sysinstall -- system installation and configuration tool
sysinstall [var=value] [function] [...]
The sysinstall utility is used for installing and configuring FreeBSD
systems. It is the first utility invoked by the FreeBSD installation
boot floppy and is also available as /usr/sbin/sysinstall on newly
installed FreeBSD systems for use in later configuring the system.
The sysinstall utility is generally invoked without arguments for the
default behavior, where the main installation/configuration menu is presented.
On those occasions where it is deemed necessary to invoke a subsystem of
sysinstall directly, however, it is also possible to do so by naming the
appropriate function entry points on the command line. Since this action
is essentially identical to running an installation script, each commandline
argument corresponding to a line of script, the reader is encouraged
to read the section on scripting for more information on this feature.
The sysinstall utility is essentially nothing more than a monolithic C
program with the ability to write MBRs and disk labels (through the services
of the libdisk(3) library) and install distributions or packages
onto new and existing FreeBSD systems. It also contains some extra
intelligence for running as a replacement for init(8) when it's invoked
by the FreeBSD installation boot procedure. It assumes very little in
the way of additional utility support and performs most file system operations
by calling the relevant syscalls (such as mount(2)) directly.
The sysinstall utility currently uses the dialog(3) library to do user
interaction with simple ANSI line graphics, color support for which is
enabled by either running on a syscons VTY or some other color-capable
terminal emulator (newer versions of xterm will support color when using
the ``xterm-color'' termcap entry).
This product is currently at the end of its life cycle and will eventually
be replaced.
The sysinstall utility may be either driven interactively through its
various internal menus or run in batch mode, driven by an external
script. Such a script may be loaded and executed in one of 3 ways:
LOAD_CONFIG_FILE [Toc] [Back]
If sysinstall is compiled with LOAD_CONFIG_FILE set in the environment
(or in the Makefile) to some value, then that value will
be used as the filename to automatically look for and load when
sysinstall starts up and with no user interaction required. This
option is aimed primarily at large sites who wish to create a
single prototype install for multiple machines with largely identical
configurations and/or installation options.
MAIN MENU [Toc] [Back]
If sysinstall is run interactively, that is to say in the default
manner, it will bring up a main menu which contains a "load config
file" option. Selecting this option will prompt for the name
of a script file which it then will attempt to load from a DOS or
UFS formatted floppy.
COMMAND LINE [Toc] [Back]
Each command line argument is treated as a script directive when
sysinstall is run in multi-user mode. Execution ends either by
explicit request (e.g. calling the shutdown directive), upon
reaching the end of the argument list or on error.
For example:
/usr/sbin/sysinstall _ftpPath=ftp://ziggy/pub/ mediaSetFTP configPackages
Would initialize sysinstall for FTP installation media (using the
server `ziggy') and then bring up the package installation editor,
exiting when finished.
A script is a list of one or more directives, each directive taking the
form of:
var=value
function
or #somecomment
Where var=value is the assignment of some internal sysinstall variable,
e.g. "ftpPass=FuNkYChiKn", and function is the name of an internal
sysinstall function, e.g. "mediaSetFTP", and #comment is a single-line
comment for documentation purposes (ignored by sysinstall). Each directive
must be by itself on a single line, functions taking their arguments
by examining known variable names. This requires that you be sure to
assign the relevant variables before calling a function which requires
them.
The noError variable can be assigned before each directive: this will
cause any error detected while processing the directive itself to be
ignored. The value of noError will automatically reset to the default
"unassigned" every time a directive is processed.
When and where a function depends on the settings of one or more variables
will be noted in the following table:
Function Glossary:
configAnonFTP
Invoke the Anonymous FTP configuration menu.
Variables: None
configRouter
Select which routing daemon you wish to use, potentially loading
any required 3rd-party routing daemons as necessary.
Variables:
router can be set to the name of the desired routing daemon,
e.g. ``routed'' or ``gated'', otherwise it is prompted
for.
configNFSServer
Configure host as an NFS server.
Variables: None
configNTP
Configure host as a user of the Network Time Protocol.
