---
title: "FreeBSD/alpha 5.1-RELEASE Installation Instructions"
sidenav: download
---

++++


        <h3 class="CORPAUTHOR">The FreeBSD Project</h3>

        <p class="COPYRIGHT">Copyright &copy; 2000, 2001, 2002,
        2003 by The FreeBSD Documentation Project</p>
        <hr />
      </div>

      <blockquote class="ABSTRACT">
        <div class="ABSTRACT">
          <a id="AEN11" name="AEN11"></a>

          <p>This article gives some brief instructions on
          installing FreeBSD/alpha 5.1-RELEASE, with particular
          emphasis given to obtaining a FreeBSD distribution. Some
          notes on troubleshooting and frequently-asked questions
          are also given.</p>
        </div>
      </blockquote>

      <div class="SECT1">
        <hr />

        <h1 class="SECT1"><a id="INSTALL" name="INSTALL">1
        Installing FreeBSD</a></h1>

        <p>This section documents the process of installing a new
        distribution of FreeBSD. These instructions pay particular
        emphasis to the process of obtaining the FreeBSD
        5.1-RELEASE distribution and to beginning the installation
        procedure. The <a
        href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/install.html"
         target="_top">``Installing FreeBSD''</a> chapter of the <a
        href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/"
         target="_top">FreeBSD Handbook</a> provides more in-depth
        information about the installation program itself,
        including a guided walkthrough with screenshots.</p>

        <p>If you are upgrading from a previous release of FreeBSD,
        please see <a href="#UPGRADING">Section 3</a> for
        instructions on upgrading.</p>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="GETTING-STARTED"
          name="GETTING-STARTED">1.1 Getting Started</a></h2>

          <p>Probably the most important pre-installation step that
          can be taken is that of reading the various instruction
          documents provided with FreeBSD. A roadmap of documents
          pertaining to this release of FreeBSD can be found in <tt
          class="FILENAME">README.TXT</tt>, which can usually be
          found in the same location as this file; most of these
          documents, such as the release notes and the hardware
          compatibility list, are also accessible in the
          Documentation menu of the installer.</p>

          <p>Note that on-line versions of the FreeBSD <a
          href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/"
           target="_top">FAQ</a> and <a
          href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/"
           target="_top">Handbook</a> are also available from the
          <a href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/" target="_top">FreeBSD
          Project Web site</a>, if you have an Internet
          connection.</p>

          <p>This collection of documents may seem daunting, but
          the time spent reading them will likely be saved many
          times over. Being familiar with what resources are
          available can also be helpful in the event of problems
          during installation.</p>

          <p>The best laid plans sometimes go awry, so if you run
          into trouble take a look at <a href="#TROUBLE">Section
          4</a>, which contains valuable troubleshooting
          information. You should also read an updated copy of <tt
          class="FILENAME">ERRATA.TXT</tt> before installing, since
          this will alert you to any problems which have reported
          in the interim for your particular release.</p>

          <div class="IMPORTANT">
            <blockquote class="IMPORTANT">
              <p><b>Important:</b> While FreeBSD does its best to
              safeguard against accidental loss of data, it's still
              more than possible to <span class="emphasis"><i
              class="EMPHASIS">wipe out your entire disk</i></span>
              with this installation if you make a mistake. Please
              do not proceed to the final FreeBSD installation menu
              unless you've adequately backed up any important data
              first.</p>
            </blockquote>
          </div>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="AEN36" name="AEN36">1.2 Hardware
          Requirements</a></h2>

          <p>FreeBSD for the Alpha/AXP supports the platforms
          described in <tt class="FILENAME">HARDWARE.TXT</tt>.</p>

          <p>You will need a dedicated disk for FreeBSD/alpha. It
          is not possible to share a disk with another operating
          system at this time. This disk will need to be attached
          to a SCSI controller which is supported by the SRM
          firmware or an IDE disk assuming the SRM in your machine
          supports booting from IDE disks.</p>

          <p>Your root filesystem MUST be the first partition
          (partition <tt class="LITERAL">a</tt>) on the disk to be
          bootable.</p>

          <p>You will need the SRM console firmware for your
          platform. In some cases, it is possible to switch between
          AlphaBIOS (or ARC) firmware and SRM. In others it will be
          necessary to download new firmware from the vendor's Web
          site.</p>

          <p>If you are not familiar with configuring hardware for
          FreeBSD, you should be sure to read the <tt
          class="FILENAME">HARDWARE.TXT</tt> file; it contains
          important information on what hardware is supported by
          FreeBSD.</p>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="FLOPPIES" name="FLOPPIES">1.3
          Floppy Disk Image Instructions</a></h2>

          <p>Depending on how you choose to install FreeBSD, you
          may need to create a set of floppy disks (usually two) to
          begin the installation process. This section briefly
          describes how to create these disks, either from a CDROM
          installation or from the Internet. Note that in the
          common case of installing FreeBSD from CDROM, on a
          machine that supports bootable CDROMs, the steps outlined
          in this section will not be needed and can be
          skipped.</p>

          <p>For most CDROM or network installations, all you need
          to copy onto actual floppies from the <tt
          class="FILENAME">floppies/</tt> directory are the <tt
          class="FILENAME">kern.flp</tt> and <tt
          class="FILENAME">mfsroot.flp</tt> images (for 1.44MB
          floppies). Depending on your hardware, you may also need
          to make the third <tt class="FILENAME">drivers.flp</tt>
          image to provide necessary device drivers.</p>

          <p>Getting these images over the network is easy. Simply
          fetch the <tt class="REPLACEABLE"><i>release</i></tt><tt
          class="FILENAME">/floppies/kern.flp</tt>, <tt
          class="REPLACEABLE"><i>release</i></tt><tt
          class="FILENAME">/floppies/mfsroot.flp</tt>, and <tt
          class="REPLACEABLE"><i>release</i></tt><tt
          class="FILENAME">/floppies/drivers.flp</tt> files from <a
          href="ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/"
          target="_top">ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/</a> or one of the
          many mirrors listed at <a
          href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/mirrors-ftp.html"
           target="_top">FTP Sites</a> section of the Handbook, or
          on the <a href="http://mirrorlist.FreeBSD.org/"
          target="_top">http://mirrorlist.FreeBSD.org/</a> Web
          pages.</p>

