FreeBSD Archive

14.2-RELEASE now includes OCI-compatible images, and the Podman toolkit on FreeBSD is ready to use them, on both amd64 and arm64 systems. ↫ Dave Cottlehuber This article from Dave Cottlehuber goes into more detail about the OCI-compatible FreeBSD images and how to use them.

FreeBSD 14.2 has been released, and as the version number suggests, this isn’t a major release with huge changes. Still, it does bring support for downloading and installing necessary firmware packages after installation, the latest versions of OpenZFS and OpenSSL, and much more. FreeBSD 14.2 is available for the main architectures it supports – x86, PowerPC/POWER, ARM, and RISC-V, and can be downloaded from the usual location.

quBSD is a FreeBSD jails/bhyve wrapper which implements a Qubes inspired containerization schema. Written in shell, based on zfs, and uses the underlying FreeBSD tools. ↫ quBSD GitHub page quBSD really seems to build upon the best FreeBSD has to offer. Neat.

It’s the start of the work week, so for the IT administrators among us, I have another great article by friend of the website, Stefano Marinelli. This article covers migrating a Proxmox-based setup to FreeBSD with bhyve. The load is not particularly high, and the machines have good performance. Suddenly, however, I received a notification: one of the NVMe drives died abruptly, and the server rebooted. ZFS did its job, and everything remained sufficiently secure, but since it’s a leased server and already several years old, I spoke with the client and proposed getting more recent hardware and redoing the setup based on a FreeBSD host. ↫ Stefano Marinelli If you’re interested in moving one of your own setups, or one of your clients’ setups, from Linux to FreeBSD, this is a great place to start and get some ideas, tips, and tricks. Like I said, it’s Monday, and you need to get to work.

For nearly 15 years, FreeBSD has been at the core of my personal infrastructure, and my passion for it has only grown over time. As a die-hard fan, I’ve stuck with BSD-based systems because they continue to deliver exactly what I need—storage, networking, and security—without missing a beat. The features I initially fell in love with, like ZFS, jails, and pf, are still rock-solid and irreplaceable. There’s no need to overhaul them, and in many ways, that reliability is what keeps me hooked. My scripts from 20 years ago still work, and that’s a rare kind of stability that few platforms can boast. It’s not just me, either—big names like Netflix, Microsoft, and NetApp, alongside companies like Tailscale and AMD, continue to support FreeBSD, further reinforcing my belief in its strength and longevity (you can find the donators and sponsors right here). Yet, while this familiarity is comforting, it’s becoming clear that FreeBSD must evolve to keep pace with the modern landscape of computing. ↫ gyptazy It’s good to read so many articles and comments from long-time FreeBSD users and contributors who seem to recognise that there’s a real opportunity for FreeBSD to become more than ‘just’ a solid server operating system. This aligns neatly with FreeBSD itself recognising this, too, and investing in improving the operating system’s support for what are not considered basic laptop features like touchpad gestures and advanced sleep states, among other things. I’ve long held the belief that the BSDs are far closer to attracting a wider, more general computing-focused audience than even they themselves sometimes seem to think. There’s a real, tangible benefit to the way BSDs are developed and structured – a base system developed by one team – compared to the Linux world, and there’s enough disgruntlement among especially longtime Linux users about things like Wayland and systemd that there’s a pool of potential users to attract that didn’t exist only a few years ago. If you’re a little unsure about the future of Linux – give one of the BSDs a try. There’s a real chance you’ll love it.

FreeBSD is going to take its desktop use quite a bit more seriously going forward. FreeBSD has long been a top choice for IT professionals and organizations focused on servers and networking, and it is known for its unmatched stability, performance, and security. However, as technology evolves, FreeBSD faces a significant challenge: supporting modern laptops. To address this, the FreeBSD Foundation and Quantum Leap Research has committed $750,000 to improve laptop support, a strategic investment that will be pivotal in FreeBSD’s future. ↫ FreeBSD Foundation blog So, what are they going to spend this big bag of money on? Well, exactly the kind of things you expect. They want to improve and broaden support for various wireless chipsets, add support for modern powersaving processor states, and make sure laptop-specific features like touchpad gestures, specialty buttons, and so on, work properly. On top of that, they want to invest in better graphics driver support for Intel and AMD, as well as make it more seamless to switch between various audio devices, which is especially crucial on laptops where people might reasonably be expected to use headphones. In addition, while not specifically related to laptops, FreeBSD also intends to invest in support for heterogeneous cores in its scheduler and improvements to the bhyve hypervisor. Virtualisation is, of course, not just something for large desktops and servers, but also laptop users might turn to for certain tasks and workloads. The FreeBSD project will be working not just with Quantum Leap Research, but also various hardware makers to assist in bringing FreeBSD’s laptop support to a more modern, plug-and-play state. Additionally, the mentioned cash injection is not set in stone; additional contributions from both individuals and larger organisations are obviously welcome, and of course if you can contribute code, bug reports, documentation, and so on, you’re also more than welcome to jump in.

