FreeBSD Desktop – Part 2 – Install

This is the second post in the FreeBSD Desktop series.

You may want to check other articles in the FreeBSD Desktop series on the FreeBSD Desktop – Global Page where you will find links to all episodes of the series along with table of contents for each episode’s contents.

How about actually installing FreeBSD? On a real hardware? You may first want to mess with the FreeBSD installer in a virtualized hardware (Bhyve/KVM/XEN/Virtualbox/…) so You will gain some confidence. In these posts series we will create a complete step by step FreeBSD desktop installation on USB 2.0 pendrive. 8 GB size or more is required. This way You will not have to ‘touch’ you installed system and as You gain confidence in FreeBSD You may want to switch to it if it suits your needs better then the currently installed system on your hardware. This way You can also try it on various computers without the need of (re)install or You may use it as You ‘go/mobile’ system on a stick.

For the series I will use one of the best laptops ever made – Lenovo ThinkPad X220 – shown below.

Its a 2011 12.5″ screen laptop with best keyboard layout on the world. As the series will progress I will also show the differences to other laptop – Lenovo ThinkPad T420s – another great machine. Besides being one of the best laptops ever made they also today have another advantage – they are dirt cheap. You can get any of them in a really good condition for about $150-180.

BIOS

First we need to setup our machine, I mean the BIOS settings in the laptop. We will disable unused (Express Card/Bluetooth/Camera/Fingerprint Reader/…) and unwanted options (Intel AMT/Security Chip/UEFI/…). Below are screens with these settings.

Install

The install is very similar to the HardenedBSD install made in earlier post – Introduction to HardenedBSD World.

You will need:
* 8GB or larger USB pendrive for the installation (or install directly to hard disk)
* 1GB or larger USB pendrive or 700MB CD-R(W) disk for the FreeBSD installer to boot/install from

Besides all Lenovo ThinkPad XY20 (X220/T420/T420s/T520/W520) laptops being one of the best ever made they have one amusing problem – the broken GPT boot 🙂 The installer – on these Lenovo laptops – will ask You if You want to apply that fix – answer ‘yes’ there. Later in the setup process this option is called GPT + Lenovo Fix (BIOS) as a Partition Scheme option. You can read more about GPT issue on this FreeBSD Mailing Lists post – using GPT / EFI booting on Lenovo BIOSes – https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-i386/2013-March/010437.html.

One more thing to mention, this GPT BUG is present only when You want to boot FreeBSD from GPT partition in BIOS/Legacy mode. If You make UEFI install (which we will do in one of the next articles in the series) this problem is not present and FreeBSD boots properly on Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (and other from XY20 series) from GPT partition in UEFI mode.

Now the install process. First You need the FreeBSD 11.1-RELEASE install image, download it from here – FreeBSD-11.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img – http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/releases/ISO-IMAGES/11.1/FreeBSD-11.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img.

To put the image on the pendrive we will use the dd(1) tool available on almost any Mac OS X (macOS) and Linux system – You can read more about that command on following Wikipedia article on dd command.

For Windows You will have to download it from here – dd for windows – http://www.chrysocome.net/dd.

On FreeBSD such command will look like that:

# dd if=FreeBSD-11.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img of=/dev/da1

… but for performance reasons its better to add bs=1m (bs=1M on Linux/Windows) to the command.

# dd if=FreeBSD-11.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img of=/dev/da1 bs=1m

Alternatively You may want to burn the ISO image to the CD-R(W) disc and boot from it instead of USB pendrive, in such case here is the ISO image link – FreeBSD-11.1-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso – http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/releases/ISO-IMAGES/11.1/FreeBSD-11.1-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso

Now to install. Attach the USB pendrive or CD disc with FreeBSD installer and boot from it, on most laptops You may show the temporary boot list selection with [F11] or [F12] key.

After You have booted to the screen below with Welcome message, leave the ‘focus’ on the Install button and attach the 8GB or larger USB pendrive for installation.

You will see kernel buffer messages messing the screen and showing that new drive has been attached, but as the ‘focus’ is still on the Install button so just hit [ENTER] key and proceed with the installation process as shown on the images below.

You can select your desired keyboard layout, it can also be changed later, your choice.

When we have a new machine there is always a problem with new name for it. The RFC 1178 Choosing a Name for Your Computer from 1990 year tries to address that issue – https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1178. For machine hostname we will use Slavic word for the wind which would be vetru – in normalized form – as original as You can imagine is not in ASCII compatible – вѣтръ (větrŭ) 🙂

We do not need any additional components, with all deselected as shown below only the (not shown) base and kernel will be installed.