          <p>Get two blank, freshly formatted floppies and image
          copy <tt class="FILENAME">kern.flp</tt> onto one and <tt
          class="FILENAME">mfsroot.flp</tt> onto the other. These
          images are <span class="emphasis"><i
          class="EMPHASIS">not</i></span> DOS files. You cannot
          simply copy them to a DOS or UFS floppy as regular files,
          you need to ``image'' copy them to the floppy with <tt
          class="FILENAME">fdimage.exe</tt> under DOS (see the <tt
          class="FILENAME">tools</tt> directory on your CDROM or
          FreeBSD FTP mirror) or the <a
          href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=dd&amp;sektion=1&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
          <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
          class="REFENTRYTITLE">dd</span>(1)</span></a> command in
          UNIX.</p>

          <p>For example, to create the kernel floppy image from
          DOS, you'd do something like this:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">C&#62;</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>fdimage kern.flp a:</b></tt>
</pre>

          <p>Assuming that you'd copied <tt
          class="FILENAME">fdimage.exe</tt> and <tt
          class="FILENAME">kern.flp</tt> into a directory
          somewhere. You would do the same for <tt
          class="FILENAME">mfsroot.flp</tt>, of course.</p>

          <p>If you're creating the boot floppy from a UNIX
          machine, you may find that:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>dd if=floppies/kern.flp of=/dev/rfd0</b></tt>
</pre>

          <p>or</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>dd if=floppies/kern.flp of=/dev/floppy</b></tt>
</pre>

          <p>work well, depending on your hardware and operating
          system environment (different versions of UNIX have
          different names for the floppy drive).</p>

          <p>If you're on an alpha machine that can network-boot
          its floppy images or you have a 2.88MB or LS-120 floppy
          capable of taking a 2.88MB image on an x86 machine, you
          may wish to use the single (but twice as large) <tt
          class="FILENAME">boot.flp</tt> image. It contains the
          contents of <tt class="FILENAME">kern.flp</tt> and <tt
          class="FILENAME">mfsroot.flp</tt> on a single floppy.
          This file should also be used as the boot file for those
          mastering ``El Torito'' bootable CD images. See the <a
          href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=mkisofs&amp;sektion=8&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+Ports">
          <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
          class="REFENTRYTITLE">mkisofs</span>(8)</span></a>
          command for more information.</p>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="START-INSTALLATION"
          name="START-INSTALLATION">1.4 Installing FreeBSD from
          CDROM or the Internet</a></h2>

          <p>The easiest type of installation is from CDROM. If you
          have a supported CDROM drive and a FreeBSD installation
          CDROM, you can boot FreeBSD directly from the CDROM.
          Insert the CDROM into the drive and type the following
          command to start the installation (substituting the name
          of the appropriate CDROM drive if necessary):</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
&gt;&gt;&gt;<tt class="USERINPUT"><b>boot dka0</b></tt>
</pre>

          <p>Alternatively you can boot the installation from
          floppy disk. You should start the installation by
          building a set of FreeBSD boot floppies from the files
          <tt class="FILENAME">floppies/kern.flp</tt> and <tt
          class="FILENAME">floppies/mfsroot.flp</tt> using the
          instructions found in <a href="#FLOPPIES">Section
          1.3</a>. From the SRM console prompt (<tt
          class="LITERAL">&gt;&gt;&gt;</tt>), just insert the <tt
          class="FILENAME">kern.flp</tt> floppy and type the
          following command to start the installation:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
&gt;&gt;&gt;<tt class="USERINPUT"><b>boot dva0</b></tt>
</pre>

          <p>Insert the <tt class="FILENAME">mfsroot.flp</tt>
          floppy when prompted and you will end up at the first
          screen of the install program.</p>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="AEN209" name="AEN209">1.5 Detail
          on various installation types</a></h2>

          <p>Once you've gotten yourself to the initial
          installation screen somehow, you should be able to follow
          the various menu prompts and go from there. If you've
          never used the FreeBSD installation before, you are also
          encouraged to read some of the documentation in the
          Documentation submenu as well as the general ``Usage''
          instructions on the first menu.</p>

          <div class="NOTE">
            <blockquote class="NOTE">
              <p><b>Note:</b> If you get stuck at a screen, press
              the <b class="KEYCAP">F1</b> key for online
              documentation relevant to that specific section.</p>
            </blockquote>
          </div>

          <p>If you've never installed FreeBSD before, or even if
          you have, the ``Standard'' installation mode is the most
          recommended since it makes sure that you'll visit all the
          various important checklist items along the way. If
          you're much more comfortable with the FreeBSD
          installation process and know <span class="emphasis"><i
          class="EMPHASIS">exactly</i></span> what you want to do,
          use the ``Express'' or ``Custom'' installation options.
          If you're upgrading an existing system, use the
          ``Upgrade'' option.</p>

          <p>The FreeBSD installer supports the direct use of
          floppy, DOS, tape, CDROM, FTP, NFS and UFS partitions as
          installation media; further tips on installing from each
          type of media are listed below.</p>

          <p>Once the install procedure has finished, you will be
          able to start FreeBSD/alpha by typing something like this
          to the SRM prompt:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
&gt;&gt;&gt;<tt class="USERINPUT"><b>boot dkc0</b></tt>
</pre>

          <p>This instructs the firmware to boot the specified
          disk. To find the SRM names of disks in your machine, use
          the <tt class="LITERAL">show device</tt> command:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
&gt;&gt;&gt;<tt class="USERINPUT"><b>show device</b></tt>
dka0.0.0.4.0               DKA0           TOSHIBA CD-ROM XM-57  3476
dkc0.0.0.1009.0            DKC0                       RZ1BB-BS  0658
dkc100.1.0.1009.0          DKC100             SEAGATE ST34501W  0015
dva0.0.0.0.1               DVA0
ewa0.0.0.3.0               EWA0              00-00-F8-75-6D-01
pkc0.7.0.1009.0            PKC0                  SCSI Bus ID 7  5.27
pqa0.0.0.4.0               PQA0                       PCI EIDE
pqb0.0.1.4.0               PQB0                       PCI EIDE
</pre>

          <p>This example is from a Digital Personal Workstation
          433au and shows three disks attached to the machine. The
          first is a CDROM called <tt class="DEVICENAME">dka0</tt>
          and the other two are disks and are called <tt
          class="DEVICENAME">dkc0</tt> and <tt
          class="DEVICENAME">dkc100</tt> respectively.</p>

          <p>You can specify which kernel file to load and what
          boot options to use with the <tt
          class="OPTION">-file</tt> and <tt
          class="OPTION">-flags</tt> options, for example:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">&gt;&gt;&gt;</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>boot -file kernel.old -flags s</b></tt>
</pre>

