Welcome to the FreeBSD 2.X FAQ!
As is usual with Usenet FAQs, this document aims to cover the most
frequently asked questions concerning the FreeBSD operating system
(and of course answer them!). Although originally intended to reduce
bandwidth and avoid the same old questions being asked over and over
again, FAQs have become recognized as valuable information resources.
Every effort has been made to make this FAQ as informative as
possible; if you have any suggestions as to how it may be improved,
please feel free to mail them to the Briefly, FreeBSD 2.X is a UN*X-like operating system based on
U.C. Berkeley's 4.4BSD-lite release for the i386 platform. It is
also based indirectly on William Jolitz's port of U.C. Berkeley's
Net/2 to the i386, known as 386BSD, though very little of the 386BSD
code remains. A fuller description of what FreeBSD is and how
it can work for you may be found on the FreeBSD is used by companies, Internet Service Providers, researchers,
computer professionals, students and home users all over the world
in their work, education and recreation. See some of them in the
For more detailed information on FreeBSD, please see the
The goals of the FreeBSD Project are to provide software that may
be used for any purpose and without strings attached. Many of us
have a significant investment in the code (and project) and would
certainly not mind a little financial compensation now and then,
but we're definitely not prepared to insist on it. We believe
that our first and foremost "mission" is to provide code to any
and all comers, and for whatever purpose, so that the code gets
the widest possible use and provides the widest possible benefit.
This is, we believe, one of the most fundamental goals of Free
Software and one that we enthusiastically support.
That code in our source tree which falls under the GNU General
Public License (GPL) or GNU Library General Public License (LGPL)
comes with slightly more strings attached, though at least on the
side of enforced access rather than the usual opposite. Due to the
additional complexities that can evolve in the commercial use of
GPL software, we do, however, endeavor to replace such software
with submissions under the more relaxed BSD copyright whenever
possible.
For those of our readers whose first language is not English, it
may be worth pointing out that the word ``free'' is being used in two
ways here, one meaning ``at no cost'', the other meaning ``you can do
whatever you like''. Apart from one or two things you
Version If you are not familiar with the operating system or are not
capable of identifying the difference between a real problem and
a temporary problem, you should not use FreeBSD-current. This
branch sometimes evolves quite quickly and can be un-buildable
for a number of days at a time. People that use FreeBSD-current
are expected to be able to analyze any problems and only report them
if they are deemed to be mistakes rather than ``glitches''. Questions
such as ``make world produces some error about groups'' on the
-current mailing list are sometimes treated with contempt.
Every now and again, a No claims are made that any snapshot can be considered
``production quality'' for any purpose. For stability
and tested mettle, you will have to stick to full releases.
Snapshot releases are directly available from Back when FreeBSD 2.0.5 was released, we decided to branch FreeBSD
development into two parts. One branch was named The -current branch is slowly progressing towards 4.0 and beyond,
the previous 2.2-stable branch having just retired with the release
of 2.2.8. 3.0-stable has now replaced it, the next release coming
up with 3.3 in Q3 1999. 4.0-current is now the "current branch",
with the first 4.0 releases appearing in Q1 2000.
As a general principle, the FreeBSD core team only release a new
version of FreeBSD when they believe that there are sufficient new
features and/or bug fixes to justify one, and are satisfied that the
changes made have settled down sufficiently to avoid compromising the
stability of the release. Many users regard this caution as one of
the best things about FreeBSD, although it can be a little
frustrating when waiting for all the latest goodies to become
available...
Releases are made about every 4 months on average.
For people needing (or wanting) a little more excitement, there are
SNAPs released more frequently, particularly during the month or so
leading up to a release.
FreeBSD 3.x currently runs on the The key decisions concerning the FreeBSD project, such as the
overall direction of the project and who is allowed to add code to
the source tree, are made by a However, most non-trivial changes are discussed in advance in the
, and there are no restrictions
on who may take part in the discussion.
Every significant release of FreeBSD is available via anonymous ftp
from the FreeBSD is also available via CDROM, from the following place(s):
Walnut Creek CDROM In Australia, you may find it at:
Advanced Multimedia Distributors You can find full information in the You can find full information in the You can find full information in the Yes, most major IRC networks host a FreeBSD chat
channel:
Each of these channels are distinct and are not connected to
each other. Their chat styles also differ, so you may need to try
each to find one suited to your chat style. As with *all* types
of IRC traffic, if you're easily offended or can't deal with lots
of young people (and more than a few older ones) doing the verbal
equivalent of jello wrestling, don't even bother with it.
There is a FreeBSD Documentation Project which you may contact (or
even better, join) on the doc mailing list:
A FreeBSD ``handbook'' is available, and can be found as:
The definitive printed guide on FreeBSD is ``The Complete FreeBSD'',
written by Greg Lehey and published by Walnut Creek CDROM Books. Now
in its second edition, the book contains 1,750 pages of install &
system administration guidance, program setup help, and manual pages.
The book (and current FreeBSD release) can be ordered from
However, as FreeBSD 2.2.X is based upon Berkeley 4.4BSD-Lite2, most
of the 4.4BSD manuals are applicable to FreeBSD 2.2.X. O'Reilly
and Associates publishes these manuals:
A description of these can be found via WWW as:
For a more in-depth look at the 4.4BSD kernel organization,
you can't go wrong with:
McKusick, Marshall Kirk, Keith Bostic, Michael J Karels,
and John Quarterman. The Design and Implementation of the 4.4BSD Operating
System. Reading, Mass. : Addison-Wesley, 1996. A good book on system administration is:
Evi Nemeth, Garth Snyder, Scott Seebass & Trent R. Hein, The Problem Report database of all open user change requests
may be queried (or submitted to) by using our web-based PR
The up-to-date FAQ is available from the FreeBSD Web Server or any
mirror as PostScript and plain text (7 bit ASCII and 8-bit Latin1).
As PostScript (about 370KB):
As ASCII text (about 220KB):
As ISO 8859-1 text (about 220KB):
The up-to-date Handbook is available from the FreeBSD Web Server or any
mirror as PostScript and plain text (7 bit ASCII and 8-bit Latin1).
As PostScript (about 1.7MB):
As ASCII text (about 1080KB):
As ISO 8859-1 text (about 1080KB):
True, the ASCII and Latin1 versions of the FAQ and Handbook aren't
strictly plaintext; they contain underlines and overprints that
assume the output is going directly to a dot matrix printer. If you
need to reformat them to be human-readable, run the file through col:
Certainly! There are multiple ways to mirror the Web pages.
Well, we can't pay, but we might arrange a free CD or T-shirt and a
Contributor's Handbook entry if you submit a translation of the
documentation.
The following newsgroups contain pertinent discussion for FreeBSD
users:
Web resources:
The FreeBSD handbook also has a fairly complete