Solved When will be good time to install FreeBSD-12?

bookwormep

bookwormep

I have read the release schedule info on FreeBSD-12, but just when is a
good time to install or upgrade? Could be on the early BETA release side,
or just wait until after the official release. Comments and criticism are welcome.
 
Traditionally the N.0 releases have had some problems and it has been better to wait for the N.1 release if the system is in production. The reason is simply that while problems are being identified after the stable branch is forked from CURRENT there isn't that much time for users to test it and often calls for testing are not taken seriously. This results in that the N.0 release ends up being the BETA phase for the major N version of FreeBSD.
 
kpa said:
Traditionally the N.0 releases have had some problems and it has been better to wait for the N.1 release if the system is in production. The reason is simply that while problems are being identified after the stable branch is forked from CURRENT there isn't that much time for users to test it and often calls for testing are not taken seriously. This results in that the N.0 release ends up being the BETA phase for the major N version of FreeBSD.
Click to expand...

While your comment is pretty much saying the same as my earlier comment (wait for 12.1 if no pressing upgrade need), I believe "beta" is taking it a bit too far for n.0 releases. They are still more stable than any version of Linux or Windows (gasp) ever released.
 
That just has been my experience so far, especially with FreeBSD 10.0 that had loads of different problems that weren't really rectified until 10.1.
 
Crivens said:
After you have verified that you have verified good, current backups ;)
Click to expand...
He said “current backups” and he mean it. So do make a backup first, like the SAME day or have your Last-Good ready. Everybody forgot to do this at least once in his life, and will do it again by accident. I almost lost my system today because I did not backup before doing what I did below and I have no Last-Good. All I had was a Last-Old which I'm back to right now... dang!

Anyway, if you mean which one to start with… If I was you I’ll wait until BETA2 after all those developers heads thaw-out :) … or RC-2 after stable/12 thaw. RC’s are surly upgradeable, I’m not so sure about any BETA snapshot. That might work if you turn-off witness in the kernel then UPDATE from there thru-out 12-RELEASE.

https://www.freebsd.org/releases/12.0R/schedule.html

I installed FreeBSD-12.0-ALPHA7-amd64 and I could not install a pkg. I got a warning: “pkg cert did not match” or something like that. Most people wait until RC-2 but I’m going to install BETA1 this coming Friday and update to BETA-2 a week latter and if it don’t work I’ll revert.

If you got the backup and got the time we both might learn something, unknown (then why).
 
I actually spent a couple hours last weekend with 12.0-CURRENT-BETA2. But after experimenting with ShelLuser's
How-to: "Installing w/o an Installer" - I came so close, that
I almost had a pot of coffee! But not quite FreeBSD.
(My test was with UFS filesystem; ZFS for ShelLuser's)
Try again this coming weekend!
 
bookwormep said:
I actually spent a couple hours last weekend with 12.0-CURRENT-BETA2.
Click to expand...
Please be careful with version strings, 12.0-CURRENT-BETA2 doesn't exist. 12.0-CURRENT doesn't exist any more, -CURRENT moved to 13.0. The correct version is 12.0-BETA2.
 
bookwormep said:
I actually spent a couple hours last weekend with 12.0-CURRENT-BETA2. But after experimenting with ShelLuser's
How-to: "Installing w/o an Installer" - I came so close, that
I almost had a pot of coffee!
Click to expand...
hee hee Wow, what a GO! Life with FreeBSD for real.

I'll be laughing for weeks. ha ha haaa
 
FreeBSD-12.0-ALPHA8-i386-bootonly.iso would boot only until EOL. FreeBSD-12.0-BETA2-i386-disc1.iso and FreeBSD-12.0-BETA3-i386-bootonly.iso never would boot - not even BTX-loader.

This must be due to DRM/DRM2 removed from FreeBSD-12.0.
I have an old CPU (Pentium 4) refurbished desktop used for testing.
And researched related articles and pipermail, as well.

So, do I need to build a custom kernel, workaround to include the:
graphics/drm-legacy-kmod ; or wait for full release?

Sorry, Sir Dice, about the misspelled version strings above, my bad...

Yes, I ran checksums on all of these disks, they matched.
 
Well, 32-bit support in FreeBSD at this point is a bit limited to begin with, as 32-bit is quickly sailing off into the sunset (except for embedded environments). Arguably, the Pentium-4 (10 to 18 years old) should be considered obsolete, anyway. In other words, issues with such a CPU are unlikely to be a show stopper for development.

If you would give us some more information (which chipset, if using integrated graphics - or otherwise, the graphics card in use) it might enable somebody to help you.
 
There are few newer CPUs that are still 32-bit only and are in use. One of them is the VIA C7 series which was introduced in 2005. I ran a FreeBSD/pfSense firewall on a system based on a C7 cpu for quite long time.
 
bookwormep said:
FreeBSD-12.0-ALPHA8-i386-bootonly.iso would boot only until EOL. FreeBSD-12.0-BETA2-i386-disc1.iso and FreeBSD-12.0-BETA3-i386-bootonly.iso never would boot - not even BTX-loader.

This must be due to DRM/DRM2 removed from FreeBSD-12.0.
I have an old CPU (Pentium 4) refurbished desktop used for testing.
And researched related articles and pipermail, as well.

So, do I need to build a custom kernel, workaround to include the:
graphics/drm-legacy-kmod ; or wait for full release?
Click to expand...

Wait a second … If you don't even get to the loader, then it has nothing to do with the kernel, let alone DRM. So, building a custom kernel wouldn't change a thing. The problem seems to be in the boot sequence, before the kernel is even loaded.

Have you tried BETA1? There have been a few changes to the loader in stable/12 between BETA1 and BETA2:
http://inof.de/FreeBSD/svnews/?&m=2018-10-15&du=m&p=/stable/12/stand
Maybe one of them is the culprit.

Regarding your Pentium 4 CPU: That shouldn't be a problem. FreeBSD 12 supports all processors since the 80486 (not including the 486SX). See the Hardware Compatibility List.
 
FreeBSD-12.0-BETA1-i386-bootonly.iso did not boot, either.
Checksums matched okay.

Ollie, it seems very logical that BTX-loader is the culprit, especially after your hyperlinked article above details those
changes.

I am going to setup a minimal install to run 'dmesg' and find
the graphics card info. Actually glad that I am discovering all
this ahead of time.
 
Nah. The motherboard and CPU are circa. 2003. Tested a 64-bit
out-of-curiosity though; still no go.

I would like to cut the boot-loader out of FreeBSD-12.0-ALPHA8-i386-bootonly.iso; then edit the latest BETA3 - paste that boot-
loader into it; re-master the .iso disk and give that a try?
EDIT: Hey how about that.
 
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