Comment bling unbound (Score 1) 319
I let my Linux Mint desktop slide way out of the support envelop while I waited for PC-BSD to become a viable replacement. I had a single FreeBSD machine running ZFS as my server, which had been rock solid, but I'd never run a BSD desktop before. Then in a single week it was "BSD everywhere" on my home network.
I embrace change on my own terms (which is not change caused by the Gnome developers becoming bored of their own architecture, or Canonical deciding that tablets are the new shit). PC-BSD features boot environments. This amounts to an "undo" key for your operating system. Batch patch? Nuke the fucker.
I can temporize for years, then jump in with both boots if the time seems right.
It's one of the worst things about computing culture that we still collectively tolerate: the notion that capability upgrades are welded at the hip to work flow "innovation". Install a new OS, you're guaranteed to get a mixture of both.
I'd vastly prefer the tick-tock model as practised by Intel (or the alternating new airframe / new engine model as practised by Boeing) where releases that muck with the established user interface change no underlying features / capabilities at all (so the only reason anyone installs the GUI refactor release is because you actually want to partake in the bling rebinding).
Hopefully BSD won't someday lose its mind like Linux did, in which your trusty tighty-whities suddenly becomes a full-body support corset (with no-one asked). Personally, I can handle the change from tighty-whities to rc.d boxer shorts just fine, thank you very much.