This is freebsd-rustdate, a reimplementation of freebsd-update. It’s primarily written because of how slow freebsd-update is, and is written in rust because I felt like it. In usage, it’s expected to be similar, but not identical to freebsd-update. There are probably a number of minor edge-case differences I don’t even know about, but there are a number of larger ones that are intentional too. ↫ Matthew Fuller I love it when someone takes on a very well-established tool that’s used by countless people who probably barely think about how it could be improved. In this case, the performance improvements are nothing short of extraordinary, but of course, its author Matthew Fuller rightfully points out that you really shouldn’t be using this on any production system. It has not received even one percent of the kind of testing and eyeballs that the regular update tool in FreeBSD has received, so there may be edge cases or bugs. Improving the speed of the update process is always welcome. If it’s slow and time-consuming, people might postpone the updates because they’re getting in the way of what they want to do at the moment. Sure, I doubt the average FreeBSD user is the kind of person to postpone updates and run an insecure system in the meantime, but it might still draw a few people across the line to quickly get them done before continuing their work. This new rust-based FreeBSD update tool is definitely not going to be replacing the current one any time soon, nor is it even a part of the FreeBSD project in the first place, so there’s no need to worry about any potential breakage to your FreeBSD system because they’re replacing a battle-tested tool with a new one. All this does for now is highlight that there’s gains to be made here, and that’s a goal worth pursuing.

One feature I couldn’t live without anymore is snapshots. As system administrators, we often find ourselves in situations where we’ve made a mistake, need to revert to a previous state, or need access to a log that has been rotated and disappeared. Since I started using ZFS, all of this has become incredibly simple, and I feel much more at ease when making any modifications. However, since I don’t always remember to create a manual snapshot before starting to work, I use an automatic snapshot system. For this type of snapshot, I use the excellent zfs-autobackup tool – which I also use for backups. The goal is to have a single, flexible, and configurable tool without having to learn different syntaxes. ↫ Stefano Marinelli I’m always a little sad about the fact that the kind of advanced features modern file systems like ZFS, btrfs, and others offer are so inaccessible to mere desktop users like myself. While I understand they’re primarily designed for server use, they’re still making their way to desktops – my Fedora installations all default to btrfs – and I’d love to be able to make use of their advanced features straight from within KDE (or GNOME or whatever it is you use). Of course, that’s neither here or there for the article at hand, which will be quite useful for people administering FreeBSD and/or Linux systems, and who would like to get the most out of ZFS by automating some of its functionality.

Hetzner no longer offers a FreeBSD rescue system but it is possible to install and manage FreeBSD with OpenZFS from the Linux rescue system on a dedicated server with UEFI boot. The installation is done on a mirrored OpenZFS pool consisting of two drives. ↫ Martin Matuska Not much to add here – Hetzner is a popular hosting and server provider, and if you want to use FreeBSD on their machines, here’s how.