          <p>To make FreeBSD/alpha boot automatically, use these
          commands:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">&gt;&gt;&gt;</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>set boot_osflags a</b></tt>
<tt class="PROMPT">&gt;&gt;&gt;</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>set bootdef_dev dkc0</b></tt>
<tt class="PROMPT">&gt;&gt;&gt;</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>set auto_action BOOT</b></tt>
</pre>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="AEN248" name="AEN248">1.5.1
            Installing from a Network CDROM</a></h3>

            <p>If you simply wish to install from a local CDROM
            drive then see <a href="#START-INSTALLATION">Section
            1.4</a>. If you don't have a CDROM drive on your system
            and wish to use a FreeBSD distribution CD in the CDROM
            drive of another system to which you have network
            connectivity, there are also several ways of going
            about it:</p>

            <ul>
              <li>
                <p>If you would be able to FTP install FreeBSD
                directly from the CDROM drive in some FreeBSD
                machine, it's quite easy: You simply add the
                following line to the password file (using the <a
                href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=vipw&amp;sektion=8&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
                <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
                class="REFENTRYTITLE">vipw</span>(8)</span></a>
                command):</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
ftp:*:99:99::0:0:FTP:/cdrom:/sbin/nologin
</pre>

                <p>On the machine on which you are running the
                install, go to the Options menu and set Release
                Name to <tt class="LITERAL">any</tt>. You may then
                choose a Media type of <tt class="LITERAL">FTP</tt>
                and type in <tt class="FILENAME">ftp://<tt
                class="REPLACEABLE"><i>machine</i></tt></tt> after
                picking ``URL'' in the ftp sites menu.</p>

                <div class="WARNING">
                  <blockquote class="WARNING">
                    <p><b>Warning:</b> This may allow anyone on the
                    local network (or Internet) to make ``anonymous
                    FTP'' connections to this machine, which may
                    not be desirable.</p>
                  </blockquote>
                </div>
              </li>

              <li>
                <p>If you would rather use NFS to export the CDROM
                directly to the machine(s) you'll be installing
                from, you need to first add an entry to the <tt
                class="FILENAME">/etc/exports</tt> file (on the
                machine with the CDROM drive). The example below
                allows the machine <tt
                class="HOSTID">ziggy.foo.com</tt> to mount the
                CDROM directly via NFS during installation:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
/cdrom          -ro             ziggy.foo.com
</pre>

                <p>The machine with the CDROM must also be
                configured as an NFS server, of course, and if
                you're not sure how to do that then an NFS
                installation is probably not the best choice for
                you unless you're willing to read up on <a
                href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=rc.conf&amp;sektion=5&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
                <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
                class="REFENTRYTITLE">rc.conf</span>(5)</span></a>
                and configure things appropriately. Assuming that
                this part goes smoothly, you should be able to
                enter: <tt class="FILENAME"><tt
                class="REPLACEABLE"><i>cdrom-host</i></tt>:/cdrom</tt>
                as the path for an NFS installation when the target
                machine is installed, e.g. <tt
                class="FILENAME">wiggy:/cdrom</tt>.</p>
              </li>
            </ul>
          </div>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="AEN280" name="AEN280">1.5.2
            Installing from Floppies</a></h3>

            <p>If you must install from floppy disks, either due to
            unsupported hardware or just because you enjoy doing
            things the hard way, you must first prepare some
            floppies for the install.</p>

            <p>First, make your boot floppies as described in <a
            href="#FLOPPIES">Section 1.3</a>.</p>

            <p>Second, peruse <a href="#LAYOUT">Section 2</a> and
            pay special attention to the ``Distribution Format''
            section since it describes which files you're going to
            need to put onto floppy and which you can safely
            skip.</p>

            <p>Next you will need, at minimum, as many 1.44MB
            floppies as it takes to hold all files in the <tt
            class="FILENAME">bin</tt> (binary distribution)
            directory. If you're preparing these floppies under
            DOS, then these floppies <span class="emphasis"><i
            class="EMPHASIS">must</i></span> be formatted using the
            MS-DOS <tt class="FILENAME">FORMAT</tt> command. If
            you're using Windows, use the Windows File Manager
            format command.</p>

            <div class="IMPORTANT">
              <blockquote class="IMPORTANT">
                <p><b>Important:</b> Frequently, floppy disks come
                ``factory preformatted''. While convenient, many
                problems reported by users in the past have
                resulted from the use of improperly formatted
                media. Re-format them yourself, just to make
                sure.</p>
              </blockquote>
            </div>

            <p>If you're creating the floppies from another FreeBSD
            machine, a format is still not a bad idea though you
            don't need to put a DOS filesystem on each floppy. You
            can use the <a
            href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=disklabel&amp;sektion=8&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
            <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
            class="REFENTRYTITLE">disklabel</span>(8)</span></a>
            and <a
            href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=newfs&amp;sektion=8&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
            <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
            class="REFENTRYTITLE">newfs</span>(8)</span></a>
            commands to put a UFS filesystem on a floppy, as the
            following sequence of commands illustrates:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>fdformat -f 1440 fd0.1440</b></tt>
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>disklabel -w -r fd0.1440 floppy3</b></tt>
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>newfs -t 2 -u 18 -l 1 -i 65536 /dev/fd0</b></tt>
</pre>

            <p>After you've formatted the floppies for DOS or UFS,
            you'll need to copy the files onto them. The
            distribution files are split into chunks conveniently
            sized so that 5 of them will fit on a conventional
            1.44MB floppy. Go through all your floppies, packing as
            many files as will fit on each one, until you've got
            all the distributions you want packed up in this
            fashion. Each distribution should go into its own
            subdirectory on the floppy, e.g.: <tt
            class="FILENAME">a:\bin\bin.inf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">a:\bin\bin.aa</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">a:\bin\bin.ab</tt>, ...</p>

            <div class="IMPORTANT">
              <blockquote class="IMPORTANT">
                <p><b>Important:</b> The <tt
                class="FILENAME">bin.inf</tt> file also needs to go
                on the first floppy of the <tt
                class="FILENAME">bin</tt> set since it is read by
                the installation program in order to figure out how
                many additional pieces to look for when fetching
                and concatenating the distribution. When putting
                distributions onto floppies, the <tt
                class="FILENAME">distname.inf</tt> file <span
                class="emphasis"><i
                class="EMPHASIS">must</i></span> occupy the first
                floppy of each distribution set. This is also
                covered in <tt
                class="FILENAME">README.TXT</tt>.</p>
              </blockquote>
            </div>

