxiac headline is accurate. The "with approval by core" exception doesn't negate their policy. The example they gave as something they would be willing to consider is uncopyrightable changes, like changes to whitespace.

There have been to date no exceptions made, and none are forseen.
@halm @onlooker

[-] jaypatelani@lemmy.ml 3 points 13 hours ago

https://mastodon.sdf.org/@washbear/117435137561965715

[-] fuzzy@beige.party 1 points 5 hours ago

@jaypatelani also, for giggles, there's an extremist anti-AI site that describes NetBSD's AI policy as permissive.

I'll allow people to find their own way there.

[-] strawberry_enjoyer42@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 13 hours ago

As @halm@leminal.space said, it's because of their firm stance regarding LLM-generated.

[-] fuzzy@beige.party 1 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago)

@SocialistVibes01 I can't see any of the three previous replies in Mastodon, is that normal? A limitation of Lemmy, maybe?

In Lemmy (not logged in), I see a response from Imnebuddy less than thirty minutes ago.

https://beige.party/@Imnebuddy@lemmy.ml (logged in to Mastodon) shows nothing more recent than https://lemmy.ml/post/41935087 – ten months ago.

#Fediverse #Lemmy #Mastodon

https://lemmy.ml/post/41935087

[-] Imnebuddy@lemmy.ml 1 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

I wonder if I was specifically blocked. Not sure what I did. I'm not as active on this account, and sometimes I have posted some unpopular material because I am a communist, though my most unpopular post I shared a video that I later realized was created by an Anti-China ultra that I do not agree with, though the video itself still holds value and some truth after the election. I'm not great at being eloquent and charismatic when trying to make marxist-leninist arguments to help educate and raise class consciousness, but I'm trying to work on it. I try not to be disrespectful unless someone is treating me or someone poorly.

[-] fuzzy@beige.party 2 points 13 hours ago

@Imnebuddy thanks, you're ahead of me in your thinking.

You're not blocked.

At my profile, I'm open about blocking.

Cc @SocialistVibes01

[-] Imnebuddy@lemmy.ml 1 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago)

I see. I'm not Anti AI, though. I just believe in this capitalist system it is used irresponsibly and against the proletariat. I believe it is a tool, and in a socialist system we can use it to benefit humanity without wrecklessly destroying people's ability to survive. I believe China's use of AI is an example that other countries should follow, treating the tech as infrastructure instead of some cash grab while threatening people and the planet and expanding surveillance against the working class.

Wait, did you block me? If I said anything wrong, I'm willing to discuss in good faith.

[-] fuzzy@beige.party 2 points 12 hours ago

@Imnebuddy

Thanks for asking, and for sharing your beliefs.

You were not previously blocked; you're not blocked now.

[-] SocialistVibes01@lemmy.ml 2 points 18 hours ago

Maybe your instance has defederated from .ml since then.

https://lemmy.ml/instances

We're those pesky commies after all...

[-] fuzzy@beige.party 1 points 14 hours ago

@SocialistVibes01

https://lemmy.ml/instances shows beige.party as:

― linked
― not blocked.

For your Lemmy post, my beige.party view shows:

0 boosts · 0 quotes · 0 favourites

– clearly out of tune with the Lemmy view of its popularity.

My https://mastodon.social/@SocialistVibes01@lemmy.ml/117598276783857430 view of your post is more in tune (screenshot below).

I have a quiet idea about a possible explanation. I'll test something, then follow up, maybe later today.

In the meantime: from the logged-out Lemmy view of your Lemmy post, I see that Imnebuddy probably did see my comment about CoffeeBSD. That's a good thing, although it might negate the possible explanation (above).

Ah, the Mysteries of the Fediverse.

#Fediverse #Lemmy #Mastodon

My logged in view of https://mastodon.social/@SocialistVibes01@lemmy.ml/117598276783857430