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FreeBSD Handbook

The FreeBSD Documentation Project

Copyright © 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008 The FreeBSD Documentation Project

Welcome to FreeBSD! This handbook covers the installation and day to day use of FreeBSD 6.3-RELEASE and FreeBSD 7.0-RELEASE. This manual is a work in progress and is the work of many individuals. As such, some sections may become dated and require updating. If you are interested in helping out with this project, send email to the FreeBSD documentation project mailing list. The latest version of this document is always available from the FreeBSD web site (previous versions of this handbook can be obtained from https://docs.FreeBSD.org/doc/). It may also be downloaded in a variety of formats and compression options from the FreeBSD FTP server or one of the numerous mirror sites. If you would prefer to have a hard copy of the handbook, you can purchase one at the FreeBSD Mall. You may also want to search the handbook.

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Table of Contents

I. Getting Started

1 Introduction

1.1 Synopsis
1.2 Welcome to FreeBSD!
1.3 About the FreeBSD Project

2 Installing FreeBSD

2.1 Synopsis
2.2 Hardware Requirements
2.3 Pre-installation Tasks
2.4 Starting the Installation
2.5 Introducing Sysinstall
2.6 Allocating Disk Space
2.7 Choosing What to Install
2.8 Choosing Your Installation Media
2.9 Committing to the Installation
2.10 Post-installation
2.11 Troubleshooting
2.12 Advanced Installation Guide
2.13 Preparing Your Own Installation Media

3 UNIX Basics

3.1 Synopsis
3.2 Virtual Consoles and Terminals
3.3 Permissions
3.4 Directory Structure
3.5 Disk Organization
3.6 Mounting and Unmounting File Systems
3.7 Processes
3.8 Daemons, Signals, and Killing Processes
3.9 Shells
3.10 Text Editors
3.11 Devices and Device Nodes
3.12 Binary Formats
3.13 For More Information

4 Installing Applications: Packages and Ports

4.1 Synopsis
4.2 Overview of Software Installation
4.3 Finding Your Application
4.4 Using the Packages System
4.5 Using the Ports Collection
4.6 Post-installation Activities
4.7 Dealing with Broken Ports

5 The X Window System

5.1 Synopsis
5.2 Understanding X
5.3 Installing X11
5.4 X11 Configuration
5.5 Using Fonts in X11
5.6 The X Display Manager
5.7 Desktop Environments

II. Common Tasks

6 Desktop Applications

6.1 Synopsis
6.2 Browsers
6.3 Productivity
6.4 Document Viewers
6.5 Finance
6.6 Summary

7 Multimedia

7.1 Synopsis
7.2 Setting Up the Sound Card
7.3 MP3 Audio
7.4 Video Playback
7.5 Setting Up TV Cards
7.6 Image Scanners

8 Configuring the FreeBSD Kernel

8.1 Synopsis
8.2 Why Build a Custom Kernel?
8.3 Finding the System Hardware
8.4 Kernel Drivers, Subsystems, and Modules
8.5 Building and Installing a Custom Kernel
8.6 The Configuration File
8.7 If Something Goes Wrong

9.1 Synopsis
9.2 Introduction
9.3 Basic Setup
9.4 Advanced Printer Setup
9.5 Using Printers
9.6 Alternatives to the Standard Spooler
9.7 Troubleshooting

10 Linux Binary Compatibility

10.1 Synopsis
10.2 Installation
10.3 Installing Mathematica®
10.4 Installing Maple™
10.5 Installing MATLAB®
10.6 Installing Oracle®
10.7 Installing SAP® R/3®
10.8 Advanced Topics

III. System Administration

11 Configuration and Tuning

11.1 Synopsis
11.2 Initial Configuration
11.3 Core Configuration
11.4 Application Configuration
11.5 Starting Services
11.6 Configuring the cron Utility
11.7 Using rc under FreeBSD
11.8 Setting Up Network Interface Cards
11.9 Virtual Hosts
11.10 Configuration Files
11.11 Tuning with sysctl
11.12 Tuning Disks
11.13 Tuning Kernel Limits
11.14 Adding Swap Space
11.15 Power and Resource Management
11.16 Using and Debugging FreeBSD ACPI

