ipfw HOW-TO links

Nice list of links on using ipfw, as posted to the freebsd-questions list by "W.D.". Mind you, I haven't checked them, just thought I'd pass it along and archive it. And no, I haven't done my firewall yet....

• http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/firewalls.html


• http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-ipfw/


• http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=freebsd-ipfw&r=1&w=2


• http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=freebsd-ipfw&w=2&r=1&s=newbie&q=b


• http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/bsd/2001/04/25/FreeBSD_Basics.html


• http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/bsd/2001/05/09/FreeBSD_Basics.html


• http://freebsd.hanirc.org/holyboard/holyboard.cgi?db=ipfw


• http://www.Google.com/search?q=%22ipfw_rules%22+Richard+Caley


• http://www.Google.com/search?q=ipfw+firewall+rules


• http://www.Google.com/search?q=%22ipfw_rules%22


• http://www.Google.com/search?q=ipfw+firewall+rules+primer


• http://dva.dyndns.org/faq.html

freebsd-update port

An interesting looking client that will do a binary update of your FreeBSD machine, ala Windows Update.

Port description for security/freebsd-update

Setting keyboard & font

One thing I've been trying to get "just so" has been my terminal setup. I don't use X, as my FreeBSD machine is basically a server, and I'm perfectly comfortable using Emacs and a command line. But I've been trying to get the font, video screen and keyboard mapping to work for me, and I still don't have it 100% my way.

I currently have the following in my rc.conf:

#

# vidcontrol stuff

#

font8x8="swiss-8x8"

font8x16="swiss-8x16"

allscreens_flags="80x60 lightwhite blue"

This sets my fonts to be the 'swiss' fonts, and screen to be in 80x60 mode, bright white on blue screen. Mind you, this is for all the virtual terminals (the ones you get to via Alt-F keys), and doesn't work in the X Terminals. I haven't been able to get the 132 column modes to work correctly yet.

Anyway, the following man page documents vidfont and kbdmap, two commands you can run interactively from the command line to let you select which video font and keyboard mapping to use. I haven't yet found a keyboard mapping that works right for me, so I'm still playing with this one too.

FreeBSD Hypertext Man Pages: kbdmpa, vidfont

You also should set the correct variables in /etc/rc.conf so the changes stick. See /etc/defaults/rc.conf for all the "System console options". That is what you do with the strings hat vidfont and kbdmap echo back for you, put them right into your rc.conf.

Disk Usage

Quick and easy du command to find the space used by each folder found in another folder:

$ du -hx -d 1 /

This command tells du to start in the root folder, do down 1 folder deep (-d 1), and give out stats in "human readable" form (-h) and to not traverse mounted file systems (-x). In a nutshell, it tells you which folders are taking up the most space on your root partition, something that is real nice to know.

FreeBSD Hypertext Man Pages: du

Mount root filesystem read-only

Sometimes, it can be useful to mount the root (ie, the '/') filesystem read-only. Usually, this is to run fsck on it, to fix it up after a horrible crash. Here's how to do it:

# mount -u -o ro -f /



Of course, you do this as root (hence the '#' prompt).

Mail archive search

I am just on a roll today, aren't I? And I'm still only up to last December in my freebsd-questions mail backlog!

Anyway, this is a page to simply search the FreeBSD.org mailing lists. The search page on the FreeBSD site is more than just a little flakey. Depending on how you limit the search, you may or may not get a hit, even though the filter you put on your search should've had nothing to do with suppressing the message in question. This one, perhaps, works a little better.

Rambler: FreeBSD mail archives search

ports Makefile args

Here's the man page for ports(7). It gives a nice overview of ports, but most importantly, it documents the various arguments you can pass to make when you are in the port's directory. Flags like deinstall, reinstall, and configure are all explained.

FreeBSD Hypertext Man Pages: ports