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1<?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?> 2<!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//DTD DocBook XML V4.5-Based Extension//EN" 3 "../../../share/xml/freebsd45.dtd" [ 4<!ENTITY % release PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//ENTITIES Release Specification//EN" "release.ent"> 5 %release; 6]> 7 8<article> 9 <articleinfo> 10 <title>&os; &release.current; README</title> 11 12 <corpauthor>The &os; Project</corpauthor> 13 14 <pubdate>$FreeBSD: stable/10/release/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/readme/article.xml 250746 2013-05-17 18:53:29Z gabor $</pubdate> 15 16 <copyright> 17 <year>2000</year> 18 <year>2001</year> 19 <year>2002</year> 20 <year>2003</year> 21 <year>2004</year> 22 <year>2005</year> 23 <year>2006</year> 24 <year>2007</year> 25 <year>2008</year> 26 <holder role="mailto:doc@FreeBSD.org">The &os; Documentation Project</holder> 27 </copyright> 28 29 <legalnotice id="trademarks" role="trademarks"> 30 &tm-attrib.freebsd; 31 &tm-attrib.intel; 32 &tm-attrib.opengroup; 33 &tm-attrib.sparc; 34 &tm-attrib.general; 35 </legalnotice> 36 </articleinfo> 37 38 <abstract> 39 <para>This document gives a brief introduction to &os; 40 &release.current;. It includes some information on how to 41 obtain &os;, a listing of various ways to contact the &os; 42 Project, and pointers to some other sources of 43 information.</para> 44 </abstract> 45 46 <sect1 id="intro"> 47 <title>Introduction</title> 48 49 <para>This distribution is a &release.type; of &os; &release.current;, the 50 latest point along the &release.branch; branch.</para> 51 52 <sect2> 53 <title>About &os;</title> 54 55 <para>&os; is an operating system based on 4.4 BSD Lite for 56 AMD64 and Intel EM64T based PC hardware (&arch.amd64;), 57 Intel, AMD, Cyrix or NexGen <quote>x86</quote> based PC hardware (&arch.i386;), 58 Intel Itanium Processor based computers (&arch.ia64;), 59 NEC PC-9801/9821 series PCs and compatibles (&arch.pc98;), 60 and &ultrasparc; machines (&arch.sparc64;). Versions 61 for the &arm; (&arch.arm;), &mips; (&arch.mips;), and 62 &powerpc; (&arch.powerpc;) architectures are currently under 63 development as well. &os; works with a wide variety of 64 peripherals and configurations and can be used for everything 65 from software development to games to Internet Service 66 Provision.</para> 67 68 <para>This release of &os; contains everything you need to run 69 such a system, including full source code for the kernel and 70 all utilities in the base distribution. With the source 71 distribution installed, you can literally recompile the entire 72 system from scratch with one command, making it ideal for 73 students, researchers, or users who simply want to see how it 74 all works.</para> 75 76 <para>A large collection of third-party ported software (the 77 <quote>Ports Collection</quote>) is also provided to make it 78 easy to obtain and install all your favorite traditional &unix; 79 utilities for &os;. Each <quote>port</quote> consists of a 80 set of scripts to retrieve, configure, build, and install a 81 piece of software, with a single command. Over &os.numports; 82 ports, from editors to programming languages to graphical 83 applications, make &os; a powerful and comprehensive operating 84 environment that extends far beyond what's provided by many 85 commercial versions of &unix;. Most ports are also available as 86 pre-compiled <quote>packages</quote>, which can be quickly 87 installed from the installation program.</para> 88 </sect2> 89 90 <sect2> 91 <title>Target Audience</title> 92 93 <para releasetype="current">This &release.type; is aimed primarily at early adopters 94 and various other users who want to get involved with the 95 ongoing development of &os;. While the &os; development team 96 tries its best to ensure that each &release.type; works as 97 advertised, &release.branch; is very much a 98 work-in-progress.</para> 99 100 <para releasetype="current">The basic requirements for using this &release.type; are 101 technical proficiency with &os; and an understanding of the 102 ongoing development process of &os; &release.branch; (as 103 discussed on the &a.current;).</para> 104 105 <para releasetype="current">For those more interested in doing business with &os; than 106 in experimenting with new &os; technology, formal releases 107 (such as &release.prev.stable;) are frequently more appropriate. 