BSD Installer 2009

This page will help serve all of the needed features and todo items for integrating the BSD Installer v2.0 into the FreeBSD distribution.

pfSense has used the BSDInstaller for years and it has served us well. It is time to give back to the FreeBSD community at large so we have decided to pick up the work involved in bringing BSD Installer to FreeBSD as a viable replacement for Sysinstall.

(this page is currently a work in progress as we identify the missing bits)

What is BSD Installer

BSD Installer is a complete installer with a seperated backend and frontend technology. Communication between the various frontends (QT, Curses, WebCGI, TTY) use the libdfui protocool (name pending change to cater to all communities). BSD Installer V2 is written using C libraries and Lua to make it very easy to make changes to the installer. Libraries being used by the BSD Installer currently: LibAura, LibDFUI and LibInstaller.

Interested developers

Scott Ullrich

sullrich@gmail.com

BSD Installer / pfSense developer

Ermal Luçi

ermal.luci@gmail.com

pfSense / FreeBSD developer

Kris Moore

kris@pcbsd.org

PC-BSD developer

Items that need to change in FreeBSD's tree currently

Make release integration

Modify make release and make rerelease to generate a liveCD containing a full installer and packages

Needed Features missing that are present in Sysinstall

User management

Add/delete/edit users

Distributions

Install additional distribution sets?

Startup

Configure startup options

TTys

Configure system TTys

Security

Security options

Mouse

Configure mouse

Network

Configure various networking services

Fixit

Invoke fixit utilities. http://www.freebsd-corp-net-guide.com/technotes/fixit.html

Needed Features missing that are present in PC-BSD's installer

ZFS Support

ZFS Support for root partitions

Features that are desirable but are not present in sysinstall, finstall or PC-BSD's installer

Restore/Clone

Option to restore from user specified system backup, I.E. Tar Archive

Entirely new features

GPT

GPT support

Kernel selection

Ability to select various Kernel on installation such as XEN, kernel containing GDB, etc.

Usability improvements

Add to me here

Content goes here

Completed Items

Rename LibDFUI -> LibBSDIUI

May 11, 2009

Link to snapshots that contain FreeBSD 8 and BSD Installer. Built every 6-7 hours https://web.archive.org/web/20091226171206/http://snapshots.pfsense.org/FreeBSD_8_0/?C=M;O=D

Link to BSDInstaller v2.0 https://web.archive.org/web/20060511175654/http://cvs.bsdinstaller.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/installer/src/backend/lua/

Link to Installer REPO (moved to Git recently) https://rcs.pfsense.org/projects/bsdinstaller (This link is broken)

Link to BSDInstaller Wiki where you can find Design Goals, LibDFUI BSDIUI information and more https://web.archive.org/web/20120219133823/http://wiki.bsdinstaller.org/wikka.php?wakka=BSDInstaller

Link to mailing list where we will be discussing Installer integration http://lists.pcbsd.org/mailman/listinfo/installer (This link is broken)


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BSDInstaller2009 (last edited 2020-11-17T01:56:55+0000 by SashaVigole)