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Packaging with CPack – on FreeBSD

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This blog by user Bobulate writes about his work in progress with FreeBSD and CPack, a cross-platform software packaging tool that comes with CMake packing software. Read about his thoughts at the link below.cmake

Some days of the week, I work on Free Software projects that aren’t ready to see the light yet; they live in my own git repo’s, or wherever. While I have the intention of publishing eventually, I usually want to get things somewhat working before throwing code out there.

Part of checking if things work is packaging, and installing the stuff on more than one system. Sure, I can build everywhere, or copy around executables, but it struck me that it’d be cool to have packages — you know, installable with the system package manager — for the stuff I make. O yeah, I know flatpak is the new orange, but I’m not that hip. I’ll stick with Debian and FreeBSD packages, thanks.

Original post: http://euroquis.nl/bobulate/?p=1531

FreeBSD Foundation – February 2017 Projects Update

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Ed Maste of the FreeBSD Foundation gives us an update on a February project initiative — blacklistd has been completely ported from NetBSD by Kurt Lidl. Read their full announcement at the link below.freebsd_foundation

Internet-connected servers regularly face brute-force attacks on services that they provide, such as SSH or authenticated SMTP. We’d like to limit the number of brute-force attempts that may be made, both to prevent unwarranted access to the resources and to limit the impact of noisy log files.

There are a number of existing tools to mitigate brute force attacks, including fail2ban and sshguard. These operate by monitoring log files for entries corresponding to failed access attempts, and then automatically installing a firewall rule to temporarily disallow further access from the same source.  These tools are functional but can be somewhat fragile and require ongoing maintenance to track any changes in log message formats.

Original post: https://www.freebsdfoundation.org/blog/february-2017-projects-update/

FreeBSD & Google Summer of Code

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The annual Google Summer of Code is coming up, and as usual there will be several students representing the FreeBSD project. They will begin accepting applications starting March 20, 2017 and ending April 3, 2017.

googlesummerofcodeInstructions for applications including a template can be found at https://www.FreeBSD.org/projects/summerofcode.html

Students should have familiarity with UNIX/Linux/FreeBSD, and should have experience with installing and re-building FreeBSD should their project require this. Generally good knowledge of C is also a requirement. For the start of the GSoC students should ideally know how to use some Version Control System like subversion or github.

Most candidates keep some contact with the community, usually through project mailing lists or IRC, and actively keep in touch with developers to suggest possible mentors.

Please check the list of project ideas at https://wiki.FreeBSD.org/SummerOfCodeIdeas

FreeBSD Google Summer of Code: https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/organizations/6092454341115904/

[How-To] Install VMware Tools on FreeBSD server

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User David Pasek shows us how to get VMware tools installed on a virtual machine running FreeBSD. VMware tools improves your virtual machine experience by providing driver compatibility, etc. Follow the link below for the full set of instructions.

VM-LogoFreeBSD is my favorite operating system. All my FreeBSD servers (except embedded systems on physical micro computers) are running as virtual machines. FreeBSD is officially supported GuestOS by VMware so nothing stops to virtualize FreeBSD even for productional use.

VMware Tools is a suite of utilities that enhances the performance of the virtual machine’s guest operating system and improves management of the virtual machine. Although the guest operating system can run without VMware Tools, you would lose important functionality and convenience. In other words, VMware tools are not necessary but highly recommended to use on virtual machines running on top of VMware ESXi hosts.

Full tutorial: http://blog.igics.com/2017/02/how-to-install-vmware-tools-on-freebsd.html

MirageOS Unikernels Now Support KVM and FreeBSD bhyve

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MirageOS is a library operating system that builds unikernels for the purpose of high-performance network applications for cloud and mobile platforms. Recently, the developers have announced support for KVM hypervisor and FreeBSD’s bhyve. Read the full article for more information on what this capability brings.

Unikernels-620x300Expanding Unikernels Support

Previously, unikernels created using MirageOS were far from being able to boot anywhere. They supported only environments hosted using the Xen hypervisor.

With the release of MirageOS 3.0, however, the platform now supports the KVM and FreeBSD bhyve hypervisors, too. That’s significant because it brings the unikernels a step closer to realizing their full potential—which is to be entirely environment-agnostic and capable of booting anywhere.