            <p>Once you come to the Media screen of the install,
            select ``Floppy'' and you'll be prompted for the
            rest.</p>
          </div>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="AEN350" name="AEN350">1.5.4
            Installing from QIC/SCSI Tape</a></h3>

            <p>When installing from tape, the installation program
            expects the files to be simply tar'ed onto it, so after
            fetching all of the files for the distributions you're
            interested in, simply use <a
            href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=tar&amp;sektion=1&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
            <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
            class="REFENTRYTITLE">tar</span>(1)</span></a> to get
            them onto the tape with a command something like
            this:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt class="USERINPUT"><b>cd <tt
class="REPLACEABLE"><i>/where/you/have/your/dists</i></tt></b></tt>
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>tar cvf /dev/rsa0 <tt
class="REPLACEABLE"><i>dist1</i></tt> .. <tt
class="REPLACEABLE"><i>dist2</i></tt></b></tt>
</pre>

            <p>When you go to do the installation, you should also
            make sure that you leave enough room in some temporary
            directory (which you'll be allowed to choose) to
            accommodate the <span class="emphasis"><i
            class="EMPHASIS">full</i></span> contents of the tape
            you've created. Due to the non-random access nature of
            tapes, this method of installation requires quite a bit
            of temporary storage. You should expect to require as
            much temporary storage as you have stuff written on
            tape.</p>

            <div class="NOTE">
              <blockquote class="NOTE">
                <p><b>Note:</b> When going to do the installation,
                the tape must be in the drive <span
                class="emphasis"><i
                class="EMPHASIS">before</i></span> booting from the
                boot floppies. The installation ``probe'' may
                otherwise fail to find it.</p>
              </blockquote>
            </div>

            <p>Now create a boot floppy as described in <a
            href="#FLOPPIES">Section 1.3</a> and proceed with the
            installation.</p>
          </div>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="FTPNFS" name="FTPNFS">1.5.5
            Installing over a Network using FTP or NFS</a></h3>

            <p>After making the boot floppies as described in the
            first section, you can load the rest of the
            installation over a network using one of 3 types of
            connections: serial port, parallel port, or
            Ethernet.</p>

            <div class="SECT4">
              <hr />

              <h4 class="SECT4"><a id="AEN375"
              name="AEN375">1.5.5.1 Serial Port</a></h4>

              <p>SLIP support is rather primitive, and is limited
              primarily to hard-wired links, such as a serial cable
              running between two computers. The link must be
              hard-wired because the SLIP installation doesn't
              currently offer a dialing capability. If you need to
              dial out with a modem or otherwise dialog with the
              link before connecting to it, then I recommend that
              the PPP utility be used instead.</p>

              <p>If you're using PPP, make sure that you have your
              Internet Service Provider's IP address and DNS
              information handy as you'll need to know it fairly
              early in the installation process. You may also need
              to know your own IP address, though PPP supports
              dynamic address negotiation and may be able to pick
              up this information directly from your ISP if they
              support it.</p>

              <p>You will also need to know how to use the various
              ``AT commands'' for dialing out with your particular
              brand of modem as the PPP dialer provides only a very
              simple terminal emulator.</p>
            </div>

            <div class="SECT4">
              <hr />

              <h4 class="SECT4"><a id="AEN381"
              name="AEN381">1.5.5.2 Parallel Port</a></h4>

              <p>If a hard-wired connection to another FreeBSD or
              Linux machine is available, you might also consider
              installing over a ``laplink'' style parallel port
              cable. The data rate over the parallel port is much
              higher than what is typically possible over a serial
              line (up to 50k/sec), thus resulting in a quicker
              installation. It's not typically necessary to use
              ``real'' IP addresses when using a point-to-point
              parallel cable in this way and you can generally just
              use RFC 1918 style addresses for the ends of the link
              (e.g. <tt class="HOSTID">10.0.0.1</tt>, <tt
              class="HOSTID">10.0.0.2</tt>, etc).</p>

              <div class="IMPORTANT">
                <blockquote class="IMPORTANT">
                  <p><b>Important:</b> If you use a Linux machine
                  rather than a FreeBSD machine as your PLIP peer,
                  you will also have to specify <tt
                  class="OPTION">link0</tt> in the TCP/IP setup
                  screen's ``extra options for ifconfig'' field in
                  order to be compatible with Linux's slightly
                  different PLIP protocol.</p>
                </blockquote>
              </div>
            </div>

            <div class="SECT4">
              <hr />

              <h4 class="SECT4"><a id="AEN392"
              name="AEN392">1.5.5.3 Ethernet</a></h4>

              <p>FreeBSD supports many common Ethernet cards; a
              table of supported cards is provided as part of the
              FreeBSD Hardware Notes (see <tt
              class="FILENAME">HARDWARE.TXT</tt> in the
              Documentation menu on the boot floppy or the top
              level directory of the CDROM). If you are using one
              of the supported PCMCIA Ethernet cards, also be sure
              that it's plugged in <span class="emphasis"><i
              class="EMPHASIS">before</i></span> the laptop is
              powered on. FreeBSD does not, unfortunately,
              currently support ``hot insertion'' of PCMCIA cards
              during installation.</p>

              <p>You will also need to know your IP address on the
              network, the <tt class="OPTION">netmask</tt> value
              for your subnet and the name of your machine. Your
              system administrator can tell you which values are
              appropriate to your particular network setup. If you
              will be referring to other hosts by name rather than
              IP address, you'll also need a name server and
              possibly the address of a gateway (if you're using
              PPP, it's your provider's IP address) to use in
              talking to it. If you want to install by FTP via an
              HTTP proxy (see below), you will also need the
              proxy's address.</p>

              <p>If you do not know the answers to these questions
              then you should really probably talk to your system
              administrator <span class="emphasis"><i
              class="EMPHASIS">first</i></span> before trying this
              type of installation. Using a randomly chosen IP
              address or netmask on a live network is almost
              guaranteed not to work, and will probably result in a
              lecture from said system administrator.</p>

              <p>Once you have a network connection of some sort
              working, the installation can continue over NFS or
              FTP.</p>
            </div>

            <div class="SECT4">
              <hr />

              <h4 class="SECT4"><a id="AEN403"
              name="AEN403">1.5.5.4 NFS installation tips</a></h4>

              <p>NFS installation is fairly straight-forward:
              Simply copy the FreeBSD distribution files you want
              onto a server somewhere and then point the NFS media
              selection at it.</p>

