# HOWTO: Install FreeBSD (desktop version for newbies)



## macondo (Jan 22, 2017)

HOWTO: FreeBSD Installation (desktop version for newbies)

This howto is dedicated to all newbies, as one myself, I know how frustrating it can be.

Without much ado, the first thing you should find out is how to configure your computer BIOS so it boots from your CD/DVD/USB thumbdrive, depending on what you will be using.

Check the FreeBSD documentation, Google search, etc.

Then, comes the choice of what version to install: the latest (11.0) or the previous one (10.3). I do not like to install brand-new ones until they go to following sub-versions, i.e. (11.1, 11.2) but that is just me, it's up to you, after all,  it's a free country.

In this howto you will install 10.3. You can install version 11.0 if you desire. Later on, you can upgrade to the version you want.

Burn the CD1 for version 10.3 64-bit in my case:

ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/r...GES/10.3/FreeBSD-10.3-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso

Download the ISO, burn it, insert the CD and reboot, it should come up as the installation CD, it will take a few minutes to recognize your hardware, until finally it will end at the prompt and unto the installation. Press (I)nstall. and away we go...

Don't bother partitioning the hard drive, give the whole drive to FreeBSD, afterall why mess with it in the first try. Unless you're into gastric ulcers, there is always time to live dangerously.

By now, you should have watched the video 10 times until you know it by heart. The video in question is:


```
Riba Linux
How-to Install freeBSD 10.3 plus XFCE desktop and basic applications
```





Follow the video, after the basic installation, reboot and get ready to install some packages.

Do NOT forget to add your user to the WHEEL group, otherwise, you cannot `sudo`. If you forget, don't fret, it can be fixed afterwards.

Do NOT forget to ENABLE hald and dbus in your /etc/rc.conf so your mouse and keyboard work.

First, as root, do:

`# freebsd-update fetch`

At the end of the screen press the Down Arrow on your keyboard until you get to root prompt.

Next,

`# freebsd-update install`

Next,

I will install LXDE instead of XFCE4, it's lighter and faster IMHO. Perfect for newbies.

`# pkg install nano sudo`
`# pkg install  xorg`
`# pkg install firefox-esr`
`# pkg install lxde-meta`

I like to install the 'big dogs' one by one, it seems to me it goes faster, I'm sure I'm wrong.

`# nano /home/user_name/.xinitrc`

type:
`exec startlxde`

`#reboot`

Come back to the console:


```
$ login: username
$ passwd: username password (press Enter)
$ startx (press Enter)
```




listo!
Good luck,
macondo


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## macondo (Jan 27, 2017)

It's been a few days since I wrote this howto, and there's something bugging me. Why should a newbie install the ZFS system when he/she can install the UFS one.

Don't bother with ZFS, install the UFS, later on when you know more about FreeBSD, you can install ZFS. The installation will go faster with UFS (less configuration); I certainly do not need it to cruise the Web, watch videos in YouTube, answer letters to aunt Molly or read foreign newspapers.


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## ASX (Jan 28, 2017)

macondo said:


> It's been a few days since I wrote this howto, and there's something bugging me. Why should a newbie install the ZFS system when he/she can install the UFS one.



Most likely because he/she is a user who want to learn about ZFS, I did exactly that and I'm still learning all the way.

Consider also that FreeBSD "newbies" usually already had some past experience about another Unix or Linux operating system, and hopefully has already read some documentation about ZFS.


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## macondo (Jan 28, 2017)

ASX said:


> Most likely because he/she is a user who want to learn about ZFS, I did exactly that and I'm still learning all the way.
> 
> Consider also that FreeBSD "newbies" usually already had some past experience about another Unix or Linux operating system, and hopefully has already read some documentation about ZFS.



Hmmm, it makes sense, OTOH, selfishly I must admit, I tend to think most newbies are like me: I can't care less about ZFS, jails, or any other exotic facet of Unix, all I wanted was to get away from systemd and be able to use a minimalist type of OS that works i.e. Devuan, BSD.


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## ASX (Jan 28, 2017)

macondo said:


> I tend to think most newbies are like me: I can care less about ZFS


That's correct! In the vast majority of use cases is correct to suggest the use of UFS for a desktop filesystem. 
You asked why ZFS, I only provided my point of view, that didn't imply it should be suggested or adopted widely.


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## macondo (Jan 28, 2017)

ASX said:


> That's correct! In the vast majority of use cases is correct to suggest the use of UFS for a desktop filesystem.
> You asked why ZFS, I only provided my point of view, that didn't imply it should be suggested or adopted widely.



