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.\"    may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
.\"    without specific prior written permission.
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.\"	@(#)hier.7	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/5/93
.\" $FreeBSD$
.\"
.Dd March 8, 2017
.Dt HIER 7
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm hier
.Nd layout of file systems
.Sh DESCRIPTION
A sketch of the file system hierarchy.
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa /libexec/"
.It Pa /
root directory of the file system
.It Pa /bin/
user utilities fundamental to both single-user and multi-user environments
.It Pa /boot/
programs and configuration files used during operating system bootstrap
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa defaults/" -compact
.It Pa defaults/
default bootstrapping configuration files; see
.Xr loader.conf 5
.It Pa dtb/
Compiled flattened device tree (FDT) files; see
.Xr fdt 4
and
.Xr dtc 1
.It Pa firmware/
Loadable modules containing binary firmware for hardware that needs
firmware downloaded to it to function
.It Pa kernel/
pure kernel executable (the operating system loaded into memory
at boot time)
.It Pa modules/
third-party loadable kernel modules;
see
.Xr kldstat 8
.It Pa zfs/
Contains
.Xr zfs 8
zpool cache files.
.El
.It Pa /cdrom/
default mount point for CD-ROM drives
.It Pa /compat/
normally a link to
.Pa /usr/compat .
If not, then the
.Pa /usr/compat
comments apply
.It Pa /dev/
device special files managed by
.Xr devfs 5
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa net/" -compact
.It Pa fd/
file descriptor files;
see
.Xr \&fd 4
.It Pa net/
network devices
.El
.It Pa /etc/
system configuration files and scripts
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa bluetooth/" -compact
.It Pa defaults/
default system configuration files;
see
.Xr rc 8
.It Pa bluetooth/
bluetooth configuration files
.It Pa localtime
local timezone information;
see
.Xr ctime 3
.It Pa mail/
Sendmail control files
.It Pa mtree/
mtree configuration files;
see
.Xr mtree 8
.It Pa pam.d/
configuration files for the Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM)
library
.It Pa periodic/
scripts that are run daily, weekly, and monthly, via
.Xr cron 8 ;
see
.Xr periodic 8
.It Pa rc.d/
System and daemon startup/control scripts;
see
.Xr rc 8
.It Pa security/
OpenBSM audit configuration files;
see
.Xr audit 8
.It Pa ppp/
ppp configuration files;
see
.Xr ppp 8
.It Pa ssh/
OpenSSH configuration files;
see
.Xr ssh 1
.It Pa ssl/
OpenSSL configuration files
.El
.It Pa /lib/
critical system libraries needed for binaries in
.Pa /bin
and
.Pa /sbin
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa geom/" -compact
.It Pa geom/
class-specific libraries for the
.Xr geom 8
utility
.El
.It Pa /libexec/
critical system utilities needed for binaries in
.Pa /bin
and
.Pa /sbin
.It Pa /media/
contains subdirectories to be used as mount points
for removable media such as CDs, USB drives, and
floppy disks
.It Pa /mnt/
empty directory commonly used by
system administrators as a temporary mount point
.It Pa /net/
automounted NFS shares;
see
.Xr auto_master 5
.It Pa /proc/
process file system;
see
.Xr procfs 5
.It Pa /rescue/
statically linked programs for emergency recovery;
see
.Xr rescue 8
.It Pa /root/
root's HOME directory
.It Pa /sbin/
system programs and administration utilities
fundamental to both single-user and multi-user environments
.It Pa /tmp/
temporary files that are not guaranteed to persist across system reboots
.It Pa /usr/
contains the majority of user utilities and applications
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa libdata/" -compact
.It Pa bin/
common utilities, programming tools, and applications
.It Pa compat/
files needed to support binary compatibility with other operating systems,
such as Linux
.It Pa include/
standard C include files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.It Pa altq/
C include files for alternate queueing
.It Pa arpa/
C include files for Internet service protocols
.It Pa bsnmp/
C include files for the SNMP daemon
.It Pa c++/
C++ include files
.It Pa cam/
C include files for the Common Access Methods Layer
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.It Pa scsi/
The SCSI device on top of CAM
.El
.It Pa dev/
C include files for programming various
.Fx
devices
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.It Pa ic/
Various header files describing driver- and bus-independent