              <p>If this server supports only ``privileged port''
              access (this is generally the default for Sun and
              Linux workstations), you will need to set this option
              in the Options menu before installation can
              proceed.</p>

              <p>If you have a poor quality Ethernet card which
              suffers from very slow transfer rates, you may also
              wish to toggle the appropriate Options flag.</p>

              <p>In order for NFS installation to work, the server
              must also support ``subdir mounts'', e.g. if your
              FreeBSD distribution directory lives on <tt
              class="FILENAME">wiggy:/usr/archive/stuff/FreeBSD</tt>,
              then <tt class="HOSTID">wiggy</tt> will have to allow
              the direct mounting of <tt
              class="FILENAME">/usr/archive/stuff/FreeBSD</tt>, not
              just <tt class="FILENAME">/usr</tt> or <tt
              class="FILENAME">/usr/archive/stuff</tt>.</p>

              <p>In FreeBSD's <tt
              class="FILENAME">/etc/exports</tt> file this is
              controlled by the <tt class="OPTION">-alldirs</tt>
              option. Other NFS servers may have different
              conventions. If you are getting <tt
              class="LITERAL">Permission Denied</tt> messages from
              the server then it's likely that you don't have this
              properly enabled.</p>
            </div>

            <div class="SECT4">
              <hr />

              <h4 class="SECT4"><a id="AEN420"
              name="AEN420">1.5.5.5 FTP Installation tips</a></h4>

              <p>FTP installation may be done from any mirror site
              containing a reasonably up-to-date version of
              FreeBSD. A full menu of reasonable choices for almost
              any location in the world is provided in the FTP site
              menu during installation.</p>

              <p>If you are installing from some other FTP site not
              listed in this menu, or you are having troubles
              getting your name server configured properly, you can
              also specify your own URL by selecting the ``URL''
              choice in that menu. A URL can contain a hostname or
              an IP address, so something like the following would
              work in the absence of a name server:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
ftp://216.66.64.162/pub/FreeBSD/releases/alpha/4.2-RELEASE
</pre>

              <p>There are three FTP installation modes you can
              use:</p>

              <ul>
                <li>
                  <p>FTP: This method uses the standard ``Active''
                  mode for transfers, in which the server initiates
                  a connection to the client. This will not work
                  through most firewalls but will often work best
                  with older FTP servers that do not support
                  passive mode. If your connection hangs with
                  passive mode, try this one.</p>
                </li>

                <li>
                  <p>FTP Passive: This sets the FTP "Passive" mode
                  which prevents the server from opening
                  connections to the client. This option is best
                  for users to pass through firewalls that do not
                  allow incoming connections on random port
                  addresses.</p>
                </li>

                <li>
                  <p>FTP via an HTTP proxy: This option instructs
                  FreeBSD to use HTTP to connect to a proxy for all
                  FTP operations. The proxy will translate the
                  requests and send them to the FTP server. This
                  allows the user to pass through firewalls that do
                  not allow FTP at all, but offer an HTTP proxy.
                  You must specify the hostname of the proxy in
                  addition to the FTP server.</p>

                  <p>In the rare case that you have an FTP proxy
                  that does not go through HTTP, you can specify
                  the URL as something like:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="USERINPUT"><b>ftp://foo.bar.com:<tt
class="REPLACEABLE"><i>port</i></tt>/pub/FreeBSD</b></tt>
</pre>

                  <p>In the URL above, <tt
                  class="REPLACEABLE"><i>port</i></tt> is the port
                  number of the proxy FTP server.</p>
                </li>
              </ul>
              <br />
              <br />
            </div>
          </div>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="AEN441" name="AEN441">1.5.6
            Tips for Serial Console Users</a></h3>

            <p>If you'd like to install FreeBSD on a machine using
            just a serial port (e.g. you don't have or wish to use
            a VGA card), please follow these steps:</p>

            <div class="PROCEDURE">
              <ol type="1">
                <li>
                  <p>Connect some sort of ANSI (vt100) compatible
                  terminal or terminal emulation program to the <tt
                  class="DEVICENAME">COM1</tt> port of the PC you
                  are installing FreeBSD onto.</p>
                </li>

                <li>
                  <p>Unplug the keyboard (yes, that's correct!) and
                  then try to boot from floppy or the installation
                  CDROM, depending on the type of installation
                  media you have, with the keyboard unplugged.</p>
                </li>

                <li>
                  <p>If you don't get any output on your serial
                  console, plug the keyboard in again and wait for
                  some beeps. If you are booting from the CDROM,
                  proceed to <a href="#HITSPACE">step 5</a> as soon
                  as you hear the beep.</p>
                </li>

                <li>
                  <p>For a floppy boot, the first beep means to
                  remove the <tt class="FILENAME">kern.flp</tt>
                  floppy and insert the <tt
                  class="FILENAME">mfsroot.flp</tt> floppy, after
                  which you should press <b
                  class="KEYCAP">Enter</b> and wait for another
                  beep.</p>
                </li>

                <li>
                  <a id="HITSPACE" name="HITSPACE"></a>

                  <p>Hit the space bar, then enter</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="USERINPUT"><b>boot -h</b></tt>
</pre>

                  <p>and you should now definitely be seeing
                  everything on the serial port. If that still
                  doesn't work, check your serial cabling as well
                  as the settings on your terminal emulation
                  program or actual terminal device. It should be
                  set for 9600 baud, 8 bits, no parity.</p>
                </li>
              </ol>
            </div>
          </div>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="AEN463" name="AEN463">1.6
          Question and Answer Section for Alpha/AXP Architecture
          Users</a></h2>

          <div class="QANDASET">
            <dl>
              <dt>1.6.1. <a href="#Q1.6.1.">Can I boot from the ARC
              or Alpha BIOS Console?</a></dt>

              <dt>1.6.2. <a href="#Q1.6.2.">Help! I have no space!
              Do I need to delete everything first?</a></dt>

              <dt>1.6.3. <a href="#Q1.6.3.">Can I mount my Compaq
              Tru64 or VMS extended partitions?</a></dt>

              <dt>1.6.4. <a href="#Q1.6.4.">What about support for
              Compaq Tru64 (OSF/1) binaries?</a></dt>

              <dt>1.6.5. <a href="#Q1.6.5.">What about support for
              Linux binaries?</a></dt>

              <dt>1.6.6. <a href="#Q1.6.6.">What about support for
              NT Alpha binaries?</a></dt>
            </dl>