I understand you completely, you are a scholar, you like BSD, it tickles your imagination, proof of that is your record helping us, your knowledge is vast. But for most of us, 'vi' is an enigma.

My original question about the usage of ZFS, was really with the author of the video: why grab the 'unwashed masses' and put them thru that? Or maybe, he was being helpful and thought of doing a complete job. Personally, I owe him (Mr. Marcelo Salvador from Portugal) a great debt, without him I would never have installed FreeBSD.


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## forquare (Jan 28, 2017)

macondo said:


> It's been a few days since I wrote this howto, and there's something bugging me. Why should a newbie install the ZFS system when he/she can install the UFS one.
> 
> Don't bother with ZFS, install the UFS, later on when you know more about FreeBSD, you can install ZFS. The installation will go faster with UFS (less configuration); I certainly do not need it to cruise the Web, watch videos in YouTube, answer letters to aunt Molly or read foreign newspapers.



I suppose if you install on ZFS from the getgo then it's already there when/if the newbie wants to learn it. 

Should they find later down the line about ZFS, when they had originally installed UFS, they may be put off by having to reinstall the system they've spent time learning and setting up as they like—I'm guessing the average newbie is using this as one of their main machines and doesn't have several to play with. It's daunting, even with backups, to blow such a system away.


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## tobiam (Jan 30, 2017)

forquare I agree, but the reverse could be true too, when ZFS requires a lot of memory and has "slow writes" (COW, you know what I mean).

But actually it's easier to say that. Usually saying something like ZFS is amazing, you can do snapshots, dedup, sync them, etc., but it's slower and requires a certain amount of memory to be fun seems kind of straight forward enough to explain. Some jail/bhyve related tools rely on it, but jails and bhyve can also work without.

Since this is pretty much the only decision they need to make in advance it's not like newbies tend to be overwhelmed. But I agree they both have pros and contras and i also think that for a quick, just do this and you will have a working system one kind of has to make a few decisions for the user.

I also like to call UFS the ext4 and ZFS the better, stable and working version of Btrfs. Some people with Linux background then decide for UFS on their own, others for ZFS. So I guess that works.

Also sometimes saying saying "it's copy on write with all positive and negative implications" just works.


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## Eric A. Borisch (Mar 8, 2017)

Out-of-the-box ZFS support (+bootable +(geli)encryption) is one of the premier (IMHO) features of FreeBSD; combine it with auto-snapshots and sysutils/beadm, and there is plenty of reason to use it by default over UFS on a desktop machine.

Or, more explicitly:

auto-snapshots (e.g. sysutils/zfstools): provides filesystem versioning. Accidentally delete / change a config file (or anything else)? Grab or compare the previous version [1] from snapshots. So incredibly useful once you realize it's possible and easy.
beadm: Easily staged upgrades. Create a new BE. Boot into it (or, even better, start a jail in it) and perform your upgrade. Something broke? Select the last BE and act like it never happened. You can even select it from the boot menu if the upgrade really went sideways!
[1] Shameless plug for my tool of choice ...


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## morbit (Mar 8, 2017)

hald and dbus are no longer defaults, and for a good reason.


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## Beast13 (May 2, 2017)

macondo said:


>



what is that *'S' *on blue (some no script? ) on right upper corner . . .

tia !


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## Handy92 (May 2, 2017)

Nice... but for what? In my opinion *BSD is systems not for child and still should be configuring using Console, support via Handbook and Man pages. For Newbies is PC-BSD or Debian kFreeBSD or Debian kHurd.

PS. First as root set Firewall(for example IPFW with default Client configuration), and disable remote logins and sendmail because probably nobody will be use it. I no have idea what is the reason, to keeping enable sendmail and syslogd without -ss flags as default configuration.  SSHD, rlogin, telnet, everything what is not absolutelly nesseserry for work FreeBSD to Off as default. Everything.


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## Beast13 (May 2, 2017)

^

HOW ? would you be kind and teach me ?



> PS.
> First as root set Firewall, and
> disable remote logins and sendmail because probably nobody will be use it.
> 
> ...


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## Handy92 (May 2, 2017)

I tried helping here but I am unsweetable on it. I do not have enaught knowledge for helping.... There You have everything.

https://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook/firewalls-ipfw.html

Point 29.4.1 But it is suggested, prefered once of three firewalls...

Edit: disabling remote syslogd:

Syslogd_enable="yes"
syslogd_flags="-ss" - without this port using via syslogd is olways open even if is blocking via firewall. I was check it.

Remote logins is blocking using port blocking via firewall. 22 is using for sshd, rest I dont remember. Sendmail disable:


```
sendmail_enable="NONE"
sendmail_msp_queue_enable="NO"
sendmail_outbound_enable="NO"
sendmail_submit_enable="NO"
```

rest You have write in /etc/defaults/rc.conf.

