# FreeBSD 10.0-BETA1 Testdrive - yay for zfs-install!



## frijsdijk (Oct 22, 2013)

Just gave FreeBSD-10.0-BETA1 a test drive in VirtualBox. Knew of some of the new features and changes to 10.0, but it was a pleasant surprise to find that `bsdinstall` now supports (experimental) installing/booting from ZFS! I've tested single drive (zfs 'stripe'), a mirror (zfs mirror), and a zfs mirror with `geli` encryption. All works perfectly. Good work! This will be appreciated.

It's nice to be surprised, but where could I have read this before hand? I'd like to keep track of what's coming


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## blazingice (Oct 22, 2013)

Have a good look at the announcemnts for each beta. For example zfs-install has already been mentioned:



> o Updates to bsdinstall(8).  Please note the following:
> - 10.0-BETA1 introduces a number of updates to bsdinstall(8),
> notably the ability to install to a full ZFS filesystem.
> Please keep in mind that this is an experimental feature.
> ...


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## phoenix (Oct 22, 2013)

And, there's a very long thread on they -current mailing list covering the changes and debugging being added to bsdinstall specifically to support ZFS.  They've re-rolled testing ISOs based on the changes in that thread 3-4 times already, since BETA1 was released.


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## srobert (Oct 23, 2013)

frijsdijk said:
			
		

> It's nice to be surprised, but where could I have read this before hand? I'd like to keep track of what's coming



Had you been watching the fine weekly program at http://www.bsdnow.tv you would have heard the hosts talking about that very thing, and other exciting developments.


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## jrm@ (Oct 23, 2013)

Allan Jude and Kris Moore (and TJ behind the scenes) are doing an amazing job with BSDNow.

Allan says he wrote the first draft of the installer improvements on the plane to EuroBSDCon and then Devin Teske works his shell-foo to spruce it up.


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## frijsdijk (Oct 23, 2013)

Thanks all for the replies. I try to follow CURRENT, but perhaps BSDNow is a better place to watch!


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## frijsdijk (Oct 23, 2013)

On interesting 'problem' that I ran into with geli encrypted, zfs booted configurations, is that the 'normal' /boot/(kernel|modules) directories are not 'there', and thus for instance the installation of virtualbox from ports fails when it wants to copy the kernel modules to /boot/modules. I wonder how freebsd-update will handle configurations like these? I don't have the VM anymore, but it was something like a /bootenv/boot zfs slice without a mountpoint to which /boot was pointing with a symbolic link. Any ideas?


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