Not too long ago I linked to a blog post by long-time OSNews reader (and silver Patreon) and friend of mine Morgan, about how to set up OpenBSD as a workstation operating system – and in fact, I personally used that guide in my own OpenBSD journey. Well, Morgan’s back with another, similar article, this time covering FreeBSD. After going through the basic steps needed to make FreeBSD a bit more amenable to desktop use, Morgan notes about performance: Now let’s compare FreeBSD. Well, quite frankly, there is no comparison! FreeBSD just feels snappier and more responsive on the desktop; at the same 170Hz refresh it actually feels like 170Hz. Void Linux always felt fast enough and I thought it had no lag at all at that refresh rate, but comparing them side by side (FreeBSD installed on the NVMe drive, Void running from a USB 4 SSD with similar performance), FreeBSD is smooth as glass and I started noticing just the slightest lag/stutter on Void. The same holds true for Firefox; I use smooth scrolling and on FreeBSD it really is perfectly smooth. Similarly, Youtube performance is unreal, with no dropped frames at any resolution all the way up to 4Kp60, and the videos look so much smoother! ↫ Morgan/kaidenshi This is especially relevant for me personally, since the prime reason I switched my workstation back to Fedora KDE was OpenBSD’s performance issues. While those performance issues were entirely expected and the result of the operating system’s focus on security and hardening, it did mean it’s just not suitable for me as a workstation operating system, even if I like the internals and find it a joy to use, even under the hood. If FreeBSD delivers more solid desktop and workstation performance, it might be time I set up a FreeBSD KDE installation and see if it can handle my workstation’s 270Hz 4K display. As I keep reiterating – the BSD world has a lot to offer those wishing to run a UNIX-like workstation operating system, and it’s articles like these that help people get started. A lot of the steps taken may seem elementary to many of us, but for people coming from Linux or even Windows, they may be unfamiliar and daunting, so having it all laid out in a straightforward manner is quite helpful.

This document provides information about the NanoBSD tools, which can be used to create FreeBSD system images for embedded applications, suitable for use on a USB key, memory card or other mass storage media. It can be used to build specialized install images, designed for easy installation and maintenance of systems commonly called “computer appliances”. Computer appliances have their hardware and software bundled in the product, which means all applications are pre-installed. The appliance is plugged into an existing network and can begin working (almost) immediately. ↫ FreeBSD documentation Some of the primary features of NanoBSD are exactly what you’d expect out of a tool like this, such as the system being entirely read-only at runtime, so you don’t have to worry about shutdowns or data loss, and of course, the entire creation process of NanoBSD images using a simple shell script with any arbitrary set of requirements. For the rest, it remains a FreeBSD system, so ports and packages work just as you’d expect, and assuming your specific settings for the NanoBSD image didn’t remove it, anything that works in FreeBSD, works in a NanoBSD image, too. The documentation is, as is often the case in the BSD world, excellent, and very easy to follow, even for someone not at all specialised in things like this. Reading through it, I’m pretty sure even I could create a customised NanoBSD image and run it, since it very much looks like you’re just creating a custom installation script, adding just the things you need. I don’t have a use for something like this, but I’m not sure how well-known NanoBSD is, and I feel like there’s definitely some among you who would appreciate this.

The Vector Packet Processor (VPP) is a framework for moving packets around at high rates. Its core concept is handling packets in groups known as “vectors,” which allows for the native use of vector processor instructions for packet classification and processing in different CPU architectures — currently amd64 and arm64. VPP can process packets at incredibly high rates and competes with many dedicated forwarding appliances. This is achieved using userspace networking that bypasses the host’s normal network stack. This article describes the porting of VPP to FreeBSD and working with the upstream VPP project to include FreeBSD as a supported target. ↫ Tom Jones It’s not unusual for me to link to something a little over my head, and this is another example of something I know y’all will like, but I don’t really understand fully.