108 Releases undergo a period of testing and quality assurance 109 checking to ensure high reliability and dependability.</para> 110 111 <para releasetype="snapshot">This &release.type; is aimed primarily at early adopters 112 and various other users who want to get involved with the 113 ongoing development of &os;. While the &os; development team 114 tries its best to ensure that each &release.type; works as 115 advertised, &release.branch; is very much a 116 work-in-progress.</para> 117 118 <para releasetype="snapshot">The basic requirements for using this &release.type; are 119 technical proficiency with &os; and an understanding of the 120 ongoing development process of &os; &release.branch; (as 121 discussed on the &a.current;).</para> 122 123 <para releasetype="snapshot">For those more interested in doing business with &os; than 124 in experimenting with new &os; technology, formal releases 125 (such as &release.prev.stable;) are frequently more appropriate. 126 Releases undergo a period of testing and quality assurance 127 checking to ensure high reliability and dependability.</para> 128 129 <para releasetype="release">This &release.type; of &os; is suitable for all users. It 130 has undergone a period of testing and quality assurance 131 checking to ensure the highest reliability and 132 dependability.</para> 133 </sect2> 134 </sect1> 135 136 <sect1 id="obtain"> 137 <title>Obtaining &os;</title> 138 139 <para>&os; may be obtained in a variety of ways. This section 140 focuses on those ways that are primarily useful for obtaining a 141 complete &os; distribution, rather than updating an existing 142 installation.</para> 143 144 <sect2> 145 <title>CDROM and DVD</title> 146 147 <para>&os; -RELEASE distributions may be ordered on CDROM or DVD 148 from several publishers. This is frequently the most 149 convenient way to obtain &os; for new installations, as it 150 provides a convenient way to quickly reinstall the system if 151 necessary. Some distributions include some of the optional, 152 precompiled <quote>packages</quote> from the &os; Ports 153 Collection, or other extra material.</para> 154 155 <para>A list of the CDROM and DVD publishers known to the 156 project are listed in the <ulink 157 url="&url.books.handbook;/mirrors.html"><quote>Obtaining 158 &os;</quote></ulink> appendix to the Handbook.</para> 159 </sect2> 160 161 <sect2> 162 <title>FTP</title> 163 164 <para>You can use FTP to retrieve &os; and any or all of its 165 optional packages from <ulink 166 url="ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/"></ulink>, which is the official 167 &os; release site, or any of its 168 <quote>mirrors</quote>.</para> 169 170 <para>Lists of locations that mirror &os; can be found in the 171 <ulink 172 url="&url.books.handbook;/mirrors-ftp.html">FTP 173 Sites</ulink> section of the Handbook. 174 Finding a close (in networking terms) mirror from which to 175 download the distribution is highly recommended.</para> 176 177 <para>Additional mirror sites are always welcome. Contact 178 <email>freebsd-admin@FreeBSD.org</email> for more details on 179 becoming an official mirror site. You can also find useful 180 information for mirror sites at the <ulink 181 url="&url.articles.hubs;/">Mirroring 182 &os;</ulink> article.</para> 183 184 <para>Mirrors generally contain the ISO images generally used to 185 create a CDROM of a &os; release. They usually also contain 186 floppy disk images (for applicable platforms), as well as the 187 files necessary to do an installation over the network. 188 Finally mirrors sites usually contain a set of packages for 189 the most current release.</para> 190 </sect2> 191 </sect1> 192 193 <sect1 id="contacting"> 194 <title>Contacting the &os; Project</title> 195 196 <sect2> 197 <title>Email and Mailing Lists</title> 198 199 <para>For any questions or general technical support issues, 200 please send mail to the &a.questions;.</para> 201 202 <para>If you're tracking the &release.branch; development efforts, you 203 <emphasis>must</emphasis> join the &a.current;, in order to 204 keep abreast of recent developments and changes that may 205 affect the way you use and maintain the system.</para> 206 207 <para>Being a largely-volunteer effort, the &os; 208 Project is always happy to have extra hands willing to help—there are already far more desired enhancements than 209 there is time to implement them. To contact the developers on 210 technical matters, or with offers of help, please send mail to 211 the &a.hackers;.