            <div class="QANDAENTRY">
              <div class="QUESTION">
                <p><a id="Q1.6.1." name="Q1.6.1."></a><b>1.6.1.</b>
                Can I boot from the ARC or Alpha BIOS Console?</p>
              </div>

              <div class="ANSWER">
                <p><b></b>No. FreeBSD, like Compaq Tru64 and VMS,
                will only boot from the SRM console.</p>
              </div>
            </div>

            <div class="QANDAENTRY">
              <div class="QUESTION">
                <p><a id="Q1.6.2." name="Q1.6.2."></a><b>1.6.2.</b>
                Help! I have no space! Do I need to delete
                everything first?</p>
              </div>

              <div class="ANSWER">
                <p><b></b>Unfortunately, yes.</p>
              </div>
            </div>

            <div class="QANDAENTRY">
              <div class="QUESTION">
                <p><a id="Q1.6.3." name="Q1.6.3."></a><b>1.6.3.</b>
                Can I mount my Compaq Tru64 or VMS extended
                partitions?</p>
              </div>

              <div class="ANSWER">
                <p><b></b>No, not at this time.</p>
              </div>
            </div>

            <div class="QANDAENTRY">
              <div class="QUESTION">
                <p><a id="Q1.6.4." name="Q1.6.4."></a><b>1.6.4.</b>
                What about support for Compaq Tru64 (OSF/1)
                binaries?</p>
              </div>

              <div class="ANSWER">
                <p><b></b>FreeBSD can run Tru64 applications very
                well using the <a
                href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/url.cgi?ports/emulators/osf1_base/pkg-descr">
                <tt class="FILENAME">emulators/osf1_base</tt></a>
                port/package.</p>
              </div>
            </div>

            <div class="QANDAENTRY">
              <div class="QUESTION">
                <p><a id="Q1.6.5." name="Q1.6.5."></a><b>1.6.5.</b>
                What about support for Linux binaries?</p>
              </div>

              <div class="ANSWER">
                <p><b></b>FreeBSD can run AlphaLinux binaries with
                the assistance of the <a
                href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/url.cgi?ports/emulators/linux_base/pkg-descr">
                <tt class="FILENAME">emulators/linux_base</tt></a>
                port/package.</p>
              </div>
            </div>

            <div class="QANDAENTRY">
              <div class="QUESTION">
                <p><a id="Q1.6.6." name="Q1.6.6."></a><b>1.6.6.</b>
                What about support for NT Alpha binaries?</p>
              </div>

              <div class="ANSWER">
                <p><b></b>FreeBSD is not able to run NT
                applications natively, although it has the ability
                to mount NT partitions.</p>
              </div>
            </div>
          </div>
        </div>
      </div>

      <div class="SECT1">
        <hr />

        <h1 class="SECT1"><a id="LAYOUT" name="LAYOUT">2
        Distribution Format</a></h1>

        <p>A typical FreeBSD distribution directory looks something
        like this (exact details may vary depending on version,
        architecture, and other factors):</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
ERRATA.HTM      README.TXT      compat1x        dict            kernel
ERRATA.TXT      RELNOTES.HTM    compat20        doc             manpages
HARDWARE.HTM    RELNOTES.TXT    compat21        docbook.css     packages
HARDWARE.TXT    base            compat22        filename.txt    ports
INSTALL.HTM     boot            compat3x        floppies        proflibs
INSTALL.TXT     catpages        compat4x        games           src
README.HTM      cdrom.inf       crypto          info            tools
</pre>

        <p>If you want to do a CDROM, FTP or NFS installation from
        this distribution directory, all you need to do is make the
        1.44MB boot floppies from the floppies directory (see <a
        href="#FLOPPIES">Section 1.3</a> for instructions on how to
        do this), boot them and follow the instructions. The rest
        of the data needed during the installation will be obtained
        automatically based on your selections. If you've never
        installed FreeBSD before, you also want to read the
        entirety of this document (the installation instructions)
        file.</p>

        <p>If you're trying to do some other type of installation
        or are merely curious about how a distribution is
        organized, what follows is a more thorough description of
        some of these items in more detail:</p>

        <ol type="1">
          <li>
            <p>The <tt class="FILENAME">*.TXT</tt> and <tt
            class="FILENAME">*.HTM</tt> files contain documentation
            (for example, this document is contained in both <tt
            class="FILENAME">INSTALL.TXT</tt> and <tt
            class="FILENAME">INSTALL.HTM</tt>) and should be read
            before starting an installation. The <tt
            class="FILENAME">*.TXT</tt> files are plain text, while
            the <tt class="FILENAME">*.HTM</tt> files are HTML
            files that can be read by almost any Web browser. Some
            distributions may contain documentation in other
            formats as well, such as PDF or PostScript.</p>
          </li>

          <li>
            <p><tt class="FILENAME">docbook.css</tt> is a Cascading
            Style Sheet (CSS) file used by some Web browsers for
            formatting the HTML documentation.</p>
          </li>

          <li>
            <p>The <tt class="FILENAME">base</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">catpages</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">crypto</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">dict</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">doc</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">games</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">info</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">manpages</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">proflibs</tt>, and <tt
            class="FILENAME">src</tt> directories contain the
            primary distribution components of FreeBSD itself and
            are split into smaller files for easy packing onto
            floppies (should that be necessary).</p>
          </li>

          <li>
            <p>The <tt class="FILENAME">compat1x</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">compat20</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">compat21</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">compat22</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">compat3x</tt>, and <tt
            class="FILENAME">compat4x</tt> directories contain
            distributions for compatibility with older releases and
            are distributed as single gzip'd tar files - they can
            be installed during release time or later by running
            their <tt class="FILENAME">install.sh</tt> scripts.</p>
          </li>

          <li>
            <p>The <tt class="FILENAME">floppies/</tt> subdirectory
            contains the floppy installation images; further
            information on using them can be found in <a
            href="#FLOPPIES">Section 1.3</a>.</p>
          </li>

          <li>
            <p>The <tt class="FILENAME">packages</tt> and <tt
            class="FILENAME">ports</tt> directories contain the
            FreeBSD Packages and Ports Collections. Packages may be
            installed from the packages directory by running the
            command:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt><tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>/stand/sysinstall configPackages</b></tt>
</pre>

            <p>Packages can also be installed by feeding individual
            filenames in <tt class="FILENAME">packages</tt>/ to the
            <a
            href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=pkg_add&amp;sektion=1&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
            <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
            class="REFENTRYTITLE">pkg_add</span>(1)</span></a>
            command.</p>

