Walnut Creek developed a close relationship with the FreeBSD Unix-like open source operating system project from its inception in 1993.

[3] Walnut Creek also gained fame for its idgames subdirectory, which was the de facto distribution center for the Doom-engine modification community at the time.

As more users gained access to high-speed Internet connections, demand for software on physical media decreased dramatically.

The company merged with Berkeley Software Design Inc. (BSDI) in 2000 to focus more engineering effort on the similar FreeBSD and BSD/OS operating systems.

[4] The software assets of BSDI (FreeBSD, Slackware, BSD/OS) were acquired by Wind River Systems in 2001, and the remainder of the company renamed itself iXsystems.