hardware circuits
.It Pa ofw/
Open Firmware support
.It Pa pbio/
8255 PPI cards;
see
.Xr pbio 4
.It Pa ppbus/
The parallel port bus;
see
.Xr ppbus 4
.It Pa usb/
The USB subsystem
.It Pa utopia/
Physical chip driver for ATM interfaces;
see
.Xr utopia 4
.It Pa wi/
The
.Xr wi 4
WaveLAN driver
.El
.It Pa fs/
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.It Pa cd9660/
iso9660 file system
.It Pa fdescfs/
per-process file descriptors file system
.It Pa fifofs/
.St -p1003.1
FIFOs file system
.It Pa msdosfs/
MS-DOS file system
.It Pa nfs/
C include files for NFS (Network File System) version 2, 3 and 4
.It Pa nullfs/
loopback file system
.It Pa procfs/
process file system
.It Pa smbfs/
SMB/CIFS file system
.It Pa udf/
UDF file system
.It Pa unionfs
union file system
.El
.It Pa geom/
GEOM framework
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.It Pa concat/
CONCAT GEOM class
.It Pa gate/
GATE GEOM class
.It Pa mirror/
MIRROR GEOM class
.It Pa nop/
NOP GEOM class
.It Pa raid3/
RAID3 GEOM class
.It Pa stripe/
STRIPE GEOM class
.El
.Pp
.It Pa isc/
ISC utility library libisc include files
.It Pa libmilter/
C include files for libmilter,
the
.Xr sendmail 8
mail filter API
.It Pa machine/
machine-specific C include files
.It Pa net/
miscellaneous network C include files
.It Pa net80211/
C include files for 802.11 wireless networking;
see
.Xr net80211 4
.It Pa netinet/
C include files for Internet standard protocols;
see
.Xr inet 4
.It Pa netinet6/
C include files for Internet protocol version 6;
see
.Xr inet6 4
.It Pa netipsec/
kernel key-management service;
see
.Xr ipsec 4
.It Pa netnatm/
NATM include files;
see
.Xr natm 4
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.It Pa api/
include files for the signalling API
.It Pa msg/
include files that describe signalling messages and
declare associated functions
.It Pa saal/
include files for the signalling AAL layer
.It Pa sig/
include files for the UNI signalling protocol
.El
.It Pa netsmb/
SMB/CIFS requester
.It Pa nfs/
C include files for NFS (Network File System) version 2 and 3 (legacy)
.It Pa objc/
Objective C include files
.It Pa openssl/
OpenSSL (Cryptography/SSL toolkit) headers
.It Pa pccard/
PC-CARD controllers
.It Pa protocols/
C include files for Berkeley service protocols
.It Pa readline/
get a line from a user, with editing;
see
.Xr readline 3
.It Pa rpc/
remote procedure calls;
see
.Xr rpc 3
.It Pa rpcsvc/
definition of RPC service structures; see
.Xr rpc 3
.It Pa security/
PAM; see
.Xr pam 8
.It Pa sys/
system C include files (kernel data structures)
.\" .It Pa tcl/
.\" Tcl language;
.\" see
.\" .Xr Tcl n
.\" .Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.\" .It Pa generic/
.\" ???
.\" .It Pa unix/
.\" ???
.\" .El
.It Pa ufs/
C include files for UFS (The U-word File System)
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.It Pa ffs/
Fast file system
.It Pa ufs/
UFS file system
.El
.It Pa vm/
virtual memory;
see
.Xr vmstat 8
.El
.Pp
.It Pa lib/
shared and archive
.Xr ar 1 Ns -type
libraries
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa aout/
a.out archive libraries
.It Pa compat/
shared libraries for compatibility
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa aout/
a.out backward compatibility libraries
.El
.It Pa debug/
standalone debug data for the kernel and base system libraries and binaries
.It Pa dtrace/
DTrace library scripts
.It Pa engines/
OpenSSL (Cryptography/SSL toolkit) dynamically loadable engines
.It Pa private/
Private system libraries not for use by third-party programs.
ABI and API stability are not guaranteed.
.El
.Pp
.It Pa libdata/
miscellaneous utility data files
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa gcc/
.Xr gcc 1
configuration data
.It Pa ldscripts/
linker scripts;
see
.Xr ld 1
.It Pa lint/
various prebuilt lint libraries;
see
.Xr lint 1
.El
.Pp
.It Pa libexec/
system daemons & system utilities (executed by other programs)
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa aout/
utilities to manipulate a.out executables
.It Pa elf/
utilities to manipulate ELF executables
.It Pa lpr/
utilities and filters for LP print system;
see
.Xr lpr 1
.It Pa sendmail/
the
.Xr sendmail 8
binary;
see
.Xr mailwrapper 8
.It Pa sm.bin/
restricted shell for
.Xr sendmail 8 ;
see
.Xr smrsh 8
.El
.Pp
.It Pa local/
local executables, libraries, etc.
Also used as the default destination for the
.Fx
ports framework.
Within
.Pa local/ ,
the general layout sketched out by
.Nm
for
.Pa /usr
should be used.
