From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Mar 27 00:34:58 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 6E6DB16A422 for ; Mon, 27 Mar 2006 00:34:58 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from mfitzgerald@pacific.net.au) Received: from jay.exetel.com.au (jay.exetel.com.au [220.233.0.8]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 322D343D6D for ; Mon, 27 Mar 2006 00:34:54 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from mfitzgerald@pacific.net.au) Received: (qmail 24605 invoked by uid 507); 27 Mar 2006 10:34:53 +1000 Received: from 28.101.233.220.exetel.com.au (HELO ?192.168.1.100?) (220.233.101.28) by jay.exetel.com.au with SMTP; 27 Mar 2006 10:34:53 +1000 In-Reply-To: <1143299803.23986.21.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <44255711.8080309@cogeco.ca> <1143299803.23986.21.camel@localhost.localdomain> Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v623) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed Message-Id: <9b50de6058045955c882997c4630605c@pacific.net.au> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From: Malcolm Fitzgerald Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2006 10:34:53 +1000 To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.623) Cc: "Michael M." Subject: Re: Installong screenshots X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2006 00:34:58 -0000 On 26/03/2006, at 2:16 AM, Michael M. wrote: > But I speak as an not-disinterested bystander. I'm expecting delivery > of a new machine next week, and I want to try my hand at installing > FreeBSD. (I have tried once before, but failed due to disk geometry > errors I couldn't figure out how to solve.) So I've been reading > through some of the documentation on-and-off, and lurking here, just to > get prepared -- and, um, psyched. :-) I had a similar problem. I solved it by going to the HDD manufacturer's web site, searching for the model number and using the information found in the tech sheets. The data was very different to that being guessed by the partition tool. Have had no problems since. You may have more experience than me. I'd previously only installed systems that set up the window manager for me. What I discovered was that FreeBSD installation is very simple. However, getting a window manager set up and configuring the box to do what I wanted (printers, networks, USB thumb drives, extra CD drive, apache, PHP, mySQL) is confusing and laborious. It's a catch22 situation. If you know that you need to configure HOSTS/CUPS/X/etc then you probably know where to find them. And in my case, once it's set up I don't want to remember how to do it. I was looking for a how-to guide that would walk me through the process of setting up a machine that would be used as a desktop box. I want to use it for web site building, so I want to set up apache, mysql and php. The documentation is directed at users with some background with computers. I wanted documentation that presumed that I'd been raised by wolves: I'm not stupid, its just that I have no background knowledge. Any pointers to BSD documentation written for people raised by wolves would be appreciated. malcolm