Variables:
ntpdate_flags
The flags to ntpdate(8), that is to say the name of the
server to sync from.
configPCNFSD
Configure host to support PC NFS.
Variables:
pcnfsd_pkg
The name of the PCNFSD package to load if necessary
(defaults to hard coded version).
configPackages
Bring up the interactive package management menu.
Variables: None
configUsers
Add users and/or groups to the system.
Variables: None
configXSetup
Configure the X display subsystem.
Variables: None
configXDesktop
Configure the X desktop.
Variables: None
diskPartitionEditor
Invokes the disk partition (MBR) editor.
Variables:
geometry
The disk geometry, as a cyls/heads/sectors formatted
string. Default: no change to geometry.
partition
Set to disk partitioning type or size, its value being
free in order to use only remaining free space for
FreeBSD, all to use the entire disk for FreeBSD but maintain
a proper partition table, existing to use an existing
FreeBSD partition (first found), exclusive to use the disk
in ``dangerously dedicated'' mode or, finally, somenumber
to allocate somenumber blocks of available free space to a
new FreeBSD partition. Default: Interactive mode.
bootManager
is set to one of boot to signify the installation of a
boot manager, standard to signify installation of a "standard"
non-boot MGR DOS MBR or none to indicate that no
change to the boot manager is desired. Default: none.
diskInteractive
If set, bring up the interactive disk partition editor.
Note: Nothing is actually written to disk by this function, an
explicit call to diskPartitionWrite being required for that to
happen.
diskPartitionWrite
Causes any pending MBR changes (typically from the
diskPartitionEditor function) to be written out.
Variables: None
diskLabelEditor
Invokes the disk label editor. This is a bit trickier from a
script since you need to essentially label everything inside each
FreeBSD (type 0xA5) partition created by the diskPartitionEditor
function, and that requires knowing a few rules about how things
are laid out. When creating a script to automatically allocate
disk space and partition it up, it is suggested that you first
perform the installation interactively at least once and take
careful notes as to what the slice names will be, then and only
then hardwiring them into the script.
For example, let's say you have a SCSI disk on which you've created
a new FreeBSD partition in slice 2 (your DOS partition
residing in slice 1). The slice name would be da0s2 for the
whole FreeBSD partition (da0s1 being your DOS primary partition).
Now let's further assume that you have 500MB in this partition
and you want to sub-partition that space into root, swap, var and
usr file systems for FreeBSD. Your invocation of the
diskLabelEditor function might involve setting the following
variables:
da0s2-1=ufs 40960 /
A 20MB root file system (all sizes are in 512 byte
blocks).
da0s2-2=swap 131072 /
A 64MB swap partition.
da0s2-3=ufs 204800 /var
A 100MB /var file system.
da0s2-4=ufs 0 /usr 1
With the balance of free space (around 316MB) going to the
/usr file system and with soft-updates enabled (the argument
following the mount point, if non-zero, means to set
the soft updates flag).
One can also use the diskLabelEditor for mounting or erasing
existing partitions as well as creating new ones. Using the previous
example again, let's say that we also wanted to mount our
DOS partition and make sure that an /etc/fstab entry is created
for it in the new installation. Before calling the
diskLabelEditor function, we simply add an additional line:
da0s1=/dos_c N
before the call. This tells the label editor that you want to
mount the first slice on /dos_c and not to attempt to newfs it
(not that sysinstall would attempt this for a DOS partition in
any case, but it could just as easily be an existing UFS partition
being named here and the 2nd field is non-optional).
You can also set the diskInteractive variable to request that the
disk label editor use an interactive dialog to partition the disk
instead of using variables to explicitly layout the disk as
described above.
Note: No file system data is actually written to disk until an
explicit call to diskLabelCommit is made.
diskLabelCommit
Writes out all pending disklabel information and creates and/or
mounts any file systems which have requests pending from the
diskLabelEditor function.
Variables: None
distReset
Resets all selected distributions to the empty set (no distributions
selected).
Variables: None
distSetCustom
Allows the selection of a custom distribution set (e.g. not just
one of the existing "canned" sets) with no user interaction.