            <p>The Ports Collection may be installed like any other
            distribution and requires about 100MB unpacked. More
            information on the ports collection may be obtained
            from <a href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/ports/"
            target="_top">http://www.FreeBSD.org/ports/</a> or
            locally from <tt
            class="FILENAME">/usr/share/doc/handbook</tt> if you've
            installed the <tt class="FILENAME">doc</tt>
            distribution.</p>
          </li>

          <li>
            <p>Last of all, the <tt class="FILENAME">tools</tt>
            directory contains various DOS tools for discovering
            disk geometries, installing boot managers and the like.
            It is purely optional and provided only for user
            convenience.</p>
          </li>
        </ol>
        <br />
        <br />

        <p>A typical distribution directory (for example, the <tt
        class="FILENAME">info</tt> distribution) looks like this
        internally:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
CHECKSUM.MD5    info.ab         info.ad         info.inf        install.sh
info.aa         info.ac         info.ae         info.mtree
</pre>

        <p>The <tt class="FILENAME">CHECKSUM.MD5</tt> file contains
        MD5 signatures for each file, should data corruption be
        suspected, and is purely for reference. It is not used by
        the actual installation and does not need to be copied with
        the rest of the distribution files. The <tt
        class="FILENAME">info.a*</tt> files are split, gzip'd tar
        files, the contents of which can be viewed by doing:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>cat info.a* | tar tvzf -</b></tt>
</pre>

        <p>During installation, they are automatically concatenated
        and extracted by the installation procedure.</p>

        <p>The <tt class="FILENAME">info.inf</tt> file is also
        necessary since it is read by the installation program in
        order to figure out how many pieces to look for when
        fetching and concatenating the distribution. When putting
        distributions onto floppies, the <tt
        class="FILENAME">.inf</tt> file <span class="emphasis"><i
        class="EMPHASIS">must</i></span> occupy the first floppy of
        each distribution set!</p>

        <p>The <tt class="FILENAME">info.mtree</tt> file is another
        non-essential file which is provided for user reference. It
        contains the MD5 signatures of the <span
        class="emphasis"><i class="EMPHASIS">unpacked</i></span>
        distribution files and can be later used with the <a
        href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=mtree&amp;sektion=8&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
        <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
        class="REFENTRYTITLE">mtree</span>(8)</span></a> program to
        verify the installation permissions and checksums against
        any possible modifications to the file. When used with the
        <tt class="FILENAME">base</tt> distribution, this can be an
        excellent way of detecting trojan horse attacks on your
        system.</p>

        <p>Finally, the <tt class="FILENAME">install.sh</tt> file
        is for use by those who want to install the distribution
        after installation time. To install the info distribution
        from CDROM after a system was installed, for example, you'd
        do:</p>
<pre class="SCREEN">
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>cd /cdrom/info</b></tt>
<tt class="PROMPT">#</tt> <tt
class="USERINPUT"><b>sh install.sh</b></tt>
</pre>
      </div>

      <div class="SECT1">
        <hr />

        <h1 class="SECT1"><a id="UPGRADING" name="UPGRADING">3
        Upgrading FreeBSD</a></h1>

        <p>These instructions describe a procedure for doing a
        binary upgrade from an older version of FreeBSD.</p>

        <div class="WARNING">
          <blockquote class="WARNING">
            <p><b>Warning:</b> While the FreeBSD upgrade procedure
            does its best to safeguard against accidental loss of
            data, it is still more than possible to <span
            class="emphasis"><i class="EMPHASIS">wipe out your
            entire disk</i></span> with this installation! Please
            do not accept the final confirmation request unless you
            have adequately backed up any important data files.</p>
          </blockquote>
        </div>

        <div class="IMPORTANT">
          <blockquote class="IMPORTANT">
            <p><b>Important:</b> These notes assume that you are
            using the version of <a
            href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=sysinstall&amp;sektion=8&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
            <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
            class="REFENTRYTITLE">sysinstall</span>(8)</span></a>
            supplied with the version of FreeBSD to which you
            intend to upgrade. Using a mismatched version of <a
            href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=sysinstall&amp;sektion=8&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
            <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
            class="REFENTRYTITLE">sysinstall</span>(8)</span></a>
            is almost guaranteed to cause problems and has been
            known to leave systems in an unusable state. The most
            commonly made mistake in this regard is the use of an
            old copy of <a
            href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=sysinstall&amp;sektion=8&amp;manpath=FreeBSD+5.1-release">
            <span class="CITEREFENTRY"><span
            class="REFENTRYTITLE">sysinstall</span>(8)</span></a>
            from an existing installation to upgrade to a newer
            version of FreeBSD. This is <span class="emphasis"><i
            class="EMPHASIS">not</i></span> recommended.</p>
          </blockquote>
        </div>

        <div class="WARNING">
          <blockquote class="WARNING">
            <p><b>Warning:</b> Binary upgrades to FreeBSD
            5.1-RELEASE from FreeBSD 4-STABLE are not supported at
            this time. There are some files present in a FreeBSD
            4-STABLE whose presence can be disruptive, but are not
            removed by a binary upgrade. One notable example is
            that an old <tt class="FILENAME">/usr/include/g++</tt>
            directory will cause C++ programs to compile
            incorrectly (or not at all).</p>

            <p></p>

            <p>These upgrade instructions are provided for the use
            of users upgrading from relatively recent FreeBSD
            5-CURRENT snapshots.</p>
          </blockquote>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="AEN664" name="AEN664">3.1
          Introduction</a></h2>

          <p>The upgrade procedure replaces distributions selected
          by the user with those corresponding to the new FreeBSD
          release. It preserves standard system configuration data,
          as well as user data, installed packages and other
          software.</p>

          <p>Administrators contemplating an upgrade are encouraged
          to study this section in its entirety before commencing
          an upgrade. Failure to do so may result in a failed
          upgrade or loss of data.</p>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="AEN668" name="AEN668">3.1.1
            Upgrade Overview</a></h3>

            <p>Upgrading of a distribution is performed by
            extracting the new version of the component over the
            top of the previous version. Files belonging to the old
            distribution are not deleted.</p>

            <p>System configuration is preserved by retaining and
            restoring the previous version of the following
            files:</p>

