Absolute FreeBSD, 3rd Edition

Absolute FreeBSD, 3rd Edition

The Complete Guide to FreeBSD
by Michael W. Lucas
October 2018, 704 pp.
ISBN-13: 
9781593278922

FreeBSD is the muscle behind companies like Netflix and EMC. Any place where someone does heavy lifting on the Internet, you’ll find FreeBSD. This newly revised edition of Absolute FreeBSD brings FreeBSD’s strengths to bear on your problems and covers FreeBSD's newest features, all in the inimitable style that has made author Michael W. Lucas' system administration books so popular.

Any computer system is only as good as the system administrator’s knowledge. Absolute FreeBSD teaches you everything you need to know about managing FreeBSD systems, from installation, configuration, and taking the system from “just working” to “working well.” A cohesive focus on service delivery and best practice means that you can apply much of the book to other operating systems.

Absolute FreeBSD dives deep into server management, taking you beyond just making things work and into understanding why they work.

You’ll learn:

  • How to best install FreeBSD to meet your needs
  • Which filesystem to use in your environment
  • How to back up and restore critical data
  • How to tweak the kernel, and when not to
  • Network configuration, from activating interfaces to selecting congestion control algorithms
  • How to manage UFS, ZFS, and other critical filesystems
  • FreeBSD’s software packaging system, including how to build your own package repository
  • How and when to upgrade
  • Techniques to build your own FreeBSD
  • Advanced security features like blacklistd and packet filtering
  • How to monitor and adjust performance
  • Container-style virtualization with jails
  • Diskless systems
  • Panic management and bug reporting

With Absolute FreeBSD you will get the solid introduction you need; and if you're a fan of the earlier editions, you will expand your skills even further.

Author Bio 

Michael W. Lucas is a network/security engineer with extensive experience working with high-availability systems. He’s a regular speaker and instructor at systems administrator conferences throughout the United States. Lucas is the author of the critically-acclaimed Absolute BSD, Absolute OpenBSD, Cisco Routers for the Desperate, and PGP & GPG, all from No Starch Press.

Table of contents 

Introduction
Chapter 1: Getting More Help
Chapter 2: Before You Install
Chapter 3: Installation Walk-Through
Chapter 4: Start Me Up! The Boot Process
Chapter 5: Read This Before You Break Something Else! (Backup and Recovery)
Chapter 6: Kernel Games
Chapter 7: The Network
Chapter 8: Configuring Networking
Chapter 9: Securing Your System
Chapter 10: Disks, Partitioning, and GEOM
Chapter 11: The Unix File System
Chapter 12: ZFS
Chapter 13: Foreign Filesystems
Chapter 14: Exploring /etc
Chapter 15: Making Your System Useful
Chapter 16: Customizing Software with Ports
Chapter 17: Advanced Software Management
Chapter 18: Upgrading FreeBSD
Chapter 19: Advanced Security Features
Chapter 20: Small System Services
Chapter 21: System Performance and Monitoring
Chapter 22: Jails
Chapter 23: The Fringe of FreeBSD
Chapter 24: System (and Sysadmin) Crashes and Panics
Chapter 25: Afterword

Reviews 

"A must-have if you are interested on operating systems, not just UNIX or similar software."
—Albert Valbuena, Admin... by accident!

"A fantastic book on FreeBSD. Clear. Concise. Informative for new FreeBSD users and sysadmins . . . A must-have book for all people interested in learning FreeBSD system management."
—Vivek Gite, nixCraft

"An ESSENTIAL guide for FreeBSD."
—Gordon Ewasiuk, Amazon Vine Voice

Updates 

View the latest errata.