FreeBSD/ia64 6.1-RELEASE Installation Instructions

1.5.1 Installing from a Network CDROM

If you simply wish to install from a local CDROM drive then see Section 1.4. If you don't have a CDROM drive on your system and wish to use a FreeBSD distribution CD in the CDROM drive of another system to which you have network connectivity, there are also several ways of going about it:

• If you would be able to FTP install FreeBSD directly from the CDROM drive in some FreeBSD machine, it's quite easy: You ensure an FTP server is running and then simply add the following line to the password file (using the vipw(8) command):

  ftp:*:99:99::0:0:FTP:/cdrom:/sbin/nologin
  

  On the machine on which you are running the install, go to the Options menu and set Release Name to any. You may then choose a Media type of FTP and type in ftp://machine after picking “URL” in the ftp sites menu.

  Warning: This may allow anyone on the local network (or Internet) to make “anonymous FTP” connections to this machine, which may not be desirable.

• If you would rather use NFS to export the CDROM directly to the machine(s) you'll be installing from, you need to first add an entry to the /etc/exports file (on the machine with the CDROM drive). The example below allows the machine ziggy.foo.com to mount the CDROM directly via NFS during installation:

  /cdrom          -ro             ziggy.foo.com
  

  The machine with the CDROM must also be configured as an NFS server, of course, and if you're not sure how to do that then an NFS installation is probably not the best choice for you unless you're willing to read up on rc.conf(5) and configure things appropriately. Assuming that this part goes smoothly, you should be able to enter: cdrom-host:/cdrom as the path for an NFS installation when the target machine is installed, e.g. wiggy:/cdrom.

1.5.2 Installing from Floppies

If you must install from floppy disks, either due to unsupported hardware or just because you enjoy doing things the hard way, you must first prepare some floppies for the install.

First, make your boot floppies as described in Section 1.3.

Second, peruse Section 2 and pay special attention to the “Distribution Format” section since it describes which files you're going to need to put onto floppy and which you can safely skip.

Next you will need, at minimum, as many 1.44MB floppies as it takes to hold all files in the bin (binary distribution) directory. If you're preparing these floppies under DOS, then these floppies must be formatted using the MS-DOS FORMAT command. If you're using Windows, use the Windows File Manager format command.

If you're creating the floppies from another FreeBSD machine, a format is still not a bad idea though you don't need to put a DOS filesystem on each floppy. You can use the disklabel(8) and newfs(8) commands to put a UFS filesystem on a floppy, as the following sequence of commands illustrates:

# fdformat -f 1440 fd0
# disklabel -w fd0 floppy3
# newfs -i 65536 /dev/fd0

After you've formatted the floppies for DOS or UFS, you'll need to copy the files onto them. The distribution files are sized so that a floppy disk will hold a single file. Each distribution should go into its own subdirectory on the floppy, e.g.: a:\bin\bin.inf, a:\bin\bin.aa, a:\bin\bin.ab, ...

Once you come to the Media screen of the install, select “Floppy” and you'll be prompted for the rest.

1.5.4 Installing from QIC/SCSI Tape

When installing from tape, the installation program expects the files to be simply tar'ed onto it, so after fetching all of the files for the distributions you're interested in, simply use tar(1) to get them onto the tape with a command something like this:

# cd /where/you/have/your/dists
# tar cvf /dev/sa0 dist1 .. dist2

When you go to do the installation, you should also make sure that you leave enough room in some temporary directory (which you'll be allowed to choose) to accommodate the full contents of the tape you've created. Due to the non-random access nature of tapes, this method of installation requires quite a bit of temporary storage. You should expect to require as much temporary storage as you have stuff written on tape.

Now create a boot floppy as described in Section 1.3 and proceed with the installation.

1.5.5 Installing over a Network using FTP or NFS

After making the boot floppies as described in the first section, you can load the rest of the installation over a network using one of 3 types of connections: serial port, parallel port, or Ethernet.

ftp://216.66.64.162/pub/FreeBSD/releases/ia64/4.2-RELEASE

3.1.1 Upgrade Overview

Upgrading of a distribution is performed by extracting the new version of the component over the top of the previous version. Files belonging to the old distribution are not deleted.

System configuration is preserved by retaining and restoring the previous version of the following files:

Xaccel.ini, XF86Config, adduser.conf, aliases, aliases.db, amd.map, crontab, csh.cshrc, csh.login, csh.logout, cvsupfile, dhclient.conf, disktab, dm.conf, dumpdates, exports, fbtab, fstab, ftpusers, gettytab, gnats, group, hosts, hosts.allow, hosts.equiv, hosts.lpd, inetd.conf, localtime, login.access, login.conf, mail, mail.rc, make.conf, manpath.config, master.passwd, motd, namedb, networks, newsyslog.conf, nsmb.conf, nsswitch.conf, pam.conf, passwd, periodic, ppp, printcap, profile, pwd.db, rc.conf, rc.conf.local, rc.firewall, rc.local, remote, resolv.conf, rmt, sendmail.cf, sendmail.cw, services, shells, skeykeys, spwd.db, ssh, syslog.conf, ttys, uucp

The versions of these files which correspond to the new version are moved to /etc/upgrade/. The system administrator may peruse these new versions and merge components as desired. Note that many of these files are interdependent, and the best merge procedure is to copy all site-specific data from the current files into the new.

During the upgrade procedure, the administrator is prompted for a location into which all files from /etc/ are saved. In the event that local modifications have been made to other files, they may be subsequently retrieved from this location.

3.2.1 Backup

User data and system configuration should be backed up before upgrading. While the upgrade procedure does its best to prevent accidental mistakes, it is possible to partially or completely destroy data and configuration information.

3.2.2 Mount Filesystems

The disklabel editor is entered with the nominated disk's filesystem devices listed. Prior to commencing the upgrade, the administrator should make a note of the device names and corresponding mountpoints. These mountpoints should be entered here. Do not set the “newfs flag” for any filesystems, as this will cause data loss.

3.2.3 Select Distributions

When selecting distributions, there are no constraints on which must be selected. As a general rule, the base distribution should be selected for an update, and the man distribution if manpages are already installed. Other distributions may be selected beyond those originally installed if the administrator wishes to add additional functionality.

3.2.4 After Installation

Once the installation procedure has completed, the administrator is prompted to examine the new configuration files. At this point, checks should be made to ensure that the system configuration is valid. In particular, the /etc/rc.conf and /etc/fstab files should be checked.