We will use ZFS because we want to use Boot Environments with sysutils/beadm port.

Hit [ENTER] on the Pool Type/Disks to select target disk to install FreeBSD on.

As we will be using only single disk without redundancy select stripe here.

This may vary, select the pendrive (or disk) that You want to install FreeBSD on.

We will set SWAP size to ‘0‘ (no SWAP) as it will not be needed. If we will need SWAP in the future, then we will create ZVOL on ZFS and use it as a SWAP device.

As we are installing it on a Lenovo ThnikPad X220 with GPT BUG then we need to select GPT + Lenovo FIX (BIOS) here.

Now move ‘focus’ to Install and hit [ENTER] to proceed with installation.

This is the last chance to not overwrite your precious data.

Then You will see the install progress.

Fill in your root user password.

Select any interface here as we will not be making any configuration here.

Leave the interface unconfigured for now, we will take care about that later.

Now we will configure the time zone, I have configured Europe/Poland as shown below.

Now you may correct the date and time.

Select services as shown below.

Enable all security hardening features as shown below.

We want to create new ‘regular’ user so answer Yes here.

For the username we will use Slavic word for wolf which is Vuk.

Our job is done here, hit [ENTER] key with ‘focus’ on Exit name,

Installer will ask You if You want to modify the installed system before rebooting into it. We do not have any needs now so hit [ENTER] key on No option.

As we finished hit [ENTER] on Reboot button.

Boot

After the boot process of the newly installed FreeBSD 11.1-RELEASE USB pendrive You will see an image similar to below one.

What to do next? Lets make some basic network connectivity. Later in the FreeBSD Desktop series we will switch to network.sh for networking – FreeBSD Network Management with network.sh Script but now lets see how its done the raw way. If You will have attached LAN cable and your interface is em0 (check ifconfig(8) command output) then dhclient em0 command should grant You the working connection to the Internet – assuming that You have DHCP server on that network. Here are the commands.

# ifconfig em0 up

# dhclient em0
DHCPREQUEST on em0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67
DHCPACK from 10.254.17.1
bound to 10.254.17.3 -- renewal in 2147483647 seconds.

To test the network connectivity use the ping(8) command.

# ping -c 3 freebsd.org
PING freebsd.org (8.8.178.110): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 8.8.178.110: icmp_seq=0 ttl=52 time=242.421 ms
64 bytes from 8.8.178.110: icmp_seq=1 ttl=52 time=234.535 ms
64 bytes from 8.8.178.110: icmp_seq=2 ttl=52 time=245.120 ms

--- freebsd.org ping statistics ---
3 packets transmitted, 3 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 234.535/240.692/245.120/4.491 ms

Also check LAN network chapter in the FreeBSD Handbook – https://freebsd.org/handbook/config-network-setup.html

If You would like to connect to the World with wireless connection then here are the needed commands.

First lets check what wireless card You have.

# sysctl net.wlan.devices
net.wlan.devices: iwn0

We will now create wlan(4) virtual device on top of our iwn0 device and bring it up.

# ifconfig wlan0 create wlandev iwn0

# ifconfig wlan0 up

We can scan for existing nearby WiFi access points if needed.

# ifconfig wlan0 scan
SSID/MESH ID    BSSID              CHAN RATE    S:N     INT CAPS
xxxxxxx         xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx    7   54M  -85:-95   100 EPS  HTCAP RSN WME BSSLOAD WPS
WIFI-NETWOR...  xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx    8   54M  -71:-95   100 EPS  HTCAP APCHANREP WME ATH RSN WPA
xxxxxxx         xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx    1   54M  -90:-95   100 EPS  RSN HTCAP WME ATH WPS
xxxxxxx         xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx    1   54M  -90:-95   100 EP   RSN WME WPS

In case the name of the network does not fit into the first column, then use -v flag for verbose (and wider) output.

# ifconfig -v wlan0 scan

Now we need to add the desired WiFi network to the /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf file as shown below.

# cat > /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf << __EOF
network={
  ssid="WIFI-NETWORK-NAME"
  psk="PASSWORD"
}
__EOF

The You may connect to it using the wpa_supplicant(8) daemon. We will connect to the WiFi hot spot, and as the message ‘CTRL-EVENT-CONNECTED‘ will be displayed we hit the [CTRL]+[Z] key combination to put the process into suspended state (SIGTSTP signal). Then we type the bg(1) command to put it back into running state, but in the background (SIGCONT signal) so we can continue to type next commands.