</para> 212 213 <para>Please note that these mailing lists can experience 214 <emphasis>significant</emphasis> amounts of traffic. If you 215 have slow or expensive mail access, or are only interested in 216 keeping up with major &os; events, you may find it 217 preferable to subscribe instead to the &a.announce;.</para> 218 219 <para>All of the mailing lists can be freely joined by anyone 220 wishing to do so. Visit the <ulink url="&url.base;/mailman/listinfo"> 221 &os; Mailman Info Page</ulink>. This will give you more 222 information on joining the various lists, accessing archives, 223 etc. There are a number of mailing lists targeted at special 224 interest groups not mentioned here; more information can be 225 obtained either from the Mailman pages or the <ulink 226 url="&url.base;/support.html#mailing-list">mailing 227 lists section</ulink> of the &os; Web site.</para> 228 229 <important> 230 <para>Do <emphasis>not</emphasis> send email to the lists 231 asking to be subscribed. Use the Mailman interface 232 instead.</para> 233 </important> 234 </sect2> 235 236 <sect2> 237 <title>Submitting Problem Reports</title> 238 239 <para>Suggestions, bug reports and contributions of code are 240 always valued—please do not hesitate to report any 241 problems you may find. Bug reports with attached fixes are of 242 course even more welcome.</para> 243 244 <para>The preferred method to submit bug reports from a machine 245 with Internet mail connectivity is to use the &man.send-pr.1; 246 command. 247 <quote>Problem Reports</quote> (PRs) submitted in this way 248 will be filed and their progress tracked; the &os; developers 249 will do their best to respond to all reported bugs as soon as 250 possible. <ulink 251 url="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/query-pr-summary.cgi">A list 252 of all active PRs</ulink> is available on the &os; Web site; 253 this list is useful to see what potential problems other users 254 have encountered.</para> 255 256 <para>Note that &man.send-pr.1; itself is a shell script that 257 should be easy to move even onto a non-&os; system. Using 258 this interface is highly preferred. If, for some reason, you 259 are unable to use &man.send-pr.1; to submit a bug report, you 260 can try to send it to the &a.bugs;.</para> 261 262 <para>For more information, <ulink 263 url="&url.articles.problem-reports;/"><quote>Writing 264 &os; Problem Reports</quote></ulink>, available on the &os; Web 265 site, has a number of helpful hints on writing and submitting 266 effective problem reports.</para> 267 </sect2> 268 </sect1> 269 270 <sect1 id="seealso"> 271 <title>Further Reading</title> 272 273 <para>There are many sources of information about &os;; some are 274 included with this distribution, while others are available 275 on-line or in print versions.</para> 276 277 <sect2 id="release-docs"> 278 <title>Release Documentation</title> 279 280 <para>A number of other files provide more specific information 281 about this &release.type; distribution. These files are 282 provided in various formats. Most distributions will include 283 both ASCII text (<filename>.TXT</filename>) and HTML 284 (<filename>.HTM</filename>) renditions. Some distributions 285 may also include other formats such as Portable Document Format 286 (<filename>.PDF</filename>). 287 288 <itemizedlist> 289 <listitem> 290 <para><filename>README.TXT</filename>: This file, which 291 gives some general information about &os; as well as 292 some cursory notes about obtaining a 293 distribution.</para> 294 </listitem> 295 296 <listitem> 297 <para><filename>RELNOTES.TXT</filename>: The release 298 notes, showing what's new and different in &os; 299 &release.current; compared to the previous release (&os; 300 &release.prev;).</para> 301 </listitem> 302 303 <listitem> 304 <para><filename>HARDWARE.TXT</filename>: The hardware 305 compatibility list, showing devices with which &os; has 306 been tested and is known to work.</para> 307 </listitem> 308 309 <listitem> 310 <para><filename>ERRATA.TXT</filename>: Release errata. 311 Late-breaking, post-release information can be found in 312 this file, which is principally applicable to releases 313 (as opposed to snapshots). It is important to consult 314 this file before installing a release of &os;, as it 315 contains the latest information on problems which have 316 been found and fixed since the release was 317 created.