# sysinstall



## jotawski (May 11, 2010)

hi sirs,

i wonder if one install freebsd by not using sysinstall (or more generally is modified sysinstall to suit our needs) and what role is it during installation, an init process or other.

many thanks in advance for any hints and suggestions


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## SirDice (May 11, 2010)

Sysinstall is just an installer. Nothing more, nothing less. It used to be used to also configure your system but it's getting a bit old and you're better off doing the post-install configuration by hand. You can use a custom install.cfg if you need a customized install. More info can be found in it's man page; sysinstall(8).

That said, you don't need to use sysinstall. The installation can be done by hand. It just requires a little more work.
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/articles/fbsd-from-scratch/index.html


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## jotawski (May 11, 2010)

SirDice said:
			
		

> Sysinstall is just an installer. Nothing more, nothing less.



yes for installer role i do, uhmmm, realized this .

would you please clarify my understanding before going to complicate the story further that during first installation sysinstall is act as init (and die afterwards) when compare to normal operation.

and many thanks indeed for ffs, freebsd from scratch, link given.


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## SirDice (May 11, 2010)

jotawski said:
			
		

> would you please clarify my understanding before going to complicate the story further that during first installation sysinstall is act as init (and die afterwards) when compare to normal operation.


It's just an application.


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## Beastie (May 11, 2010)

jotawski said:
			
		

> would you please clarify my understanding before going to complicate the story further that during first installation sysinstall is act as init (and die afterwards) when compare to normal operation.


Of course, like any installer of any kind, sysinstall(8) "dies" when you reboot into your newly installed system when the installation is complete. But you can always run it afterwards if you want.

All sysinstall(8) does is create slices (fdisk part) and partitions (bsdlabel part), and extract the selected distributions (e.g. the base system and GENERIC kernel for the custom/minimal setup).

You could even bypass it completely.


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## jb_fvwm2 (May 11, 2010)

There are cd's which (if they work) can install Freebsd 
with a fully functional system (xfce or gnome usually)
(I was thinking of the link below at the bottom...) , if
sysinstall is too hard. Also, some sites have screenshots of
sysinstall to make it easier (freebsdwiki.net)...
...
If you had, say, a print of 
http://www.probleemloos.nl/freebsd ( I found while writing
this post), you would have near-complete guide 
(ALTHOUGH if you tried many things on it, they may
fail, for instance, SOME syntax for the kernel has changed
from v6 to v8....)
....
http://www.freebsd-custom.wikidot.com (announced in a thread in 
these forums also . (That site works best without the www *maybe*)


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## jotawski (May 11, 2010)

oh really thanks for all comments and hints and helps from this forum.
i need to skim over all of infos cited for now.


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