Variables:
dists List of distributions to load. Possible distribution
values are:
bin The base binary distribution.
doc Miscellaneous documentation
games Games
manpages Manual pages (unformatted)
catpages Pre-formatted manual pages
proflibs Profiled libraries for developers.
dict Dictionary information (for tools like spell).
info GNU info files and other extra docs.
crypto Encryption binaries and libraries.
compat1x Compatibility with FreeBSD 1.x
compat20 Compatibility with FreeBSD 2.0
compat21 Compatibility with FreeBSD 2.1
compat22 FreeBSD 2.2 and FreeBSD 3.0 a.out binary compatibility
compat3x Compatibility with FreeBSD 3.x (available for
FreeBSD 4.0 systems only)
compat4x Compatibility with FreeBSD 4.x (available for
FreeBSD 5.0 systems only)
ports The ports collection.
ssecure /usr/src/secure
sbase /usr/src/[top level files]
scontrib /usr/src/contrib
sgnu /usr/src/gnu
setc /usr/src/etc
sgames /usr/src/games
sinclude /usr/src/include
skrb5 /usr/src/kerberos5
slib /usr/src/lib
slibexec /usr/src/libexec
srelease /usr/src/release
sbin /usr/src/bin
ssbin /usr/src/sbin
sshare /usr/src/share
ssys /usr/src/sys
subin /usr/src/usr.bin
susbin /usr/src/usr.sbin
ssmailcf /usr/src/usr.sbin/sendmail/cf
XF86-xc XFree86 official sources.
XF86-co XFree86 contributed sources.
Xbin XFree86 binaries.
Xcfg XFree86 configuration files.
Xdoc XFree86 documentation.
Xhtml XFree86 HTML documentation.
Xlib XFree86 libraries.
Xlk98 XFree86 server link-kit for PC98 machines.
Xlkit XFree86 server link-kit for standard machines.
Xman XFree86 manual pages.
Xprog XFree86 programmer's distribution.
Xps XFree86 postscript documentation.
Xset XFree86 graphical setup tool.
PC98-Servers/X9480
XFree86 PC98 8-bit (256 color) PEGC-480 server.
PC98-Servers/X9EGC
XFree86 PC98 4-bit (16 color) EGC server.
PC98-Servers/X9GA9
XFree86 PC98 GA-968V4/PCI (S3 968) server.
PC98-Servers/X9GAN
XFree86 PC98 GANB-WAP (cirrus) server.
PC98-Servers/X9LPW
XFree86 PC98 PowerWindowLB (S3) server.
PC98-Servers/X9MGA
[DESCRIPTION MISSING]
PC98-Servers/X9NKV
XFree86 PC98 NKV-NEC (cirrus) server.
PC98-Servers/X9NS3
XFree86 PC98 NEC (S3) server.
PC98-Servers/X9SPW
XFree86 PC98 SKB-PowerWindow (S3) server.
PC98-Servers/X9SVG
[DESCRIPTION MISSING]
PC98-Servers/X9TGU
XFree86 PC98 Cyber9320 and TGUI9680 server.
PC98-Servers/X9WEP
XFree86 PC98 WAB-EP (cirrus) server.
PC98-Servers/X9WS
XFree86 PC98 WABS (cirrus) server.
PC98-Servers/X9WSN
XFree86 PC98 WSN-A2F (cirrus) server.
Servers/X3DL
XFree86 3D Labs server.
Servers/X8514
XFree86 8514 server.
Servers/XAGX
XFree86 8 bit AGX server.
Servers/XI128
XFree86 #9 Imagine I128 server.
Servers/XMa8
XFree86 ATI Mach8 server.
Servers/XMa32
XFree86 ATI Mach32 server.
Servers/XMa64
XFree86 ATI Mach64 server.
Servers/XMono
XFree86 monochrome server.
Servers/XP9K
XFree86 P9000 server.
Servers/XS3
XFree86 S3 server.
Servers/XS3V
XFree86 S3 Virge server.
Servers/XSVGA
XFree86 SVGA server.