12 The FreeBSD Booting Process

12.1 Synopsis
12.2 The Booting Problem
12.3 The Boot Manager and Boot Stages
12.4 Kernel Interaction During Boot
12.5 Device Hints
12.6 Init: Process Control Initialization
12.7 Shutdown Sequence

13 Users and Basic Account Management

13.1 Synopsis
13.2 Introduction
13.3 The Superuser Account
13.4 System Accounts
13.5 User Accounts
13.6 Modifying Accounts
13.7 Limiting Users
13.8 Groups

14 Security

14.1 Synopsis
14.2 Introduction
14.3 Securing FreeBSD
14.4 DES, Blowfish, MD5, and Crypt
14.5 One-time Passwords
14.6 TCP Wrappers
14.7 KerberosIV
14.8 Kerberos5
14.9 OpenSSL
14.10 VPN over IPsec
14.11 OpenSSH
14.12 File System Access Control Lists
14.13 Monitoring Third Party Security Issues
14.14 FreeBSD Security Advisories
14.15 Process Accounting

15.1 Synopsis
15.2 Terms Related to Jails
15.3 Introduction
15.4 Creating and Controlling Jails
15.5 Fine Tuning and Administration
15.6 Application of Jails

16 Mandatory Access Control

16.1 Synopsis
16.2 Key Terms in this Chapter
16.3 Explanation of MAC
16.4 Understanding MAC Labels
16.5 Planning the Security Configuration
16.6 Module Configuration
16.7 The MAC seeotheruids Module
16.8 The MAC bsdextended Module
16.9 The MAC ifoff Module
16.10 The MAC portacl Module
16.11 The MAC partition Module
16.12 The MAC Multi-Level Security Module
16.13 The MAC Biba Module
16.14 The MAC LOMAC Module
16.15 Nagios in a MAC Jail
16.16 User Lock Down
16.17 Troubleshooting the MAC Framework

17 Security Event Auditing

17.1 Synopsis
17.2 Key Terms in this Chapter
17.3 Installing Audit Support
17.4 Audit Configuration
17.5 Administering the Audit Subsystem

18.1 Synopsis
18.2 Device Names
18.3 Adding Disks
18.4 RAID
18.5 USB Storage Devices
18.6 Creating and Using Optical Media (CDs)
18.7 Creating and Using Optical Media (DVDs)
18.8 Creating and Using Floppy Disks
18.9 Creating and Using Data Tapes
18.10 Backups to Floppies
18.11 Backup Strategies
18.12 Backup Basics
18.13 Network, Memory, and File-Backed File Systems
18.14 File System Snapshots
18.15 File System Quotas
18.16 Encrypting Disk Partitions
18.17 Encrypting Swap Space

19 GEOM: Modular Disk Transformation Framework

19.1 Synopsis
19.2 GEOM Introduction
19.3 RAID0 - Striping
19.4 RAID1 - Mirroring
19.5 GEOM Gate Network Devices
19.6 Labeling Disk Devices
19.7 UFS Journaling Through GEOM

20 The Vinum Volume Manager

20.1 Synopsis
20.2 Disks Are Too Small
20.3 Access Bottlenecks
20.4 Data Integrity
20.5 Vinum Objects
20.6 Some Examples
20.7 Object Naming
20.8 Configuring Vinum
20.9 Using Vinum for the Root Filesystem

21 Virtualization

21.1 Synopsis
21.2 FreeBSD as a Guest OS
21.3 FreeBSD as a Host OS

22 Localization - I18N/L10N Usage and Setup

22.1 Synopsis
22.2 The Basics
22.3 Using Localization
22.4 Compiling I18N Programs
22.5 Localizing FreeBSD to Specific Languages

23 The Cutting Edge

23.1 Synopsis
23.2 FreeBSD-CURRENT vs. FreeBSD-STABLE
23.3 Synchronizing Your Source
23.4 Rebuilding “world”
23.5 Tracking for Multiple Machines

IV. Network Communication

24 Serial Communications

24.1 Synopsis
24.2 Introduction
24.3 Terminals
24.4 Dial-in Service
24.5 Dial-out Service
24.6 Setting Up the Serial Console

