Steps to learnin *BSD

[tarballed]

Morning everyone!

We'll, as I continue to play around with *BSD (Open and Free) I realize I have much to learn. In fact, a lot to learn. That's ok though. I want to learn.

What I wanted to ask everyone here for suggestions and recommendations on steps to master *BSD.

At the moment, I have two *BSD boxes.
My firewall which is running OpenBSD 3.1 and a new box that I just installed FreeBSD 4.6.

What I thought might be a good idea is to make a short list of things to learn. Then learn and master those areas and then move on to other areas. Anyone have recommendations on where to begin?

Here is what im thinking so far:

1. CVS = Is really cool, but I really dont know how to use it. I know what it does, but have yet to really learn how to use it. I've read the MAN page, but there is a lot more than just the MAN page....anyone know of a good book, web page, tutorial of some sort where I can learn how to use CVS?

For example, i've barely used CVS, but I did use it to update to source tree...I know that you can use CVS to update a lot of things....I just need to learn how to use it.

2. Ports tree = I just started playing with this. Very cool. Looks like it can be very fun. I just need to start playing with ports some more...installing and using it.

3. X-Windows = Basically, setting it up and configuring it. From what i've read, CVS can help here...This should be interesting.

4. FreeBSD Boot Loader = Since I have a second drive in the system, I wanted to install another OS on that drive...thus, I need to play with the Boot loader.


Thats what I thought i'd start out with. Once Im comfortable with this, I can move on to other things...Just need to start from the ground up.

Any thoughts? SUggestions or comments on anything I posted here?

Thanks guys.

Tarballed

[bsdjunkie]

1:) cvs: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/cvspr/
2:) ports: read the faqs for both open and free. Both have great details on ports

4:) boot loader: The install allows you to put boot loader on first drive, and its always auto detected my OS's I had.

[tarballed]

Ya, think im going to swing by and pick up that little pocket reference book. Its about $7 at my local store.

Anyother good things I could read on CVS? I'd really like to learn how to use it. I see I can update quite a bit of things with CVS...plus, its fun to use.

Ports = cool....i'll read the FAQ's for both Open and Free.

Boot loader....so if I install another OS on the second drive in my system, the boot loader automatically detects it? Thats pretty cool...Have to find more info on it.

Also, going to pick up a couple of books for *BSD; Absolute BSD is one I will be buying. Most likely, the FreeBSD Handbook as well...those two should keep me busy.

Any other goodies you can recommend? :D

[PPCLuke]

I'm no BSD master, in fact I'm going to attempt my first install tonight. but from my experience, if you install a new OS AFTER BSD, it'll overwrite the BSD bootloader.

[soup4you2]

I'm no BSD master, in fact I'm going to attempt my first install tonight. but from my experience, if you install a new OS AFTER BSD, it'll overwrite the BSD bootloader.

But why would you ever need anything else installed?

[elmore]

Of course that's what gag is for...... :)

[PPCLuke]

not saying you need anything else, in fact I love FreeBSD from what I've used of it, I'd like to get a different video card... another time to curse my converted windows box... but I do plan to try GAG if I ever get my HD replaced and get my Slack CDs

[v902]

Of course that's what gag is for...... :)

I tried gag (followed a link from somewhere in the OBSD forums I believe) and I've had problems with it, can it boot [OF]BSD with no problems? (it says it can but it couldn't boot Slack so I'm a bit skeptical on it), FBSD bootloader is quite good though =)

[|MiNi0n|]

Yup it sure can. I boot OBSD/FBSD and eeeeeeeeek... W2k using gag. No trouble at all!

[GhostDawg]

I'm no BSD master, in fact I'm going to attempt my first install tonight. but from my experience, if you install a new OS AFTER BSD, it'll overwrite the BSD bootloader.
Not trying to start anything, but after I installed Freebsd, I reinstalled Debian 3.0 and it picked up Free using Lilo without me modifying anything!

I was a little surprised it worked. :D

[soup4you2]

cheater. heh 8)

[Strog]

I've used lilo, booteasy (now boot0), 2k/XP bootloader and grub for booting FreeBSD, Linux, Win2k/XP/98, BeOS, AtheOS(yes all these OSes were installed at the same time on 1 hard drive). I've messed with the BeOS bootloader too but didn't think it was flexible enough for me.

For me a bootloader is a bootloader. I'll use a bootloader for a while and an OS install might overwrite it and I might use that one for a while. When I actually intentionally install a bootloader then I tend to favor GRUB because of its flexibility. You can configure it on the fly, setup network booting, run it from a floppy, run text or pretty it up nice, etc. I originally tried out GRUB and was going to do the network booting for some testing. I found out one of my NICs had PXE and could network boot before I even hit a bootloader.

I keep meaning to try out GAG. GAG looks like it has all the features I like in a bootloader(except network boot??no biggie) and I would probably give it a try now. I might just install it for fun between some projects. http://gag.sourceforge.net

There's a good article about setting up GRUB with FreeBSD at Daemon News.
http://www.daemonnews.org/200102/grub.html

[soup4you2]

when i was using linux i always tended to prefer lilo over grub. lilo was this sh*t when i started learning and never had a reason or need to start using grub plus there's some pretty cool hacks for lilo.