FreeBSD homepage∞
FreeBSD installer faq∞
Supported hardware for pfSense∞

FreeBSD is considered one of the most stable and economical server platforms on the market today. FreeBSD has become a very powerful alternative to commercial UNIX® workstations, and shines as an email or database server. Fully functional out of the box with a wealth of ported applications, FreeBSD has led the way in keeping stability and consistency at the forefront of the development model. Indeed, the Freesbie project has made major inroads into improving the FreeBSD installer by creating a CD-ROM bootable install that recognizes computer hardware and does a lot of auto-configuration to provide the user with a graphical environment.

Freesbie Homepage∞
Freesbie Distro Watch Information∞
Freesbie installer screenshot∞

The FreeBSD project also has a fantastic handbook∞ that is both logical and consistent covering most every possible problem and issue you will have with the operation system. This is further backed up by well designed manual pages. One of the current problems with FreeBSD is that the designers have failed to recognize the rainbow of possible users and uses of this OS. Accessiabiltiy, and installation of FreeBSD should be a trivial issue, and not require weeks of frustration. This is not to say that the tools for serious hard drive manipulation should not be present, on the contrary, the power tools should be available to the power user. A possible outline of an installation scenario is ......................

Do you want to use this machine as a Desktop or a Server?
IF Server {
}
ELSE Desktop {
}

Newbie......

• installer takes control.
• uses default settings that will work reasonably well.
• kde desktop.
• very little user input.

Developer......

• give choice of applications likely to be needed: eg. glade, bluefish, python, ruby, haskell, etc.
• gnome desktop.
• some user input.

Super-Developer......

• choice of minimalist desktop: say icewm, fluxbox.
• lots of user input.

Power-User......

• full verbose prompting on all aspects of the install.
• all user input.

Freesbie and Firefly BSD have realized this.....PC-BSD∞ is working on making this a working reality. PC-BSD ScreenShots∞. Other BSD's include NetBSD, OpenBSD and DragonFlyBSD. And if you read this far, perhaps you are interested in BUILDING YOUR OWN LIVE CD∞

Tuning Hints......