desktop-installer - FreeBSD Wiki

desktop-installer notes

sysutils/desktop-installer is a pretty neat way to quickly install your choice of one of several Desktop Environments on FreeBSD. However, it does have some rough edges.

$/!\$ (In particular, desktop-installer has only seen light testing on non-x86 machines.)

Contents

desktop-installer notes

notes for all architectures

When you run it for the first time, if you get the following, it is most likely that your clock is set wrong:

Cloning into '/usr/ports'...
fatal: unable to access 'https://git.FreeBSD.org/ports.git/': SSL certificate problem: certificate is not yet valid

Some functionality assumes that you are logged in on the system console (i.e. not via ssh and/or serial). Examples:
- restarting moused (actually ok on serial).
- actually testing x11.
Error handling, in general, needs to be more robust.

notes for non-x86 architectures

The code commonly assumes that the following are available and return non-empty answers:
- dmidecode
- ACPI sysctls
- pciconf -lv

The above are simply not true for anything other than amd64/i386. MarkLinimon is looking into this.

Valid operation of sysutils/polkit is assumed. This introduces a dependency on rust, which may or may not be available.
If the system console is not implemented yet (e.g. on Rock64), desktop-installer is of limited utility.

notes for iMac G5

desktop-installer has been tested on an iMac G5, though the resulting system is limited by lack of DRM and some popular ports.

notes for Orange Pi

HDMI is not yet supported under FreeBSD.

notes for Rock64

HDMI is not yet supported under FreeBSD.
What happens when you try to start x11:

(EE) xf86OpenConsole: No console driver found
        Supported drivers: pccons (with X support), syscons, pcvt
        Check your kernel's console driver configuration and /dev entries(EE) 
(EE)