# wpa_supplicant -i wlan0 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
Successfully initialized wpa_supplicant
wlan0: Trying to associate with xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx (SSID='WIFI-NETWORK-NAME' freq=2447 MHz)
wlan0: Associated with xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
wlan0: WPA: Key negotiation completed with xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx [PTK=CCMP GTK=TKIP]
wlan0: CTRL-EVENT-CONNECTED - Connection to xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx completed [id=17 id_str=]
^Z
[1]  + Suspended  sudo wpa_supplicant -i wlan0 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
# bg
[1]    sudo wpa_supplicant -i wlan0 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf &

Now we will request for the IP address from the access point DHCP server.

# dhclient wlan0
DHCPREQUEST on wlan0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67
DHCPACK from 10.254.17.1
bound to 10.254.17.8 -- renewal in 2147483647 seconds.

To test the network connectivity use the ping(8) command.

# ping -c 3 freebsd.org
PING freebsd.org (8.8.178.110): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 8.8.178.110: icmp_seq=0 ttl=52 time=242.421 ms
64 bytes from 8.8.178.110: icmp_seq=1 ttl=52 time=234.535 ms
64 bytes from 8.8.178.110: icmp_seq=2 ttl=52 time=245.120 ms

--- freebsd.org ping statistics ---
3 packets transmitted, 3 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 234.535/240.692/245.120/4.491 ms

Also check WLAN chapter in the FreeBSD Handbook – https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/network-wireless.html

Knowledge

In case You want to learn more about FreeBSD the FreeBSD Handbook and FreeBSD FAQ are good place to start.

• https://freebsd.org/handbook
• https://freebsd.org/faq

GPT Fix

In case the installer would not made its job properly You can make the fix by yourself, you just need a FreeBSD system for it (You already have it on the USB pendrive or CD disk). Boot into the first question and move the ‘focus’ to the Live CD button on the right but do not hit the [ENTER] yet. Now, attach the USB pendrive with FreeBSD installed. Screen will be flooded with kernel buffer about attaching new da device, note the da device number (for example da1) and now hit [ENTER] key.

You will be welcomed with login: prompt, type root and hit [ENTER] (no password is required).

Remember the kernel buffer messages screen earlier? They started with the device name (like da0 or da1), we will use that device name to apply the fix. I will assume its da0. First, lets dump partition table to FDISK file.

# fdisk -p /dev/da0 > FDISK

# cat FDISK
# /dev/da0
g c1886 h255 s63
p 1 0xee 63 30298527

Now we need to make the fix, after the 'p 1 (...)' line add 'a 1' an below that line copy the line that starts with 'p 1 (...)' and name it 'p 2 (...)'. Now in the ‘first’ line with 'p 1 (...)' change the 0xee into 0x00. Final result is shown below.

# vi FDISK
# /dev/da0
g c1886 h255 s63
p 1 0x00 63 30298527
a 1
p 2 0xee 63 30298527
:wq

After writing the file, apply this new partition table into the da0 device with fdisk(8) command.

# fdisk -f FDISK /dev/da0

Verify that fix is applied.

# fdisk -p /dev/da0
# /dev/da0
g c1886 h255 s63
p 2 0xee 63 30298527

Indeed it is. Now You have Lenovo GPT fix applied. Important to mention that this ‘fix’ does not break the USB pendrive for computers that do not have GPT problem, so with GPT FIX applied you may use it on computers other then Lenovo.

Image

In case You may want to start after the installation I have uploaded the installed image here – http://www.mediafire.com/file/ywcnw99ghqezd6u/usb-freebsd-11.1-lenovo.raw.xz – keep in mind that its compressed by xz(1) so in order to apply it to USB pendrive You must first unpack it. You may do that on the fly with following command assuming that we will be writing that image to da1 device:

# xz -c -d usb-freebsd-11.1-lenovo.raw.xz | dd > /dev/da1 bs=1m

For the record, this image contains the Lenovo GPT FIX. The passwords are set to ‘asd‘ for convenience.

Enough for one post 😉

UPDATE 1 – Lenovo GPT Fix with gpart(8)

Initially I described how to apply a fix for broken Lenovo GPT bug with fdisk(8) tool. This is very tricky and error prone but there is a lot easier way to make the same fix. Its made with other FreeBSD tool called gpart(8) and its one line only.

# gpart set -a lenovofix /dev/ada0
lenovofix set on ada0

Done. No longer the need to dance with fdisk(8) tool.

EOF