The first RC build for the FreeBSD-8.4 release cycle is now available. ISO images for the amd64, i386 and pc98 architectures are available:

Full announcement: FreeBSD 8.4-RC1 Now Available

The New York City *BSD User Group has announced a mailing list dedicated to running the Tor anonymity software on the BSDs.  The list aims to become a forum for BSD users and developers interested in improving the performance and expanding the use of the BSDs as a platform for Tor.

Tor is an open source public anonymity network that is utilized around the world for anonymity and to bypass internet censorship.  More information can be found at https://www.torproject.org.

At this point, the only BSD recommended by the Tor Project is FreeBSD 5.x or higher.  While there is an OpenBSD port, and a pkgsrc port for NetBSD and Dragonfly BSD, they are not considered recommended operating system platforms.  This is one issue the list could approach.

The user group believes the BSDs make an ideal platform for running Tor considering the stability and security track record of the operating systems.

If you’re interested, the mailing list is located at http://lists.nycbug.org/mailman/listinfo/tor-bsd.

(via G+)

“FreeBSD is once again a core part of the internet infrastructure”

Netflix, an American provider of on-demand Internet streaming media in the United States, Canada and Latin America, has established its own content delivery network called “Open Connect”, and has posted the software and hardware design online.

The 4u chassis server systems that are being used, with more than 100TB of storage, run the nginx open source web server and run FreeBSD 9.0.

Read here how Netflix is using FreeBSD and what their reason is for this choice: Netflix’s New Peering Appliance Uses FreeBSD.

Thanks again to Charles Rapenne for the heads up.

Have you installed and tweaked your FreeBSD server or desktop and are now thinking “oh I wish I could have some of the PC-BSD goodies” (PBI’s, AppCafe etc).

Well, there’s good news: it’s possible to turn FreeBSD into PC-BSD.

April’s issue of the BSD Magazine is now available: BSD Security – Protect Your BSD (free PDF download).

Covering the following topics:

- A Fresh Look at the Warden for PC-BSD 9.1
- Intro to DTrace
- A Web Application Firewall for Nginx
- Introducing EasyPBI – Making PBI Modules With a Few Mouse Clicks
- Mysql-zrm: Enterprise Level Backups for MySQL
- Anatomy of FreeBSD Compromise (Part 5)
- Hardening FreeBSD with TrustedBSD and Mandatory Access Controls (MAC)
- Security Best Practice for DNS Servers

Thank you all for your patience with the website issues over the last couple of hours. The database and theming issues are solved now, but I had to repost two posts that weren’t backed up. Apologies for that.

Thank you all who emailed me regarding this problem.

A new issue (November 2011) of the free BSD Magazine is now available: Speed Daemons (pdf).

From the table of contents:

PC-BSD 9 Turns a New Page

Since 2005, PC-BSD has striven to make BSD accessible to the desktop user. Offering a slew of improvements and added features, this release brings a more accessible BSD operating system than ever. Read the review and find out more about it.

- Mark VonFange

A Beginner’s Guide To PF

OpenBSD, FreeBSD, and PC-BSD use a built-in firewall called “Packet Filter (PF)”. This article is intended for a PF beginner to get a beginner’s understanding of how to use PF in OpenBSD.

- Toby Richards

Creating Your Own PBI Repository

In this article author describes the steps required for setting up and maintaining your own repository on a FreeBSD system.

- Kris Moore

Speed Deamons

From this article you will learn how by using advanced networking mechanisms in FreeBSD build a high performance, highly available web application server.

- Lars R. Noldan

A GIS Strategy For Web-Enabled Business

In his final article of our GIS series, the author will show you how to successfully manage and commission a complex GIS project.

- Rob Somerville

Equip Your CA With a HSM For

The CA is used for identification and authentication of servers, clients and users. Together with author take a closer look at the security of Certificate Authority in his own network.

- Erwin Kooi

Terminals Served Up BSD Style

You may have your own reason for wanting a BSD terminal server. There are two solutions to this goal: FreeNX or XRDP. This article will show you how to use both solutions.

- Toby Richards

OpenBSD Kernel Memory Pools: Monitoring Usage With Systat

This article explains how to understand memory usage statistics for kernel memory pools as they are displayed by the systat(1) command on OpenBSD.

- Paul McMath

FreeBSD 8.2 Against Ubuntu Server

An Objective Comparison of two Power House Open Source Server Platforms, BSD Unix and Linux.

- Bill Harris

EuroBSDcon 2011 From An Organizers Perspective

Have an inside look at the EuroBSDcon and get to know about events and speeches that took place in the beginning of October 2011 in Netherlands.

- Jeroen van Nieuwenhuizen

Read and download: BSD Magazine: Speed Daemons (2011-11)

• Apple’s Mac OS X helps BSD overtake Linux for development
• FreeBSD: A Faster Platform For Linux Gaming Than Linux.
• Alexander Leidinger put some instructions on his blog how to create a new Linux base and infrastructure ports on FreeBSD.
• PC-BSD/FreeBSD 9.0 For Intel Sandy Bridge
• GhostBSD: not “just another BSD”
• DragonflyBSD has fully-compatible TrueCrypt implementation
• FreeBSD 9 Installation video (new installer) (Portuguese)
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