216 lines
9.5 KiB
Plaintext
216 lines
9.5 KiB
Plaintext
o About FreeBSD:
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What is FreeBSD? FreeBSD is an operating system based on 4.4 BSD Lite
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for Intel, AMD, Cyrix or NexGen "x86" based PC hardware and Compaq
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(formerly DEC) Alpha computers. It works with a very wide variety of PC
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peripherals and configurations and can be used for everything from
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software development to Internet Service Provision.
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This release of FreeBSD contains everything you need to run such a
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system, including full source code for everything. With the source
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distribution installed you can literally recompile the entire system
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from scratch with one command, making it ideal for students,
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researchers or folks who simply want to see how it all works.
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A large collection of 3rd party ported software (the "ports
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collection") is also provided to make it easier for you to obtain and
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install all your favorite traditional UNIX utilities for FreeBSD.
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Over 3500 ports, from editors to programming languages to graphical
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applications, make FreeBSD a powerful and comprehensive operating
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environment that extends far beyond what's provided by many commercial
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versions of UNIX.
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For more documentation on this system it is recommended that you
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purchase The Complete FreeBSD, available from local bookstores
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and from the FreeBSD Mall (http://www.freebsdmall.com), as well
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as the 4.4BSD Document Set from O'Reilly Associates and the USENIX
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Association, ISBN 1-56592-082-1. We have no connection with O'Reilly,
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we're just satisfied customers!
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If you're new to FreeBSD then you should also read EVERYTHING listed
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in the Documentation menu on the boot floppy. It may seem like a lot
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to read, but you should at least acquaint yourself with the types of
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information available should you later get stuck. Once the system is
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installed, you can also revisit this menu and use a WEB browser to
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read the installed FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) and Handbook HTML
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documentation sets for FreeBSD. You can also use the browser to visit
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other WEB sites on the net (such as http://www.freebsd.org) if you
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have an Internet connection.
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NOTE: If you read no other documentation before installing a given
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version of FreeBSD, you should at least by all means *READ THE ERRATA*
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for that release so that you don't stumble over problems which have
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already been found and fixed. The ERRATA.TXT file accompanying your
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release (it should be right next to this file) is obviously already
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out of date by definition, but other copies are kept updated on the
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net and should be consulted as the "current errata" for your release
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(this is also what your ERRATA.TXT file says, by the way). These
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other copies of the errata are located at:
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1. http://www.freebsd.org/releases/
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2. ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/releases/<your-release>/ERRATA.TXT
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(and any sites which keep up-to-date mirrors of this location).
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DISCLAIMER: While FreeBSD does its best to safeguard against
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accidental loss of data, it's still more than possible to WIPE OUT
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YOUR ENTIRE DISK with this installation! Please do not proceed to the
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final FreeBSD installation menu unless you've adequately backed up any
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important data first! We really mean it!
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o E-mail addresses and tech support info:
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For general questions, please send email to :
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freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org
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Please also have patience if your questions are not answered right
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away - this mailing list is staffed purely by volunteers and they also
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have real life schedules to contend with. Questions which are asked
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intelligently (e.g. not "My system doesn't work! What's wrong!?")
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also stand a far greater chance of being answered. If your question
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does not contain enough information to allow the responder to generate
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a meaningful answer, they generally won't.
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Bug reports submitted with the send-pr command are also logged and
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tracked in our bugs database, and you'll be kept informed of any
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changes in status during the life of the bug (or feature request).
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Technical comments on this release should be sent (in English!) to:
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freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org
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Bug reports should be sent using the `send-pr' command or the Web page
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at http://www.freebsd.org/send-pr.html. If you cannot use either of
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these two methods, you may also send mail to:
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freebsd-bugs@FreeBSD.org
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PLEASE ALSO BE SURE TO INDICATE WHICH VERSION OF FREEBSD YOU'RE
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RUNNING IN ANY BUG REPORTS OR QUESTIONS!
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Sorry for the caps, but you'd be amazed at how many times people
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forget this and there are many different release versions of FreeBSD
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out there now. It's imperative that we know what you're running so
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that we tell if you're suffering from a bug which has already been
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fixed.