            <p><tt class="FILENAME">Xaccel.ini</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">XF86Config</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">adduser.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">aliases</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">aliases.db</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">amd.map</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">crontab</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">csh.cshrc</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">csh.login</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">csh.logout</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">cvsupfile</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">dhclient.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">disktab</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">dm.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">dumpdates</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">exports</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">fbtab</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">fstab</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">ftpusers</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">gettytab</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">gnats</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">group</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">hosts</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">hosts.allow</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">hosts.equiv</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">hosts.lpd</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">inetd.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">localtime</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">login.access</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">login.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">mail</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">mail.rc</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">make.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">manpath.config</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">master.passwd</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">motd</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">namedb</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">networks</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">newsyslog.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">nsmb.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">nsswitch.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">pam.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">passwd</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">periodic</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">ppp</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">printcap</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">profile</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">pwd.db</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">rc.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">rc.conf.local</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">rc.firewall</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">rc.local</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">remote</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">resolv.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">rmt</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">sendmail.cf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">sendmail.cw</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">services</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">shells</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">skeykeys</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">spwd.db</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">ssh</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">syslog.conf</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">ttys</tt>, <tt
            class="FILENAME">uucp</tt></p>

            <p>The versions of these files which correspond to the
            new version are moved to <tt
            class="FILENAME">/etc/upgrade/</tt>. The system
            administrator may peruse these new versions and merge
            components as desired. Note that many of these files
            are interdependent, and the best merge procedure is to
            copy all site-specific data from the current files into
            the new.</p>

            <p>During the upgrade procedure, the administrator is
            prompted for a location into which all files from <tt
            class="FILENAME">/etc/</tt> are saved. In the event
            that local modifications have been made to other files,
            they may be subsequently retrieved from this
            location.</p>
          </div>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="AEN742" name="AEN742">3.2
          Procedure</a></h2>

          <p>This section details the upgrade procedure. Particular
          attention is given to items which substantially differ
          from a normal installation.</p>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="AEN745" name="AEN745">3.2.1
            Backup</a></h3>

            <p>User data and system configuration should be backed
            up before upgrading. While the upgrade procedure does
            its best to prevent accidental mistakes, it is possible
            to partially or completely destroy data and
            configuration information.</p>
          </div>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="AEN748" name="AEN748">3.2.2
            Mount Filesystems</a></h3>

            <p>The disklabel editor is entered with the nominated
            disk's filesystem devices listed. Prior to commencing
            the upgrade, the administrator should make a note of
            the device names and corresponding mountpoints. These
            mountpoints should be entered here. <span
            class="emphasis"><i class="EMPHASIS">Do not</i></span>
            set the ``newfs flag'' for any filesystems, as this
            will cause data loss.</p>
          </div>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="AEN753" name="AEN753">3.2.3
            Select Distributions</a></h3>

            <p>When selecting distributions, there are no
            constraints on which must be selected. As a general
            rule, the <tt class="LITERAL">base</tt> distribution
            should be selected for an update, and the <tt
            class="LITERAL">man</tt> distribution if manpages are
            already installed. Other distributions may be selected
            beyond those originally installed if the administrator
            wishes to add additional functionality.</p>
          </div>

          <div class="SECT3">
            <hr />

            <h3 class="SECT3"><a id="FSTAB" name="FSTAB">3.2.4
            After Installation</a></h3>

            <p>Once the installation procedure has completed, the
            administrator is prompted to examine the new
            configuration files. At this point, checks should be
            made to ensure that the system configuration is valid.
            In particular, the <tt
            class="FILENAME">/etc/rc.conf</tt> and <tt
            class="FILENAME">/etc/fstab</tt> files should be
            checked.</p>
          </div>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="AEN763" name="AEN763">3.3
          Upgrading from Source Code</a></h2>

          <p>Those interested in an upgrade method that allows more
          flexibility and sophistication should take a look at <a
          href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/cutting-edge.html"
           target="_top">The Cutting Edge</a> in the FreeBSD
          Handbook. This procedure involves rebuilding all of
          FreeBSD from source code. It requires reliable network
          connectivity, extra disk space, and time, but has
          advantages for networks and other more complex
          installations. This is roughly the same procedure as is
          used for track the -STABLE or -CURRENT development
          branches.</p>

          <p><tt class="FILENAME">/usr/src/UPDATING</tt> contains
          important information on updating a FreeBSD system from
          source code. It lists various issues resulting from
          changes in FreeBSD that may affect an upgrade.</p>

          <p></p>
        </div>
      </div>

      <div class="SECT1">
        <hr />

        <h1 class="SECT1"><a id="TROUBLE" name="TROUBLE">4
        Troubleshooting</a></h1>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="REPAIRING" name="REPAIRING">4.1
          Repairing an Existing FreeBSD Installation</a></h2>

          <p>FreeBSD features a ``Fixit'' option in the top menu of
          the boot floppy. To use it, you will also need either a
          <tt class="FILENAME">fixit.flp</tt> image floppy,
          generated in the same fashion as the boot floppy, or the
          ``live filesystem'' CDROM; typically the second CDROM in
          a multi-disc FreeBSD distribution.</p>

          <p>To invoke fixit, simply boot the <tt
          class="FILENAME">kern.flp</tt> floppy, choose the
          ``Fixit'' item and insert the fixit floppy or CDROM when
          asked. You will then be placed into a shell with a wide
          variety of commands available (in the <tt
          class="FILENAME">/stand</tt> and <tt
          class="FILENAME">/mnt2/stand</tt> directories) for
          checking, repairing and examining filesystems and their
          contents. Some UNIX administration experience <span
          class="emphasis"><i class="EMPHASIS">is</i></span>
          required to use the fixit option.</p>
        </div>

        <div class="SECT2">
          <hr />

          <h2 class="SECT2"><a id="AEN784" name="AEN784">4.2 Common
          Installation Problems for Alpha/AXP Architecture
          Users</a></h2>
        </div>
      </div>
    </div>
    <hr />

    <p align="center"><small>This file, and other release-related
    documents, can be downloaded from <a
    href="ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/">ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/</a>.</small></p>

    <p align="center"><small>For questions about FreeBSD, read the
    <a href="http://www.FreeBSD.org/docs.html">documentation</a>
    before contacting &#60;<a
    href="mailto:questions@FreeBSD.org">questions@FreeBSD.org</a>&#62;.</small></p>

    <p align="center"><small><small>All users of FreeBSD 5-CURRENT
    should subscribe to the &#60;<a
    href="mailto:current@FreeBSD.org">current@FreeBSD.org</a>&#62;
    mailing list.</small></small></p>

    <p align="center">For questions about this documentation,
    e-mail &#60;<a
    href="mailto:doc@FreeBSD.org">doc@FreeBSD.org</a>&#62;.</p>
    <br />
    <br />
++++


