The FreeBSD project has released the second release candidate for FreeBSD 7.0. “We sincerely hope this will be the last of the public tests for 7.0 and that the -RELEASE builds will start in about a week and a half. If bug(s) considered big enough to be show-stoppers are found we will of course reconsider but hopefully we’re in good enough shape now to proceed with the release.”
I’m guessing there’ll be a renaming of versions. E.g. 7.0-Release = New Technology, 6.3 = Production.
There is often confusion regarding the definitions of the different FreeBSD releases and development branches. As far as I know, FreeBSD-STABLE is the branch the major releases are made from. For the new x.0 releases FreeBSD-CURRENT is branched to create FreeBSD-STABLE. Generally changes will go into FreeBSD-CURRENT first for testing and may later go into the FreeBSD-STABLE branch.
I think 6.x will be defined as “Legacy” and 7.0 will be defined as “Release” rather than “new technology”, since as of 7.0 the new technology will go into FreeBSD-CURRENT for the forthcoming 8.0. “New technology” would make it sound untested and at any rate would not be relevant for later 7.x releases.
I may be wrong so please correct me.
You’re done a good job in giving a short summary how naming conversions are to be understood.
For a comparison between CURRENT and STABLE from FreeBSD itself you could refer to:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/current-s…
FreeBSD-CURRENT is the latest working sources for FreeBSD. This includes work in progress, experimental changes, and transitional mechanisms that might or might not be present in the next official release of the software. While many FreeBSD developers compile the FreeBSD-CURRENT source code daily, there are periods of time when the sources are not buildable. These problems are resolved as expeditiously as possible, but whether or not FreeBSD-CURRENT brings disaster or greatly desired functionality can be a matter of which exact moment you grabbed the source code in!
FreeBSD-STABLE is our development branch from which major releases are made. Changes go into this branch at a different pace, and with the general assumption that they have first gone into FreeBSD-CURRENT for testing. This is still a development branch, however, and this means that at any given time, the sources for FreeBSD-STABLE may or may not be suitable for any particular purpose. It is simply another engineering development track, not a resource for end-users.
The RCs and the final RELEASE are usually built from a “snapshot” in the STABLE branch. End users usually are happy with RELEASE, while CURRENT and even STABLE may not fit their needs.
Regarding version naming, I think FreeBSD 6 will be “legacy”, while FreeBSD 7 will be “production”. FreeBSD 8 will be the “upcoming release” as soon as it’s developed that far.
No, there won’t be any renaming of releases. The versions under each heading on the website will change is all.
Right now:
Legacy Release – 5.5
Production Release – 6.3
Upcoming Release – 7.0
After 7.0 is released:
Legacy Release – 6.3
Prodction Release – 7.0
5.5 will be EoL’d this spring. 8.0 won’t be coming for another year.
How is this hard to understand??
Do we still use “tag=RELENG_7_0” or do we now use “tag=RELENG_7”?
While RELENG_7_0 will bring to 7.0-RELEASE and its possbible patches (e, g, 7.0-RELEASE-p1), RELENG_7 will take you much further to the upcoming releases in the -7- branch (e. g. 7.1-RELEASE and 7.1-RELEASE-p3).
RELENG_X gets you FreebSD X-STABLE, the continuous development branch that each release is taken from.
RELENG_X_Y gets you FreeBSD X.Y-RELEASE, plus any security fixes that are available for FreeBSD X.Y-RELEASE
RELENG_X_Y_Z_RELEASE gets you FreeBSD X.Y.Z-RELEASE, the exact same bits that go on the release CDs.
Fill in X, Y, and Z as needed.
My SMP boxs running smoothly with it!
I have always wanted to use FreeBSD side by side with Linux on my HDD but these geometry changes of the HDD had been stopping me. Does anyone know if that “feature” still exists?
I didn’t get any problem with 7.0RC-1 regarding hard disk geometry issues. Of course, we all pray that old quirk gets finally fixed in the new release.
Just ignore it.
Ignore it, as Oliver says.
I’m dual-booting FreeBSD 6.3 and Linux. I’ve had Linux for ages and just popped Free on as well. I’m using a
Debian-based distro – main thing to watch is that when
installing Free, choose the option to leave your boot-record untouched. Do the install of Free, go into
your Linux distro and (assuming your distro uses Grub to boot), put an entry like this in your menu.lst file (it may be called something else on your distro) –
title FreeBSD 7.0
rootnoverify (hd0,3)
chainloader +1
This works perfectly for me. Take close note of the “3”. That’s for my setup with a Linux root, home and swap partition. If you have more partitions you’ll need to increase that number accordingly. Good luck… 🙂
And in fact grub can read the ufs filesystem and can be used to directly load FreeBSD’s kernel or most probably, loader.
Something like this will also work:
title FreeBSD 7.0
root (hd0,3,a)
kernel /boot/loader
a means the root partitions inside FreeBSD’s “slice”
If you wish to dual boot Vista and FreeBSD, also leave the MBR unchanged, use PartitionMagic or GParted to reactivate Vista’s partition after install (usually FreeBSD’s partition is marked as active after install), then reboot to Vista and install EasyBCD. It is free and works wonders.
I run 4 installations: FreeBSD 7 i386 and amd64, (K)Ubuntu 32 and 64 bit on a mix of PATA and SATA drives. Use grub to select which one to boot. Absolutely no problems.
Sometimes it is not possible to install FreeBSD bootloader into MBR due to some bios manufacturers ignorance to support other operating systems/boot loaders (I encountered this problem with my Clevo branded tablet notebook T210C).
Install FreeBSD into prepared primary partition as usual but don’t install boot loader. Insert the PC-BSD/FreeBSD installation CD-ROM and copy the /boot/boot1 file to a new file called c:\freebsd. Then modify the c:\boot.ini file by running ‘notepad c:\boot.ini’. You cannot find this file with ‘Search’ or via Explorer as it is hidden from normal view.
Then add the following at the very end of the boot.ini file:
Code:
c:\freebsd=”FreeBSD Operating System”
After saving changes reboot Windows. The next time Windows appear you have the choice of booting Windows 2000/XP or FreeBSD. Either OS can now be started from this menu.
Edited 2008-02-14 20:18 UTC
I know FreeBSD is mainly meant for servers but darn it, this is a great desktop operating system. I have it on 2 desktops and 2 laptops and it just plain rocks. If you are looking for something fun to play with, give FreeBSD a spin.
What I would need for it to replace linux as desktop
(and I want it to) is
1) Full Flash-9 support on x86-64
2) Nvidia drivers on x86-64
As much as I like freebsd I do think
OpenSolaris will be a better replacement for linux
(in 1 to 2 years) for its support of the above..