25 PPP and SLIP

25.1 Synopsis
25.2 Using User PPP
25.3 Using Kernel PPP
25.4 Troubleshooting PPP Connections
25.5 Using PPP over Ethernet (PPPoE)
25.6 Using PPP over ATM (PPPoA)
25.7 Using SLIP

26 Electronic Mail

26.1 Synopsis
26.2 Using Electronic Mail
26.3 sendmail Configuration
26.4 Changing Your Mail Transfer Agent
26.5 Troubleshooting
26.6 Advanced Topics
26.7 SMTP with UUCP
26.8 Setting Up to Send Only
26.9 Using Mail with a Dialup Connection
26.10 SMTP Authentication
26.11 Mail User Agents
26.12 Using fetchmail
26.13 Using procmail

27 Network Servers

27.1 Synopsis
27.2 The inetd “Super-Server”
27.3 Network File System (NFS)
27.4 Network Information System (NIS/YP)
27.5 Automatic Network Configuration (DHCP)
27.6 Domain Name System (DNS)
27.7 Apache HTTP Server
27.8 File Transfer Protocol (FTP)
27.9 File and Print Services for Microsoft® Windows® clients (Samba)
27.10 Clock Synchronization with NTP

28 Firewalls

28.1 Introduction
28.2 Firewall Concepts
28.3 Firewall Packages
28.4 The OpenBSD Packet Filter (PF) and ALTQ
28.5 The IPFILTER (IPF) Firewall
28.6 IPFW

29 Advanced Networking

29.1 Synopsis
29.2 Gateways and Routes
29.3 Wireless Networking
29.4 Bluetooth
29.5 Bridging
29.6 Link Aggregation and Failover
29.7 Diskless Operation
29.8 ISDN
29.9 Network Address Translation
29.10 Parallel Line IP (PLIP)
29.11 IPv6
29.12 Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM)
29.13 Common Access Redundancy Protocol (CARP)

V. Appendices

A. Obtaining FreeBSD

A.1 CDROM and DVD Publishers
A.2 FTP Sites
A.3 Anonymous CVS
A.4 Using CTM
A.5 Using CVSup
A.6 Using Portsnap
A.7 CVS Tags
A.8 AFS Sites
A.9 rsync Sites

B. Bibliography

B.1 Books & Magazines Specific to FreeBSD
B.2 Users' Guides
B.3 Administrators' Guides
B.4 Programmers' Guides
B.5 Operating System Internals
B.6 Security Reference
B.7 Hardware Reference
B.8 UNIX® History
B.9 Magazines and Journals

C. Resources on the Internet

C.1 Mailing Lists
C.2 Usenet Newsgroups
C.3 World Wide Web Servers
C.4 Email Addresses
C.5 Shell Accounts

D. PGP Keys

D.1 Officers
D.2 Core Team Members
D.3 Developers

FreeBSD Glossary

List of Tables
2-1. Sample Device Inventory
2-2. Partition Layout for First Disk
2-3. Partition Layout for Subsequent Disks
2-4. FreeBSD 6.X and 7.X ISO Image Names and Meanings
3-1. Disk Device Codes
18-1. Physical Disk Naming Conventions
20-1. Vinum Plex Organizations
24-1. DB-25 to DB-25 Null-Modem Cable
24-2. DB-9 to DB-9 Null-Modem Cable
24-3. DB-9 to DB-25 Null-Modem Cable
24-4. Signal Names
29-1. Wiring a Parallel Cable for Networking
29-2. Reserved IPv6 addresses