Edit2: rc_debug="yes" is very usefull diagnostic tool.


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## Beast13 (May 2, 2017)

Beast13 said:


> what is that *'S' *on blue (some no script? ) on right upper corner . . .



No one ?


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## Handy92 (May 2, 2017)

Red stop icon is AdblockPlus. At this moment adblock plus is big program whos eat a lot of resources. Today recomended (from Linux community) is using uBlock is light open, soruce code is on glithub and it using filters from ABP. Blue icon maybe is Stylish?? Adson create Hole in the browser. And browser is the weekest link on correctly securing system... Installing it use the brain.


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## morbit (May 2, 2017)

HTTPS Everywhere


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## aimeec1995 (Aug 12, 2017)

This is dumb.


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## thynus (Dec 1, 2018)

This is what I was looking for.  

Goal: run FreeBSD off USB3 stick for Web browsing using Firefox.

I want to share my experience in case it is helpful to other fresh installers (noobs).  
Installing the new FreeBSD 11.2 from a USB2 stick to a USB3 stick.  USB2 was in a USB2 port and the USB3 in a blue USB 3.0 port.

Installer ran fine but when install stick was removed it had a boot error on the USB3 stick.
Somebody had already posted about USB to USB install (please update release notes); which I have done many times on Ubuntu with no problems.

Watched boot message a couple of times and edited fstab using ee.  The device number changes depending on which stick(s) are put in.

Frankly noobs without strong gizzards like 99.66% of regular people would stop right there.  

I had to install pkg and sudo!   That's probably another 80% gone.
pkg install firefox-esr took probably 4 hours overnight. I can do this on Windows, Mac on ubuntu in less than 10 min. ; just saying

installed xorg and lxde-meta.  another 2 days went by.  startlxde gave machine.id errors.  I googled around and I can see days of editing various .rcwhatsits and /proc and eventually it will all pretty much work.  But I did all that 20 years ago!  

Thanks for the hard work and the super helpful community, but for me its already taken too long.  Its like asking regular people who drive cars to install their own head gaskets and do valve adjustments before they can drive their brand new car to the corner store.  
Best wishes,

Helpful links:
https://lubuntu.me/downloads/
https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/howto-install-freebsd-desktop-version-for-newbies.59432/
https://www.freebsd.org/where.html
https://wiki.lxde.org/en/FreeBSD
https://www.gracefulsecurity.com/a-noob-installed-bsd/


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## Deleted member 30996 (Dec 2, 2018)

thynus said:


> I had to install pkg and sudo!   That's probably another 80% gone.
> pkg install firefox-esr took probably 4 hours overnight. I can do this on Windows, Mac on ubuntu in less than 10 min. ; just saying



Who forced you to install security/sudo? Or any 3rd party program for that matter? I have never installed it once in 13 years and always used `su` on every FreeBSD box I've owned. I install the same 3rd party programs that suit me every time and nothng else. That's the beauty of it. Nobody forces you install anything or wants to.



thynus said:


> installed xorg and lxde-meta.  another 2 days went by.  startlxde gave machine.id errors.  I googled around and I can see days of editing various .rcwhatsits and /proc and eventually it will all pretty much work.



I could have told you how to fix machine.id errors by running `# dbus-uuidgen --ensure` if couldn't find the answer yourself and had asked. It's documented.

I just build a system from scratch on my Thinkpad W520 a few days ago. It took 2 hours to compile x11/xorg. My Core2 Duo machines are much slower and I usually catch a nap while it complies ports like that, graphics/gimp, etc. If it took 2 days for you to build, is it a software or hardware issue? My i386 box is slowest of my machines but much faster than that.

I can build a system using ports and have all my files edited, applications preferences set, browser extensions installed and be finished within 24 hours working straight through. And none of it "pretty much works". It all works consistently.

If you see days of editing system files in a new build it must be that you're spending too much time looking for .rcwhatsits when it doesn't exist. I save my old /etc directory and work from that to edit the new files and be done in 10 minutes.



thynus said:


> Thanks for the hard work and the super helpful community, but for me its already taken too long.  Its like asking regular people who drive cars to install their own head gaskets and do valve adjustments before they can drive their brand new car to the corner store.



FreeBSD isn't for meant to be everything for everybody and I respect your decision to move on to the disco of your choice. To quote the esteemed drhowarddrfine "FreeBSD is a professional operating system for professionals". However, even "normal people' can achieve new heights if they want it bad enough to work for it, though some are destined to a life of mediocrity.


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