Exceptions are the
.Pa man
directory
.Po directly under
.Pa local/
rather than under
.Pa local/share/ Ns Pc ,
ports documentation
.Po in
.Pa share/doc/<port>/ Ns Pc ,
and
.Pa /usr/local/etc
.Po mimics
.Pa /etc Ns Pc .
.It Pa obj/
architecture-specific target tree produced by building the
.Pa /usr/src
tree
.It Pa ports/
The
.Fx
ports collection (optional).
.It Pa sbin/
system daemons & system utilities (executed by users)
.It Pa share/
architecture-independent files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa calendar/" -compact
.It Pa calendar/
a variety of pre-fab calendar files;
see
.Xr calendar 1
.It Pa dict/
word lists;
see
.Xr look 1
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa freebsd
.Fx Ns -specific
terms, proper names, and jargon
.It Pa words
common words
.It Pa web2
words from Webster's 2nd International
.It Pa papers/
reference databases;
see
.Xr refer 1
.El
.Pp
.It Pa doc/
miscellaneous documentation;
source for most of the printed
.Bx
manuals (available
from the
.Tn USENIX
association)
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa FAQ/
Frequently Asked Questions
.It Pa IPv6/
implementation notes for IPv6
.It Pa bind/
documents pertaining to BIND (the Berkeley Internet Name Domain)
.It Pa es/
Spanish translations of documents in /usr/share/doc
.It Pa handbook/
.Fx
Handbook
.It Pa ja/
Japanese translations of documents in /usr/share/doc
.It Pa legal/
License files for vendor supplied firmwares
.It Pa ncurses/
HTML documents pertaining to ncurses;
see
.Xr ncurses 3
.It Pa ntp/
HTML documents pertaining to the Network Time Protocol
.It Pa papers/
UNIX Papers
.It Pa psd/
UNIX Programmer's Supplementary Documents
.It Pa ru/
Russian translations of documents in /usr/share/doc
.It Pa smm/
UNIX System Manager's Manual
.It Pa tutorials/
.Fx
tutorials
.It Pa usd/
UNIX User's Supplementary Documents
.It Pa zh/
Chinese translations of documents in /usr/share/doc
.El
.Pp
.It Pa examples/
various examples for users and programmers
.It Pa firmware/
Firmware images loaded by userland programs
.It Pa games/
ASCII text files used by various games
.It Pa groff_font/
device description file for device name
.It Pa keys/
known trusted and revoked keys.
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa keys/pkg/" -compact
.It Pa keys/pkg/
fingerprints for
.Xr pkg 7
and
.Xr pkg 8
.El
.Pp
.It Pa locale/
localization files;
see
.Xr setlocale 3
.It Pa man/
manual pages
.It Pa mdocml/
data files used by mdocml
.It Pa me/
macros for use with the me macro package;
see
.Xr me 7
.It Pa misc/
miscellaneous system-wide ASCII text files
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa fonts/
???
.It Pa termcap
terminal characteristics database;
see
.Xr termcap 5
.El
.It Pa mk/
templates for make;
see
.Xr make 1
.It Pa nls/
national language support files;
see
.Xr mklocale 1
.It Pa security/
data files for security policies such as
.Xr mac_lomac 4
.It Pa sendmail/
.Xr sendmail 8
configuration files
.It Pa skel/
example
.Pa .\&
(dot) files for new accounts
.It Pa snmp/
MIBs, example files and tree definitions for the SNMP daemon.
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa defs/
Tree definition files for use with
.Xr gensnmptree 1
.It Pa mibs/
MIB files
.El
.It Pa syscons/
files used by syscons;
see
.Xr syscons 4
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa scrnmaps/" -compact
.It Pa fonts/
console fonts;
see
.Xr vidcontrol 1
and
.Xr vidfont 1
.It Pa keymaps/
console keyboard maps;
see
.Xr kbdcontrol 1
and
.Xr kbdmap 1
.It Pa scrnmaps/
console screen maps
.El
.It Pa tabset/
tab description files for a variety of terminals; used in
the termcap file;
see
.Xr termcap 5
.It Pa tmac/
text processing macros;
see
.Xr nroff 1
and
.Xr troff 1
.It Pa vi/
localization support and utilities for
.Xr vi 1
.It Pa zoneinfo/
timezone configuration information;
see
.Xr tzfile 5
.El
.It Pa vt/
files used by vt;
see
.Xr vt 4
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa scrnmaps/" -compact
.It Pa fonts/
console fonts;
see
.Xr vidcontrol 1
and
.Xr vidfont 1
.It Pa keymaps/
console keyboard maps;
see
.Xr kbdcontrol 1
and
.Xr kbdmap 1
.\" .It Pa scrnmaps/
.\" console screen maps
.El
.It Pa src/
.Bx ,
third-party, and/or local source files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact
.It Pa bin/
source code for files in /bin
.It Pa cddl/
Utilities covered by the Common Development and Distribution License
.It Pa contrib/
source code for contributed software
.It Pa crypto/
source code for contributed cryptography software
.It Pa etc/
source code for files in
.Pa /etc
.It Pa gnu/
Utilities covered by the GNU General Public License
.It Pa include/
source code for files in
.Pa /usr/include
.It Pa kerberos5/
build infrastructure for kerberos version 5
.It Pa lib/
source code for files in
.Pa /usr/lib
.It Pa libexec/
source code for files in
.Pa /usr/libexec
.It Pa release/
files required to produce a
.Fx
release
.It Pa rescue/
source code for files in
.Pa /rescue
.It Pa sbin/
source code for files in
.Pa /sbin
.It Pa secure/
build directory for files in
.Pa /usr/src/crypto
.It Pa share/
source for files in
.Pa /usr/share
.It Pa sys/
kernel source code
.It Pa targets/
support for experimental DIRDEPS_BUILD
.It Pa tests/
source code for files in
.Pa /usr/tests
.It Pa tools/
tools used for maintenance and testing of
.Fx
.It Pa usr.bin/
source code for files in
.Pa /usr/bin
.It Pa usr.sbin/
source code for files in
.Pa /usr/sbin
.El
.Pp
.It Pa tests/
The
.Fx
test suite.