About a week ago I reported on a case study from Dell and FreeBSD, about Dell’s ThinOS thin client operating system, which basically consists of a proprietary Dell GUI running on top of, at the moment, FreeBSD 12 (they’re moving to FreeBSD 14 for the next ThinOS release). Well, this got me interested – I’ve always been fascinated by thin clients, and a Dell/Wyse FreeBSD ‘distribution’ is just wild enough to be interesting – so I went onto eBay, and bought a Dell thin client. More specifically, I bought a Dell OptiPlex 3000 Thin Client, which comes with an Intel Pentium Silver N6005, a four core CPU without hyperthreading, 16 GB of RAM, a 32GB eMMC storage chip with room for a small M.2 SSD, WiFi 6, Ethernet, USB 3.0, 2.0, and C ports, Bluetooth, and so on. A low-power, but still quite capable little computer that I snagged for a mere €130, which is a steal compared to the full unit price; my configuration is sold new for like €700-800. Of course, these things are sold in batches of hundreds or maybe even thousands of units, and in such volumes corporate clients get massive discounts. Still, it’s a nice deal. My model came installed with Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, which I was not at all interested in. I immediately downloaded the latest ThinOS version for my model, used Dell’s tool and instructions to create a bootable USB, and got to work. The installation process was quick and easy, and does indeed look like an automated FreeBSD installation, TUI and all. After the installation is completed, you get guided through a first-run experience to configure things like the keyboard, WiFi, and so on, and it looks rather fancy. Once I completed the first-run experience, I hit the roadblock I was expecting: in order to use ThinOS, you need a ThinOS Activation License. Since my device was originally sold with (I think) Ubuntu preinstalled, it doesn’t have a TAL in its UEFI, and the only way to push a TAL to a device is to use the Dell Wyse Management Suite. Sadly, the Dell WMS only runs on Windows, and to make matters far worse, only on Windows Server. And it gets even worse – even if I created a Windows Server VM just to run WMS, I need the Pro version, which isn’t free (the free Standard version cannot push TALs), and I’d need to buy a TAL. Aside from the Windows Server restriction, I was aware of these limitations and requirements, so I’m not in the least bit surprised. I was curious to see if buying a TAL was an easy experience, or if it’s entirely geared towards enterprise customers and silly hobbyists like me need not apply. Without a license, I can use the proprietary Dell user interface, but it seems I can’t connect to any possible VDI providers, and I can’t tell what other features might be gated at the moment. With some admittedly very mild poking and prodding, I also haven’t been able to discover any ways of ‘leaving’ Dell’s proprietary GUI to get to a terminal. I’ll do some more prodding over the coming days. I’m not entirely sure where to go from here when it comes to seeing just how much you can do with ThinOS, which was my original goal for this project. I have a feeling the pro version of the Dell Wyse Management Suite is going to be rather expensive – I can’t find any pricing information, which confirms my suspicions – so I think the journey ends here. Unless any OSNews readers have experience with this stuff, and can point me to some tips and tricks to perhaps acquire and install a TAL some other way, there won’t be a more in-depth look at Dell’s weird version of FreeBSD on OSNews. Which sucks, but was to be expected when it comes to enterprise software. Mind you, this does not mean the hardware is going to waste. Not only are there other purpose-built thin client operating systems to experiment with, it is also a full-fledged tiny x86 computer with completely silent passive cooling and a free M.2 slot, so the possibilities are endless.

Several Dell products use ThinOS 9, such as the OptiPlex 3000 Thin Client, the OptiPlex All-In-One, and the Latitude series laptops, such as the Latitude 3440 and 5440. ThinOS is a ready-to-deploy solution that aims to improve virtual desktops while offering a secure platform for applications and services. It provides users with a seamless and integrated experience, whether remotely or from the office. It’s a software environment that optimizes virtual workspaces. The latest version, ThinOS 9, is built on FreeBSD 12 with other 3rd-party open source components and is well-known for its robust security and stability. This aligns with the requirements of modern enterprises that demand high performance and protection in their computing solutions. ↫ Dell case study While Dell and FreeBSD call this a ‘case study’ but while I see plenty of case, I see little study – it’s mostly just a load of marketing speak. That being said, there’s still interesting news in here about the future of ThinOS. The next release of ThinOS, version 10, will make the jump from FreeBSD 12 to the current FreeBSD 14 release, drastically improving hardware support in the process, while also bringing in the various other benefits of the latest FreeBSD release. It will also improve ThinOS’ compatibility with Linux applications, a feature of FreeBSD, which is something Dell is keen to highlight. It should come as no surprise that ThinOS 10 will also improve its security features, probably also mostly coming along for the ride from FreeBSD 14. Dell also mentions that it intends to continue using FreeBSD as the base for ThinOS, which could’ve easily gone differently as part of Dell’s acquisition of Wyze, where ThinOS originally comes from. This is good news for FreeBSD, but at the same time, when I look at thin clients on Dell’s website, ThinOS is just one of the options, and every photo shows the devices running Windows 10 IoT Enterprise LTSC 2021. I genuinely wonder what the spread is between buyers opting for ThinOS, Windows, and Linux. Thin clients have always fascinated me, so perhaps I should go onto eBay, figure out which Dell thin clients are still supported by the latest ThinOS release, buy one, and set up a simple thin client environment in my home – using ThinOS, of course.