Dispatch Support: Installing FreeBSD

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Installing FreeBSD
Last Modified: 5/18/2000

Step by Step FreeBSD Installation

The following directions outline how to prep a Dispatch server for installation of the full OS--FreeBSD--and Dispatch Automated Publishing Solutions software. Once the following steps are completed, DesertNet will access the machine and take over the installation.

This installation requires that the you have an IP address to use for this machine, and have the computer connected to the Internet. This install will download needed components--totaling about 30 MB--via ftp from a remote server, so you'll want to have high bandwidth available.

If you have questions at any point in this process, please email us at support@desert.net.

Your first step will entail procuring FreeBSD installation disks. The following links will initiate downloads of the files you need to create these disks.

Once downloaded, put the three files in a directory labeled "FreeBSD." [BTW, this process should be taking place on a Windows or DOS based Intel machine of some sort.]

You'll need two formated 3.5" 1.44MB floppy disks.

Access a DOS prompt either within Windows, by exiting Windows to the prompt, or by working from your standard command line if you are a DOS user.

From the DOS command line, change directories to the location you've stored the three downloaded files in.

Label one of the disks "Kernel" and place the floppy in the "a" drive (assuming the 3.5" drive is your "a" drive--alter instructions accordingly if it has a different drive letter).

Enter the following command:

fdimage kern.flp a:

When that disk is done and you are again at the DOS command line, label the second disk "MFS Root" and place the floppy in the drive. Enter this command:

fdimage mfsroot.flp a:

This is a screenshot example of the above two steps:

Congratulations. You now have the disks to boot the machine into a FreeBSD install.

Boot from the Kernel floppy by placing the first disk you made--labeled "Kernel"--into the "a" drive of the computer and starting/restarting the machine. By the way, you may want to make sure the computer's bios is setup to check the "a" drive for bootable media and set that drive first in the search chain of bootable devices. Insert the MFS Root floppy when the install routine asks for it. You'll want to bypass the "Kernel Configuration Menu" by hitting enter.

Move the cursor down to Express and use the space bar to activate it.

We're going to reformat the disk using FDISK. The first screen shows a typical Windows disk partition. You want to delete all the partitions and create new ones for FreeBSD.

Move the cursor down to the "fat" partition and press "D" until there is a single unused "partition" on the disk as shown in this screen.

Hit "A" to use the entire disk and answer the resulting dialog box in the affirmative (the default).

Now the screen should look something like this. Hit "Q" to quit FDISK and continue with the installation.

You want the machine to boot directly into FreeBSD; move the cursor down to the line for the standard MBR and the space bar to select it. Hit enter to continue.

Now you need to define subsections within the FreeBSD partition using the FreeBSD Disklabel Editor. Hit "A" to use the default slice settings for your disk and memory configuration.

The defaults it gives you should be fine. Hit "Q" to quit out of the Disklabel editor and continue with the installation.

You will be installing only a small portion of FreeBSD at this time. Scroll down to the "Minimal" distribution and use the space bar to put an X next to it. Then hit enter to continue to the next screen.

Scroll down to "Install from an FTP server" and hit the space bar.

In addition to the primary site there are six US mirrors near the bottom of the list. You can use traceroute or ping from another computer to determine which one will be the fastest.

Use the arrow keys and space bar to choose the one which looks most like an ethernet adapter. If two or more ethernet cards appear in the list, you will have to figure out which one is plugged in.

You want to answer "No" here. DHCP is really neat, but you probably don't have it set up to always use a static IP address for this computer.

Put the relevant values into the fields. Use tab to cycle through the fields and buttons. The host and domain names are not as important as the other values. You won't need to give any extra options for ifconfig.

The download is about 30 megabytes. If it goes too slowly, you can abort the process by any means necessary and use a faster FTP server the next time around.

Hurray, the download is finished and there are only two more things left to do! Hit enter to continue.

Move the cursor down to the Root Password line and use the space bar to choose the menu item.

An ideal password is a random collection of letters, numbers and punctuation. Be sure to remember it! The password won't appear when you type it. Repeat this process if you mistype the password the second time.

Next you need to make a user account for the dispatch user. Scroll down and select the menu item with the space bar.

Fill in the values as needed. It's important to make the dispatch user a member of the "wheel" group, and to set the home directory to "/home/dispatch".

Congratulations! You are done!

Use the "Exit" menu item and then the "Exit Install" button to exit completely out of the installation program. The system will reboot and should boot cleanly into FreeBSD, with the process ending at a FreeBSD login prompt.

After you restart the machine, contact Dispatch Support (support@desert.net) and let them know the machine is setup and ready for us to install Dispatch. We will also need to know the root password and dispatch user's password so we can access the machine and finish the installation.

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