See
.Xr tests 7
for more details.
.El
.It Pa /var/
multi-purpose log, temporary, transient, and spool files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa preserve/" -compact
.It Pa account/
system accounting files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa acct
execution accounting file;
see
.Xr acct 5
.El
.Pp
.It Pa at/
timed command scheduling files;
see
.Xr \&at 1
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa preserve/" -compact
.It Pa jobs/
directory containing job files
.It Pa spool/
directory containing output spool files
.El
.Pp
.It Pa backups/
miscellaneous backup files
.It Pa cache/
miscellaneous cached files
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa pkg/" -compact
.It Pa pkg/
cached packages for
.Xr pkg 8
.El
.Pp
.It Pa crash/
default directory to store kernel crash dumps; see
.Xr crash 8
and
.Xr savecore 8
.It Pa cron/
files used by cron;
see
.Xr cron 8
.Bl -tag -width ".Pa preserve/" -compact
.It Pa tabs/
crontab files;
see
.Xr crontab 5
.El
.Pp
.It Pa db/
miscellaneous automatically generated system-specific database files
.It Pa empty/
empty directory for use by programs that need a specifically empty directory.
Used for instance by
.Xr sshd 8
for privilege separation.
.It Pa games/
miscellaneous game status and score files
.It Pa heimdal/
kerberos server databases; see
.Xr kdc 8
.It Pa log/
miscellaneous system log files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa utx.lastlogin
last login log;
see
.Xr getutxent 3
.It Pa utx.log
login/logout log;
see
.Xr getutxent 3
.El
.Pp
.It Pa mail/
user mailbox files
.It Pa msgs/
system messages database;
see
.Xr msgs 1
.It Pa preserve/
temporary home of files preserved after an accidental death
of an editor;
see
.Xr \&ex 1
.It Pa quotas/
file system quota information files
.It Pa run/
system information files describing various info about
system since it was booted
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa ppp/
writable by the
.Dq network
group for command connection sockets; see
.Xr ppp 8
.It Pa utx.active
database of current users;
see
.Xr getutxent 3
.El
.Pp
.It Pa rwho/
rwho data files;
see
.Xr rwhod 8 ,
.Xr rwho 1 ,
and
.Xr ruptime 1
.It Pa spool/
miscellaneous printer and mail system spooling directories
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa clientmqueue/
undelivered submission mail queue;
see
.Xr sendmail 8
.It Pa ftp/
commonly ~ftp; the anonymous ftp root directory
.It Pa mqueue/
undelivered mail queue;
see
.Xr sendmail 8
.It Pa output/
line printer spooling directories
.El
.Pp
.It Pa tmp/
temporary files that are kept between system reboots
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa vi.recover/
the directory where recovery files are stored
.El
.It Pa yp/
the NIS maps
.El
.El
.Sh NOTES
This manual page documents the default
.Fx
file system layout, but
the actual hierarchy on a given system is defined at the system
administrator's discretion.
A well-maintained installation will include a customized version of
this document.
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr apropos 1 ,
.Xr find 1 ,
.Xr finger 1 ,
.Xr grep 1 ,
.Xr ls 1 ,
.Xr whatis 1 ,
.Xr whereis 1 ,
.Xr which 1 ,
.Xr fd 4 ,
.Xr devfs 5 ,
.Xr fsck 8
.Sh HISTORY
A
.Nm
manual page appeared in
.At v7 .