The first Beta build for the FreeBSD-6.2 Release Cycle is now available on most of the FTP mirror sites. If the release cycle goes as planned it is the first of two BETAs, which will be followed by two Release Candidates (RCs) and then the final release.
FreeBSD 6.2 Beta-1 Available
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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It is good to see FreeBSD leave behind the nightmare of 5.0 and move forward. The 6.x series has been nothing but wonderful, finally providing the performance and stability that BSD is known for. I can’t wait until 6.2 comes out.
Because I was so tardy in upgrading from 4.x, I lucked out and managed to skip the *entire* 5.x tree. Very very happy about that.
Could not agree more. I miss dearly the 4.x series.
I tried FreeBSD 6.1 and thought it was nice but I missed my ATI drivers to much to stay for long. DRI was below par on my 9600XT, so I am dependent on the proprietary drivers.
Edited 2006-09-21 05:15
That’s the reason I stick with Nvidia. Their FreeBSD driver is excellent. I’ve been using the Beta for a couple of days and I’ve had no problems. I’m glad to see FreeBSD moving along.
Edited 2006-09-21 07:59
desktopBSB which will be based on this.
might be my first install of a BSD system
Here you can see more information about upcoming FreeBSD 6.2 Release: http://people.freebsd.org/~bmah/relnotes/6-STABLE/
More WiFi drivers, XboX support
and lots of other improvements- works fine here. PC-BSD 1.3 will be based on this release.
Did I luck out by not trying FreeBSD until 6.1 was released because I found the installation to be a breeze. I even compiled my own kernel but there is still a lot I need to learn to get used to and good with the OS like:
1 – what are the system directories, what are the user directories, and what are the application directories?
2 – what is the difference between bin and sbin?
3 – is there a specific directory I need to be in to download source from svn or copy a .tar.gz file to extract?
4 – get Bash as my default shell
5 – what is the best way to create and mount partitions?
6 – now that I have installed Vista RC1 how do I get my boot option to show so I can boot into FreeBSD again?
1 – what are the system directories, what are the user directories, and what are the application directories?
% man hier
2 – what is the difference between bin and sbin?
% man hier
3 – is there a specific directory I need to be in to download source from svn or copy a .tar.gz file to extract?
% man hier
# cvsup -h cvsup.freebsd.org /usr/local/share/example/cvsu/ports-supfile
# cd /usr/ports
# make search name=yourfavoriteapp
# cd /usr/ports/yourfavoriteapp
# make install clean
4 – get Bash as my default shell
# pkg_add -r bash
# man chsh
5 – what is the best way to create and mount partitions?
# sysinstall
6 – now that I have installed Vista RC1 how do I get my boot option to show so I can boot into FreeBSD again?
Just install FreeBSD bootloader- it can boot any operating system without any configuration change.
# boot0cfg -B ad0
Edited 2006-09-21 14:35
No need to use cvsup to update your ports tree anymore. FreeBSD 6.x has a nice util called portsnap that comes with it.
The very first time you run it you have to overwrite your entire ports tree:
portsnap fetch && portsnap extract
After that you run it by doing:
portsnap fetch && portsnap update
MUCH easier and faster than cvsup.
MUCH easier and faster than cvsup.
If you think that cvsup is slow then try csup– written in plain C and works faster. I personally don’t like portsnap– too easy to break ports consistency.
Ahh I never heard of portsnap breaking ports consistency before. It always worked well for me. Could you elaborate on this? Was it an older version of portsnap perhaps?
Thank you for the information.
I have done the make install clean and pkg_add but I was having problems with svn. I need the PDFKit framework and the System Preferences downloaded before I can compile GWorkspace and I wasn’t sure where I needed to be. My main goal is to get GNUstep up and running so I can start developing in it since it is very similar to Cocoa in OS X.
It seems you’re really interested, then I recommend the FreeBSD Handbook. It’s really worth the time and you learn a lot about the system (and again, the 4.x series handbook was so much funnier).
Glad to see FreeBSD 6.2 is almost out but the sad part is the FreeBSD Foundation fundraising is not going that well they are short $170000 to meet their 2006 target of $200000
http://www.freebsdfoundation.org/
They are not doing too bad. They just started the fundraising about a month ago and they have already hit almost 30k. I remember it was under 10k just two weeks ago. Although I have no doubt that they will hit 200k due to many large companies interest in the wellfare of FreeBSD (HP, IBM, Yahoo, NetApp, Pair, etc.), I would strongly suggest that regular Joe person donate too. I think there is some kind of tax law about single large donations and being a non-profit organization. They got in trouble with this a few years ago and had to raise 30k to keep their tax-exempt status. Anyways, if you like FreeBSD or opensource in general, go out there and donate 10 dollars or more.