List of Figures
2-1. FreeBSD Boot Loader Menu
2-2. Typical Device Probe Results
2-3. Selecting Country Menu
2-4. Select Sysinstall Exit
2-5. Selecting Usage from Sysinstall Main Menu
2-6. Selecting Documentation Menu
2-7. Sysinstall Documentation Menu
2-8. Sysinstall Main Menu
2-9. Sysinstall Keymap Menu
2-10. Sysinstall Main Menu
2-11. Sysinstall Options
2-12. Begin Standard Installation
2-13. Select Drive for FDisk
2-14. Typical Fdisk Partitions before Editing
2-15. Fdisk Partition Using Entire Disk
2-16. Sysinstall Boot Manager Menu
2-17. Exit Select Drive
2-18. Sysinstall Disklabel Editor
2-19. Sysinstall Disklabel Editor with Auto Defaults
2-20. Free Space for Root Partition
2-21. Edit Root Partition Size
2-22. Choose the Root Partition Type
2-23. Choose the Root Mount Point
2-24. Sysinstall Disklabel Editor
2-25. Choose Distributions
2-26. Confirm Distributions
2-27. Choose Installation Media
2-28. Selecting an Ethernet Device
2-29. Set Network Configuration for ed0
2-30. Editing inetd.conf
2-31. Default Anonymous FTP Configuration
2-32. Edit the FTP Welcome Message
2-33. Editing exports
2-34. System Console Configuration Options
2-35. Screen Saver Options
2-36. Screen Saver Timeout
2-37. System Console Configuration Exit
2-38. Select Your Region
2-39. Select Your Country
2-40. Select Your Time Zone
2-41. Select Mouse Protocol Type
2-42. Set Mouse Protocol
2-43. Configure Mouse Port
2-44. Setting the Mouse Port
2-45. Enable the Mouse Daemon
2-46. Test the Mouse Daemon
2-47. Select Package Category
2-48. Select Packages
2-49. Install Packages
2-50. Confirm Package Installation
2-51. Select User
2-52. Add User Information
2-53. Exit User and Group Management
2-54. Exit Install
2-55. Network Configuration Upper-level
2-56. Select a default MTA
2-57. Ntpdate Configuration
2-58. Network Configuration Lower-level
20-1. Concatenated Organization
20-2. Striped Organization
20-3. RAID-5 Organization
20-4. A Simple Vinum Volume
20-5. A Mirrored Vinum Volume
20-6. A Striped Vinum Volume
20-7. A Mirrored, Striped Vinum Volume

List of Examples
2-1. Using an Existing Partition Unchanged
2-2. Shrinking an Existing Partition
3-1. Sample Disk, Slice, and Partition Names
3-2. Conceptual Model of a Disk
4-1. Downloading a Package Manually and Installing It Locally
11-1. Creating a Swapfile on FreeBSD
12-1. boot0 Screenshot
12-2. boot2 Screenshot
12-3. An Insecure Console in /etc/ttys
13-1. Adding a user on FreeBSD
13-2. rmuser Interactive Account Removal
13-3. Interactive chpass by Superuser
13-4. Interactive chpass by Normal User
13-5. Changing Your Password
13-6. Changing Another User's Password as the Superuser
13-7. Adding a Group Using pw(8)
13-8. Setting the List of Members of a Group Using pw(8)
13-9. Adding a New Member to a Group Using pw(8)
13-10. Using id(1) to Determine Group Membership
14-1. Using SSH to Create a Secure Tunnel for SMTP
18-1. Using dump over ssh
18-2. Using dump over ssh with RSH set
18-3. A Script for Creating a Bootable Floppy
18-4. Using mdconfig to Mount an Existing File System Image
18-5. Creating a New File-Backed Disk with mdconfig
18-6. Configure and Mount a File-Backed Disk with mdmfs
18-7. Creating a New Memory-Based Disk with mdconfig
18-8. Creating a New Memory-Based Disk with mdmfs
24-1. Adding Terminal Entries to /etc/ttys
26-1. Configuring the sendmail Access Database
26-2. Mail Aliases
26-3. Example Virtual Domain Mail Map
27-1. Reloading the inetd configuration file
27-2. Mounting an Export with amd
27-3. Installing Django with Apache2, mod_python3, and PostgreSQL
27-4. Apache Configuration for Django/mod_python
29-1. LACP aggregation with a Cisco switch
29-2. Failover mode
29-3. Branch Office or Home Network
29-4. Head Office or Other LAN
A-1. Checking Out Something from -CURRENT (ls(1)):
A-2. Using SSH to check out the src/ tree:
A-3. Checking Out the Version of ls(1) in the 6-STABLE Branch:
A-4. Creating a List of Changes (as Unified Diffs) to ls(1)
A-5. Finding Out What Other Module Names Can Be Used:

		Next
		Preface

Published under the terms of the FreeBSD Document Project