I have been using OSX for about 7 months now, not primarily as a replacement for MacOS, but as a replacement for LinuxPPC as well. Mac OSX is a hybrid *nix, a cross between NeXT/OpenStep (which was in turn derived from BSD 4.1) and FreeBSD. The filesystem layout is derived from the changes that happened for NeXT, making directories easier to setup for netboot and their derivative of NIS, NetInfo. The display system is derived from the NeXTStep Display Postscript model, updated to use PDF instead as a more recent standard. There are some things which that NeXT heritage brings to the table that Apple hasn't fully used yet, like built-in kernel support for clustering, the above-mentioned netboot, and cross-platform binary compatability (under openstep, the same BINARY could run on Sparc, i386, or NeXT68k). FreeBSD brings to the table a better TCP stack, better filesystem compatability, the BSD's most recent stable port of GCC, and a better set of tools all around. I saw somebody posted about Fink, which is definity cool, but since we're all geeks here, I'll confide in you all that the way to go is the Darwin ports collection, a direct port of the BSD ports tree system. It is much more flexible, and gives you access to a LOT more software. You can get all the details at http://gnu-darwin.sourceforge.net. The guy who maintains it was just profiled by Apple, you can find that on their site.... I hope this sheds some light on the subject... Kris Browne Taylor Corporation Imprinting Group SGI/Unix System Administrator