</para> 318 </listitem> 319 </itemizedlist> 320 </para> 321 322 <para>On platforms that support &man.sysinstall.8; (currently 323 &arch.amd64;, &arch.i386;, &arch.ia64;, &arch.pc98;, and &arch.sparc64;), these documents are generally available via the 324 Documentation menu during installation. Once the system is 325 installed, you can revisit this menu by re-running the 326 &man.sysinstall.8; utility.</para> 327 328 <note> 329 <para>It is extremely important to read the errata for any 330 given release before installing it, to learn about any 331 <quote>late-breaking news</quote> or post-release problems. 332 The errata file accompanying each release (most likely right 333 next to this file) is already out of date by definition, but 334 other copies are kept updated on the Internet and should be 335 consulted as the <quote>current errata</quote> for this 336 release. These other copies of the errata are located at 337 <ulink url="&url.base;/releases/"></ulink> (as 338 well as any sites which keep up-to-date mirrors of this 339 location).</para> 340 </note> 341 </sect2> 342 343 <sect2> 344 <title>Manual Pages</title> 345 346 <para>As with almost all &unix; like operating systems, &os; comes 347 with a set of on-line manual pages, accessed through the 348 &man.man.1; command or through the <ulink 349 url="http://www.FreeBSD.org/cgi/man.cgi">hypertext manual 350 pages gateway</ulink> on the &os; Web site. In general, the 351 manual pages provide information on the different commands and 352 APIs available to the &os; user.</para> 353 354 <para>In some cases, manual pages are written to give 355 information on particular topics. Notable examples of such 356 manual pages are &man.tuning.7; (a guide to performance tuning), 357 &man.security.7; (an introduction to &os; security), and 358 &man.style.9; (a style guide to kernel coding).</para> 359 </sect2> 360 361 <sect2> 362 <title>Books and Articles</title> 363 364 <para>Two highly-useful collections of &os;-related information, 365 maintained by the &os; Project, 366 are the &os; Handbook and &os; FAQ (Frequently Asked 367 Questions document). On-line versions of the <ulink 368 url="&url.books.handbook;/">Handbook</ulink> 369 and <ulink 370 url="&url.books.faq;/">FAQ</ulink> 371 are always available from the <ulink 372 url="&url.base;/docs.html">&os; Documentation 373 page</ulink> or its mirrors. If you install the 374 <filename>doc</filename> distribution set, you can use a Web 375 browser to read the Handbook and FAQ locally. In particular, 376 note that the Handbook contains a step-by-step guide to 377 installing &os;.</para> 378 379 <para>A number of on-line books and articles, also maintained by 380 the &os; Project, cover more-specialized, &os;-related topics. 381 This material spans a wide range of topics, from effective use 382 of the mailing lists, to dual-booting &os; with other 383 operating systems, to guidelines for new committers. Like the 384 Handbook and FAQ, these documents are available from the &os; 385 Documentation Page or in the <filename>doc</filename> 386 distribution set.</para> 387 388 <para>A listing of other books and documents about &os; can be 389 found in the <ulink 390 url="&url.books.handbook;/bibliography.html">bibliography</ulink> 391 of the &os; Handbook. Because of &os;'s strong &unix; heritage, 392 many other articles and books written for &unix; systems are 393 applicable as well, some of which are also listed in the 394 bibliography.</para> 395 </sect2> 396 </sect1> 397 398 <sect1 id="acknowledgements"> 399 <title>Acknowledgments</title> 400 401 <para>&os; represents the cumulative work of many hundreds, if not 402 thousands, of individuals from around the world who have worked 403 countless hours to bring about this &release.type;. For a 404 complete list of &os; developers and contributors, please see 405 <ulink 406 url="&url.articles.contributors;/"><quote>Contributors 407 to &os;</quote></ulink> on the &os; Web site or any of its 408 mirrors.</para> 409 410 <para>Special thanks also go to the many thousands of &os; users 411 and testers all over the world, without whom this &release.type; 412 simply would not have been possible.</para> 413 </sect1> 414</article> 415 416<!-- 417 Local Variables: 418 mode: sgml 419 sgml-indent-data: t 420 sgml-omittag: nil 421 sgml-always-quote-attributes: t 422 End: 423--> 424