Walnut Creek CDROM
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Software distribution |
| Founded | August 1991 |
| Founder | Bob Bruce |
| Defunct | 2000 |
| Headquarters | Walnut Creek, California , United States |
| Products | Freeware, shareware, and free software on CD-ROM; FreeBSD on CD-ROM; Slackware Linux publishing |
Walnut Creek CDROM Inc. was a pioneering distributor specializing in freeware, shareware, and free software delivered on CD-ROM media. Established in August 1991 by Bob Bruce in Walnut Creek, California, it stood among the earliest commercial vendors offering free software via CD-ROMs. The firm released numerous CD-ROM compilations and managed one of the most active FTP servers on the web, ftp.cdrom.com.
History
Among its initial widely used offerings were the Simtel shareware collection for MS-DOS, CICA Shareware targeting Microsoft Windows, and the Aminet archives designed for the Amiga. In January 1994, Walnut Creek issued a set of 350 literary works from Project Gutenberg, marking one of the earliest ebook compilations available.
From its inception in 1993, Walnut Creek forged a close collaboration with the FreeBSD open source Unix-like operating system initiative. It published FreeBSD on CD-ROM, provided FTP distribution, employed FreeBSD founders Jordan Hubbard and David Greenman, utilized FreeBSD for its server infrastructure, sponsored related conferences, and produced FreeBSD literature including The Complete FreeBSD. By 1997, according to Bruce, FreeBSD had become Walnut Creek’s "most successful product." Starting in 1995, the company also served as the official publisher for Slackware Linux. Additionally, Walnut Creek was noted for hosting the idgames directory, a central repository for modifications related to the Doom engine.
As broadband Internet access grew and reduced reliance on physical distribution, Walnut Creek merged with Berkeley Software Design Inc. (BSDI) in 2000 to concentrate development efforts on FreeBSD and BSD/OS. Shortly thereafter, BSDI acquired Telenet System Solutions, a provider of Internet infrastructure servers.
In 2001, Wind River Systems purchased BSDI’s software assets (including FreeBSD, Slackware, and BSD/OS), while the remainder of BSDI rebranded itself as iXsystems. Wind River soon ceased its sponsorship of Slackware; meanwhile, the FreeBSD division was spun off as FreeBSD Mall, Inc. in 2002. The idgames archives were relocated to 3D Gamers in October 2001.
The server division of iXsystems was acquired by Offmyserver in 2002; this entity reverted to the iXsystems name in 2005. In February 2007, iXsystems also acquired FreeBSD Mall.
Eventually, Walnut Creek CDROM’s website redirected visitors to Simtel.net before both platforms were discontinued (Simtel ceased operations on March 15, 2013).
External links
- Official website (archived)
- Software collection distributed at The Internet Archive
- 1991 establishments in California
- 2000 disestablishments in California
- American companies established in 1991
- Companies based in Contra Costa County, California
- Defunct software companies of the United States
- FreeBSD
- Software companies disestablished in 2000
- Software companies established in 1991
- Defunct companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area