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o WWW Resources:
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Our WEB site, http://www.freebsd.org, is also a very good source for
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updated information and provides a number of advanced documentation
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searching facilities. If you wish to use Netscape as your browser,
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several versions may be found in the ports collection under
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/usr/ports/www if you've installed the ports collection on your
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machine (always a good idea).
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Several other non-commercial browsers are also available in
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/usr/ports/www and may be compiled and installed in the same fashion.
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Many are also available as pre-compiled packages - see the Packages
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entry in the Configuration menu for more details.
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The Handbook and FAQ are also available as on-line documents in
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/usr/share/doc and can be read using the ``file:/usr/share/doc''
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syntax in any HTML capable browser.
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o Distributions:
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A typical FreeBSD distribution directory looks like this:
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ABOUT.TXT bin compat3x games proflibs
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HARDWARE.TXT compat1x info src tools
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INSTALL.TXT compat20 dict manpages packages
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README.TXT compat21 des doc
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RELNOTES.TXT compat22 floppies ports
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XF86336
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If you want to do a CDROM, FTP or NFS installation from this
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distribution directory, all you need to do is make a pair of 1.44MB
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floppies from the floppies/kern.flp and floppies/mfsroot.flp image
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files (see floppies/README.TXT for instructions on how to do this),
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boot it and follow the instructions.
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If you're trying to do some other type of installation, or are just
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curious about how the distribution is organized in general, what
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follows is a more thorough description of each item in more detail:
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The *.TXT files obviously contain documentation (ABOUT.TXT being what
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you're reading now).
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The XF86336 directory contains the XFree86 project's 3.3.6 release and
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consists of a series of gzip'd tar files which contain each component
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of the XFree86 distribution.
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The bin, dict, des, doc, games, info, manpages, proflibs, and src
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directories contain the primary distribution components of FreeBSD
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itself and are split into smaller files for easy packing onto floppies
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(should that be necessary).
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The compat1x, compat20, compat21, compat22, and compat3x directories
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contain distributions for compatibility with older releases and are
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distributed as single gzip'd tar files - they can be installed during
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release time or later by running their `install.sh' scripts.
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A typical distribution (we'll use the info distribution as an example)
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looks like this:
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CHECKSUM.MD5 info.ab info.ad info.inf install.sh
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info.aa info.ac info.ae info.mtree
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The CHECKSUM.MD5 file contains MD5 signatures for each file, should
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data corruption be suspected, and is purely for reference - it is not
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used by the actual installation and does not need to be copied with
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the rest of the distribution files. The info.a* files are split,
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gzip'd tar files, the contents of which can be viewed by doing:
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cat info.a* | tar tvzf -
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During installation, they are automatically concatenated and extracted
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by the installation procedure.
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The info.inf file is also necessary since it is read by the installation
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program in order to figure out how many pieces to look for when fetching and
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concatenating the distribution. When putting distributions onto floppies,
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the .inf file MUST occupy the first floppy of each distribution set!
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The info.mtree file is another non-essential file which is provided
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for user reference. It contains the MD5 signatures of the *unpacked*
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distribution files and can be later used with the mtree(1) program
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to verify the installation permissions and checksums against any possible
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modifications to the file. When used with the bin distribution, this can
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be an excellent way of detecting trojan horse attacks on your system.
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Finally, the install.sh file is for use by those who want to install the
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distribution after installation time. To install the info distribution from
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CDROM after a system was installed, for example, you'd do:
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cd /cdrom/info
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sh install.sh
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And that's all there is to it! Each distribution contains its own
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install.sh file for this.
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The floppies subdirectory contains the floppy installation images and
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the floppies/README.TXT file should be read for further information
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on them.
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The packages and ports directories contain the FreeBSD packages and
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ports collections. Packages may be installed from the packages directory
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by running the sysinstall utility with the argument ``configPackages''
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or by feeding the individual filenames to the pkg_add(1) command.
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The ports collection may be installed like any other distribution
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and requires about 50MB unpacked. More information on the ports collection
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may be obtained from http://www.freebsd.org/ports or locally from
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file:/usr/share/doc/handbook if you've installed the doc distribution.
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Last of all, the tools directory contains various DOS tools for
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discovering disk geometries, installing boot managers and the like.
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It is purely optional and provided only for user convenience.
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