Servers/XVG16
XFree86 VGA16 server.
Servers/XW32
XFree86 ET4000/W32, /W32i and /W32p server.
Servers/XTGA
Server for TGA cards (alpha architecture only).
Servers/Xnest
XFree86 nested X server.
Servers/Xvfb
XFree86 virtual frame-buffer X server.
Xfnts XFree86 base font set.
Xf100 XFree86 100DPI font set.
Xfcyr XFree86 Cyrillic font set.
Xfscl XFree86 scalable font set.
Xfnon XFree86 non-english font set.
Xfsrv XFree86 font server.
distSetDeveloper
Selects the standard Developer's distribution set.
Variables: None
distSetXDeveloper
Selects the standard X Developer's distribution set.
Variables: None
distSetKernDeveloper
Selects the standard kernel Developer's distribution set.
Variables: None
distSetUser
Selects the standard user distribution set.
Variables: None
distSetXUser
Selects the standard X user's distribution set.
Variables: None
distSetMinimum
Selects the very minimum distribution set.
Variables: None
distSetEverything
Selects the full whack - all available distributions.
Variables: None
distSetCRYPTO
Interactively select encryption subcomponents.
Variables: None
distSetSrc
Interactively select source subcomponents.
Variables: None
distSetXF86
Interactively select XFree86 subcomponents.
Variables: None
distExtractAll
Install all currently selected distributions (requires that media
device also be selected).
Variables: None
docBrowser
Install (if necessary) an HTML documentation browser and go to
the HTML documentation submenu.
Variables:
browserPackage
The name of the browser package to try and install as
necessary. Defaults to latest links package.
browserBinary
The name of the browser binary itself (if overriding the
browserPackage variable). Defaults to links.
installCommit
Commit any and all pending changes to disk. This function is
essentially shorthand for a number of more granular "commit"
functions.
Variables: None
installExpress
Start an "express" installation, asking few questions of the
user.
Variables: None
installStandard
Start a "standard" installation, the most user-friendly installation
type available.
Variables: None
installUpgrade
Start an upgrade installation.
Variables: None
installFixitHoloShell
Start up the "emergency holographic shell" over on VTY4 if running
as init. This will also happen automatically as part of the
installation process unless noHoloShell is set.
Variables: None
installFixitCDROM
Go into "fixit" mode, assuming a live file system CDROM currently
in the drive.
Variables: None
installFixitFloppy
Go into "fixit" mode, assuming an available fixit floppy disk
(user will be prompted for it).
Variables: None
installFilesystems
Do just the file system initialization part of an install.
Variables: None
installVarDefaults
Initialize all variables to their defaults, overriding any previous
settings.
Variables: None
loadConfig
Sort of like an #include statement, it allows you to load one
configuration file from another.
Variables:
configFile
The fully qualified pathname of the file to load.
mediaClose
If a media device is open, close it.
Variables: None
mediaSetCDROM
Select a FreeBSD CDROM as the installation media.
Variables: None
mediaSetFloppy
Select a pre-made floppy installation set as the installation
media.
Variables: None
mediaSetDOS
Select an existing DOS primary partition as the installation
media. The first primary partition found is used (e.g. C:).
Variables: None
mediaSetTape
Select a tape device as the installation media.
Variables: None
mediaSetFTP
Select an FTP site as the installation media.
Variables:
hostname
The name of the host being installed (non-optional).
domainname
The domain name of the host being installed (optional).
defaultrouter
The default router for this host (non-optional).
netDev Which host interface to use (ed0 or ep0, for example.
Non-optional).
netInteractive
If set, bring up the interactive network setup form even
if all relevant configuration variables are already set
(optional).
ipaddr The IP address for the selected host interface (nonoptional).
netmask
The netmask for the selected host interface (nonoptional).
_ftpPath
The fully qualified URL of the FTP site containing the
FreeBSD distribution you're interested in, e.g.
ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/.
mediaSetFTPActive
Alias for mediaSetFTP using "active" FTP transfer mode.