Original article: http://containerjournal.com/2017/02/27/mirageos-unikernels-now-support-kvm-freebsd-bhyve/

Hosting Journalist: http://www.hostingjournalist.com/iaas-hosting/xen-projects-mirageos-expands-its-ecosystem-in-latest-release/

FreeBSD – There and Back Again

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User Andy Mender tells us of his experience switching over to FreeBSD, having been a long time Linux user. You can also see his older blogs documenting his journey of using both open source operating systems.

bsdbikeI guess it should be no surprise that I returned to FreeBSD once more. One of the reasons I originally started learning C was to be able to help writing/fixing wireless drivers for FreeBSD. Although I haven’t reached that point of proficiency just yet, I feel FreeBSD is truly the place I belong after all. From the intrinsic order of a cathedral, through good programming practices and complete documentation to great system-level tools (jails, zfs, bhyve, etc.). Reading the most recent issue of Admin: Network & Security made it even clearer to me. GNU/Linux is growing strong in the server sector, with new GUI-driven tools and frameworks for container management. Personally, I think that’s awesome! It’s a win for the whole open-source world. However, Unix is more than just GNU/Linux – people often forget about Solaris/OpenIndiana and the various BSD-based operating systems (FreeBSD, OpenBSD, NetBSD, DragonflyBSD, etc.). They too are great server platforms, one can learn a lot from. There are scenarios in which a non-Linux Unix is more suitable for the same or similar tasks.

Original post: https://linuxmender.wordpress.com/2017/02/26/freebsd-there-and-back-again/

Related links: Debian vs FreeBSD?, FreeBSD as a Desktop OS?

TrueOS-STABLE version 2017-02-22.

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The developers of TrueOS have made available STABLE version 2017-02-22. You can download the new ISO here or use the update feature within the OS. See the link below for the full release notes.
trueos_preview

A new update for TrueOS-STABLE is available as of 2/22/17 (apologies for the late announcement). This update brings in a number of bugfixes and functionality improvements, along with a few “big-ticket” items.

Other Updates:

  • Qt version updated from 5.6.2 to 5.7.1
  • Multiple minor package updates
  • New about tool improvements (Thanks Graham Perrin!)
  • The entire package repository is synced with FreeBSD as of Feb 19, 2017.
  • The new Automounting feature is available!
  • The pc-mounttray utility has been retired in favor of the new devd-based automounter and autofs.
  • New Jail utilities are available.

Official announcement: https://www.trueos.org/blog/trueos-stable-update-released-22217/

Softpedia: http://news.softpedia.com/news/freebsd-based-trueos-operating-system-gets-new-jail-tools-automounting-feature-513329.shtml

The Mac Observer Interview with Jordan Hubbard

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tmoThe folks at The Mac Observer interview Jordan Hubbard regarding his time as a founder of FreeBSD, heading Apple’s UNIX team, and his many contributions to open source. Check out the link below to listen to the podcast.

Jordan Hubbard, the co-founder of FreeBSD, spent a dozen years at Apple bringing coherence to the UNIX core of Mac OS X. Apple calls it macOS today, but in the early years, there were lots of rough spots integrating the partly FreeBSD core into a viable consumer Mac OS X. Jordan was also instrumental in modernizing Mac OS X with features like MacPorts, Launchd, Grand Central Dispatch and application sandboxing. Today, his work complete at Apple, Jordan is an open source developer. We talked about the early development of Mac OS X derived from NeXT and even the earliest BSD origins. Along the way, we also chatted about Jordan’s childhood memories as an 8-year old being an electronics geek with Radio Shack as his Mecca. If you love macOS, don’t miss this insightful historical tour.

TMO Background Mode: Interview with Open Source Developer & Former Apple Manager Jordan Hubbard

pfSense 2.3.3 RELEASE Now Available!

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The developers of pfSense have announced the official version 2.3.3 RELEASE. See the link below for the full release notes. Download here.

pfsense-logo-150x150We are happy to announce the release of pfSense® software version 2.3.3!

This is a maintenance release in the 2.3.x series, bringing numerous stability and bug fixes, fixes for a handful of security issues in the GUI, and a handful of new features. The full list of changes is on the 2.3.3 New Features and Changes page, including a list of FreeBSD and internal security advisories addressed by this release.

This release includes fixes for 101 bugs, 14 Features, and 3 Todo items.

If you haven’t yet caught up on the changes in 2.3.x, check out the Features and Highlights video. Past blog posts have covered some of the changes, such as the performance improvements from tryforward, and the webGUI update.

Official announcement: https://blog.pfsense.org/?p=2325

DistroWatch: http://distrowatch.com/?newsid=09729

pfSense: http://linux.softpedia.com/blog/freebsd-based-pfsense-2-3-3-open-source-firewall-released-with-over-100-changes-513210.shtml