All the documentation on this site can be downloaded in a variety of different formats (HTML, Postscript, PDF, and more) and compression schemes (BZip2, Zip) from the FreeBSD FTP site.
Archived copies of the &os; documentation (articles, books, and textinfo manuals) are also available online at http://docs.FreeBSD.org/doc/.
This documentation is provided and maintained by the FreeBSD Documentation Project, and we are always looking for people to contribute new documentation and maintain existing documentation.
A project model for
the FreeBSD project (dev-model)
A formal study of the organization of the FreeBSD project.
The FreeBSD FAQ
(faq)
Frequently Asked Questions, and answers, covering all aspects of
FreeBSD.
The FreeBSD
Handbook (handbook)
A constantly evolving, comprehensive resource for FreeBSD
users.
The
FreeBSD Developers' Handbook (developers-handbook)
For people who want to develop software for FreeBSD (and not
just people who are developing FreeBSD itself).
The FreeBSD
Architecture Handbook (arch-handbook)
For FreeBSD system developers. This book covers the
architectural details of many important FreeBSD kernel
subsystems.
The Porter's
Handbook (porters-handbook)
Essential reading if you plan on providing a port of a third
party piece of software.
The PMake Tutorial
(pmake)
A tutorial for the make utility. This book is
essential reading for anyone who wants to understand all the
details of using make of reading and writing
makefiles.
Chapter 2
of "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4BSD Operating
System" (design-44bsd)
Donated by Addison-Wesley, provides a design overview of 4.4BSD,
from which FreeBSD was originally derived.
The FreeBSD
Documentation Project Primer for New Contributors
(fdp-primer)
Everything you need to know in order to start contributing to
the FreeBSD Documentation Project.
Why you should use
a BSD style license for your Open Source Project
(bsdl-gpl)
Describes the benefits of releasing code under a BSD
license.
Building
Products with FreeBSD (building-products)
How FreeBSD can help you build a better product.
Argentina.com:
A Case Study (casestudy-argentina.com)
How FreeBSD helped a large ISP in Latin America.
The
Committer's Guide (committers-guide)
Introductory information for FreeBSD committers.
Installing
and using Compiz Fusion (compiz-fusion)
How to install and use the Compiz Fusion composite window
manager under FreeBSD.
Console
Server Tutorial (console-server)
How to setup a FreeBSD based console server with a cheap
multi-port serial card.
Contributing
to FreeBSD (contributing)
How to contribute to the FreeBSD Project.
Contributing
to the FreeBSD Ports Collection (contributing-ports)
How to help maintain the FreeBSD Ports Collection.
The List of
FreeBSD Contributors (contributors)
A list of organizations and individuals who have helped enhance
FreeBSD.
CUPS on &os;
(cups)
How to setup CUPS with &os;.
Using newer
version of GCC and binutils with the &os; Ports Collection
(custom-gcc)
How to use newer versions of the GCC compilers and binutils from
the &os; ports tree. Custom GCC are also discussed.
Setting up a
CVS repository - The FreeBSD way (cvs-freebsd)
How to set up a CVS repository that uses the same CVSROOT
infrastructure as the FreeBSD project.
Explaining
BSD (explaining-bsd)
An answer to the question ``What is BSD?''
FreeBSD
From Scratch (fbsd-from-scratch)
How to automatically compile, install and configure a system
from scratch (i.e. to an empty file system), including your
favorite ports.
Filtering
Bridges (filtering-bridges)
Configuring firewalls and filtering on FreeBSD hosts acting as
bridges rather than routers.
Fonts and FreeBSD
(fonts)
A description of the various font technologies in FreeBSD, and
how to use them with different programs.
How to
get the best results from the FreeBSD-questions mailing
list (freebsd-questions)
Tips and tricks to help you maximize the chances of getting
useful information from the -questions mailing list.
Build
Your Own FreeBSD Update Server
(freebsd-update-server)
Using a FreeBSD Update server allows a system administrator to
perform fast updates for a number of machines from a local
mirror.
Writing a GEOM
Class (geom-class)
A guide to GEOM internals, and writing your own class.
Implementing
UFS journaling on a desktop PC (gjournal-desktop)
A guide to create UFS partitions configured with journaling for
desktop use.
Mirroring FreeBSD
(hubs)
The all in one guide for mirroring the FreeBSD website, CVSup
servers, FTP servers, and more.
Independent
Verification of IPsec Functionality in FreeBSD
(ipsec-must)
A method for experimentally verifying IPsec functionality.
FreeBSD on
Laptops (laptop)
Information about running FreeBSD on a laptop.
LDAP
Authentication (ldap-auth)
A practical guide about setting up an LDAP server on &os; and
how to use it for authenticating users.
