The journey to ZFS raidz1 with different sized disks (On NetBSD) (Wheelbarrow optional).

The joy of having a redundant remote backup machine is that if it dies you do not immediately lose any data, just some redundancy. On the other hand, sufficient remoteness can make the process of rebuilding annoying enough to encourage a certain desire to not repeat it.

So... I find myself wanting to setup a NetBSD machine with a ZFS raidz1, but without sufficient equally sized large disks or enough drive bays to pack in many smaller disks. In the world of ZFS, that's a pretty big liability...

https://netbsd0.blogspot.com/2022/05/the-journey-to-zfs-raidz1-with.html

#zfs #backup

Compiling the NetBSD kernel as a benchmark.

For a while, I've been compiling my own NetBSD kernel. Just for a few options, mainly CARP, at first for my Raspberry Pis, and at the moment for paravirtualized Xen domUs. Compiling a custom NetBSD kernel is a very easy task, it's just a matter of 3 main steps...

https://blog.anotherhomepage.org/post/2022/05/25/Compiling-the-NetBSD-kernel-as-a-benchmark/

#kernel #system

SSD TRIM in NetBSD HEAD (-current).

Solid state drives are complicated. TRIM is an operation in the SATA command set that can be used to mark specific blocks of a SSD unused, which helps the SSD retain good performance when large amounts of data have been deleted. It requires operating system support. macOS actually didn't support TRIM for quite a long time, so there's at least some drives available in the wild that cope well with not being regularly TRIMed. NetBSD 7.0 added a fdiscard system call, which allows portions of a device or file to be TRIMed...

https://www.unitedbsd.com/d/859-ssd-trim-in-netbsd-head-current

#hdd #fdiscard #trim

NetBSD can also run a Minecraft server.

... The good news is, yes, you can run a Minecraft server on my other favourite OS too. This post explores how I went about it, though I’m sure there are other ways...

https://rubenerd.com/netbsd-can-also-run-a-minecraft-server/

#games #minecraft

NetBSD 9.3 released.

The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce NetBSD 9.3, the third release from the NetBSD 9 stable branch.

https://blog.netbsd.org/tnf/entry/netbsd_9_3_released

#release #system

Installing OpenBSD on Scaleway Elastic Metal.

The instructions below will roughly stay the same should you want to install NetBSD or FreeBSD instead of OpenBSD...

https://www.senzilla.io/blog/2022/08/10/installing-openbsd-scaleway-elastic-metal/

#install #system

Is the NetBSD operating system losing its competitive edge to Linux and FreeBSD?

I’m not entirely sure there was ever a “competitive edge” that NetBSD had over FreeBSD… and the differences between any of the BSDs and Linux are vast — some of them are important, others not so much...

https://www.quora.com/Is-the-NetBSD-operating-system-losing-its-competitive-edge-to-Linux-and-FreeBSD/answer/Stan-Hanks

#system #justread

EuroBSDCon 2022. NetBSD.

No videos are available yet to provide much-needed context to presentations, but we'll keep you posted...

https://blog.netbsd.org/tnf/entry/eurobsdcon_2022

#eurobsdcon

Crash Override: NetBSD 5.0-9.3 Coredump Kernel Refcount LPE.

NetBSD 5.0 (released 2009) introduced a change to the in-kernel coredump handler that accidentally introduced a reference count bug on the crashing process' credential. Triggering the vulnerability leads to a use-after-free that can be trivially (though slowly) exploited to achieve local privilege escalation, gaining root from an unprivileged starting point...

https://accessvector.net/2022/netbsd-coredump-lpe

#kernel #system

OpenBSD 7.2 released. #release

Hunting kernel lock and interrupt latency.

Too much of the kernel still runs with the kernel lock, which is bad for performance -- and especially for interactive system responsiveness, since most of wscons including keyboard and mouse input still use the kernel lock. On single-CPU systems, the same problem arises with interrupt latency on its own...

https://mail-index.netbsd.org/tech-kern/2022/10/30/msg028499.html

#kernel #troubleshooting #system

NFS on NetBSD: server and client side.

As pretty much any other UNIX system, NetBSD provides solid in-kernel NFS support. See nfsssvc(2). Since I only run Windows occasionally (mainly for MS-Office or MATLAB) and all of my machines either run NetBSD, Slackware or Tribblix, it makes sense for me to opt for NFS as a distributed file system protocol to share files from my server over the local network...

https://www.unitedbsd.com/d/959-nfs-on-netbsd-server-and-client-side

#nfs #filesystem

NetBSD 10.0 BETA available.

After nearly 3 whole years of development (work started on NetBSD 10 in late 2019), BETA snapshots have finally been published for interested users to test. More changes will be backported from the development branch over the next few months before we tag a final release, so the BETA images will keep getting updated...

https://blog.netbsd.org/tnf/entry/netbsd_10_0_beta_available

#system #beta #release

🎄Happy New Year, folks!

NetBSD at Reproducible Builds Summit Venice 2022.

The sixth Reproducible Builds Summit took place exactly two months ago in Venice, Italy. These three days of workshops were filled with a succession of interactive sessions, where everyone attending had the opportunity to present or learn about anything related to Build Reproducibility...

https://blog.netbsd.org/tnf/entry/reproducible_builds_summit_venice_2022

#system #reproducible

NetBSD HAMMER2.

HAMMER2 file system for NetBSD.

https://github.com/kusumi/netbsd_hammer2

#hammer2 #filesystem

NetBSD ASCII flag for the bootloader.

Attempting to draw the NetBSD flag in ASCII and use it when booting in both NetBSD/i386 and NetBSD/amd64 in BIOS mode was thus too tempting, so here we go...

https://www.cambus.net/netbsd-ascii-flag-for-the-bootloader/

#boot #system

NetBSD 10 Beta installs and testing from i386 to ARM.

I've run NetBSD for quite some time, going back to the days of Dr. Dobbs magazine and the release of the BSD4-based 386BSD (which I installed from floppy disks...). The chance of beta testing the newest release came at the end of December 2022. I had installed NetBSD-current on Raspberry Pi platforms, and also had different levels of NetBSD 9 on systems.

This story is on my attempts to upgrade or install fresh operating systems "in house". Rather than strict chronological order, the sections below are by CPU architecture, starting with the older i386 then going to Arm processors. I have not upgraded an AMD-based system (yet), and will add notes at the end when I can...

https://jspath55.blogspot.com/2023/02/netbsd-10-beta-installs-and-testing.html

#system #install

Run GitHub CI in NetBSD Test.

Use this action to run your CI in NetBSD. The github workflow only supports Ubuntu, Windows and MacOS. But what if you need to use NetBSD? This action is to support NetBSD...

https://github.com/vmactions/netbsd-vm

#ci #github #action

#art (c)