Variables: Same as for mediaSetFTP.
mediaSetFTPPassive
Alias for mediaSetFTP using "passive" FTP transfer mode.
Variables: Same as for mediaSetFTP.
mediaSetHTTP
Alias for mediaSetFTP using an HTTP proxy.
Variables: See mediaSetFTP, plus
_httpPath
The proxy to use (host:port) (non-optional).
mediaSetUFS
Select an existing UFS partition (mounted with the label editor)
as the installation media.
Variables:
ufs full /path to directory containing the FreeBSD distribution
you're interested in.
mediaSetNFS
Variables:
hostname
The name of the host being installed (non-optional).
domainname
The domain name of the host being installed (optional).
defaultrouter
The default router for this host (non-optional).
netDev Which host interface to use (ed0 or ep0, for example.
Non-optional).
netInteractive
If set, bring up the interactive network setup form even
if all relevant configuration variables are already set
(optional).
ipaddr The IP address for the selected host interface (nonoptional).
netmask
The netmask for the selected host interface (nonoptional).
nfs full hostname:/path specification for directory containing
the FreeBSD distribution you're interested in.
mediaSetFTPUserPass
Variables:
ftpUser
The username to log in as on the ftp server site.
Default: ftp
ftpPass
The password to use for this username on the ftp server
site. Default: user@host
mediaSetCPIOVerbosity
Variables:
cpioVerbose
Can be used to set the verbosity of cpio extractions to
low, medium or high.
mediaGetType
Interactively get the user to specify some type of media.
Variables: None
optionsEditor
Invoke the interactive options editor.
Variables: None
packageAdd
Try to fetch and add a package to the system (requires that a
media type be set),
Variables:
package
The name of the package to add, e.g. bash-1.14.7 or
ncftp-2.4.2.
addGroup
Invoke the interactive group editor.
Variables: None
addUser
Invoke the interactive user editor.
Variables: None
shutdown
Stop the script and terminate sysinstall.
Variables: None
system Execute an arbitrary command with system(3)
Variables:
command
The name of the command to execute. When running from a
boot floppy, very minimal expectations should be made as
to what's available until/unless a relatively full system
installation has just been done.
tcpMenuSelect
Configure a network device.
Variables: Same as for mediaSetFTP except that _ftpPath is not
used.
The following files can be used to affect the operation of sysinstall
when used during initial system installation.
cdrom.inf A text file of properties, listed one per line, that
describe the contents of the media in use. The syntax
for each line is simply ``property = value''. Currently,
only the following properties are recognized.
CD_VERSION This property should be set to the
FreeBSD version on the current media
volume. For example, ``CD_VERSION =
4.6''.
CD_MACHINE_ARCH This property should be set to the
architecture of the contents on this
volume. This property is normally only
used with FreeBSD products that contain
CDs for different architectures, to provide
better error messages if users try
to install Alpha packages on an i386
machine. For example, ``CD_MACHINE_ARCH
= alpha''.
VOLUME In a multi-volume collection (such as
the FreeBSD 4-CD set), the ports/INDEX
file on each disc should contain the
full package index for the set. The
last field of the INDEX file denotes
which volume the package appears on, and
the VOLUME property here defines the
volume ID of the current disc.
packages/INDEX The package index file. Each package is listed on a separate
line with additional meta-data such as the required
dependencies. This index is generated by ``make index''
from the ports(7) collection. When multi-volume support
is enabled, an additional field should be added to each
line indicating which media volume contains the given
package.
For information about building a full release of FreeBSD, please see
release(7).
This utility may edit the contents of /etc/rc.conf, /etc/hosts, and
/etc/resolv.conf as necessary to reflect changes in the network configuration.
If you have a reasonably complete source tree online, take a look at
/usr/src/usr.sbin/sysinstall/install.cfg for a sample installation
script.
This utility is a prototype which lasted several years past its expiration
date and is greatly in need of death.
Jordan K. Hubbard <[email protected]>
This version of sysinstall first appeared in FreeBSD 2.0.
FreeBSD 5.2.1 August 9, 1997 FreeBSD 5.2.1 [ Back ] |