FreeBSD:
An Open Source Alternative to Linux
(linux-comparison)
A white paper explaining the differences between Linux and
FreeBSD.
Linux
emulation in &os; (linux-emulation)
A technical description about the internals of the Linux
emulation layer in &os;.
&os; Quickstart
Guide for Linux Users (linux-users)
An introductionary guide for the users that came from Linux.
Frequently
Asked Questions About The FreeBSD Mailing Lists
(mailing-list-faq)
How to best use the mailing lists, such as how to help avoid
frequently-repeated discussions.
An MH Primer
(mh)
An introduction to using the MH mail reader on FreeBSD.
Introduction to
NanoBSD (nanobsd)
Information about the NanoBSD tools, which can be used to create
FreeBSD system images for embedded applications, suitable for
use on a Compact Flash card (or other mass storage medium).
FreeBSD First
Steps (new-users)
For people coming to FreeBSD and &unix; for the first time.
Perforce in
FreeBSD Development (p4-primer)
A guide to the Perforce version control system. It also
describes how to manage experimental projects with the FreeBSD
Perforce server.
Pluggable
Authentication Modules (pam)
A guide to the PAM system and modules under FreeBSD.
OpenPGP Keys
+ (pgpkeys)
+ All of the OpenPGP keys for &os;.
Port
Mentor Guidelines (port-mentor-guidelines)
Guidelines for new and/or potential port mentors and
mentees.
Package building
procedures (portbuild)
Describes the approach used by the FreeBSD port manager team to
regularly build ports into packages. It describes the portbuild
cluster, as well as the tools needed to do incremental,
experimental, and official release package builds.
FreeBSD
Problem Report Handling Guidelines (pr-guidelines)
Recommended practices for handling FreeBSD problem reports.
Writing
FreeBSD Problem Reports (problem-reports)
How to best formulate and submit a problem report to the FreeBSD
Project.
Practical rc.d
scripting in BSD (rc-scripting)
A guide to writing new rc.d scripts and understanding those
already written.
FreeBSD as a
greylist mail server (relaydelay)
Implementing a greylist mail server on FreeBSD using Sendmail,
MySQL, Perl and the relaydelay software. This is an excellent
method to use in the fight against spam.
FreeBSD Release
Engineering (releng)
Describes the approach used by the FreeBSD release engineering
team to make production quality releases of the FreeBSD
Operating System. It describes the tools available for those
interested in producing customized FreeBSD releases for
corporate rollouts or commercial productization.
FreeBSD
Release Engineering for Third Party Packages
(releng-packages)
Describes the approach used by the FreeBSD ports management team
to produce a high quality package set suitable for official
FreeBSD release media. This document is a work in progress, but
eventually it will cover the process used to build a clean
package set on the FreeBSD.org "Ports Cluster", how to configure
any other set of machines as a ports cluster, how to split up
the packages for the release media, and how to verify that a
package set is consistent.
Remote
Installation of the &os; Operating System without a
Remote Console (remote-install)
Describes the remote installation of the &os; operating system
when the console of the remote system is unavailable.
Serial and UART
devices (serial-uart)
Detailed information about the use of serial ports on FreeBSD,
including several multi-port serial cards.
FreeBSD and
Solid State Devices (solid-state)
The use of solid state disk devices in FreeBSD.
Design elements
of the FreeBSD VM system (vm-design)
An easy to follow description of the design of the FreeBSD
virtual memory system.
Various independent efforts have also produced a great deal of useful information about FreeBSD.
Niels Jorgensen has authored an academic study on the dynamics of the FreeBSD development process: ``Putting it All in the Trunk, Incremental Software Development in the FreeBSD Open Source Project'' [Information Systems Journal (2001) 11, 321-336].
Kirk McKusick, one of the original architects of BSD at U.C. Berkeley, teaches two 4.4BSD Kernel Internals courses using FreeBSD. For those unable to attend the courses in person, a video tape series is also now available.
FreeBSD How-To's for the Lazy and Hopeless is another somewhat more light-hearted attempt to provide more readable "how-to" style information on setting up and configuring FreeBSD.
The Linux+FreeBSD mini-HOWTO describes how to use Linux and FreeBSD on the same system. It introduces FreeBSD and discusses how the two operating systems can cooperate, e.g. by sharing swap space.
Writing an ISA device driver. This document has been imported into The FreeBSD Architecture Handbook.
FreeBSD Assembly Language Programming Tutorial. This document has been imported into The FreeBSD Developer's Handbook.
The SMP support page contains information on the SMP support in FreeBSD 4.X and earlier.
Appendix A from the college textbook Operating Systems Concepts by Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne has been made available online in PDF format. The appendix is dedicated to FreeBSD and offers a good introduction to FreeBSD's internals.