5 ms·

RaspBSD – FreeBSD images for the Raspberry Pi

126 points by fcambus 11y ago

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
BrainInAJar 11y ago
How does FreeBSD work with the GPIO pins, and also things like i2c ? I'd love to not use Linux, but i use my Raspi as more than just a tiny computer
- skreuzer 11y ago
  FreeBSD has full support for GPIO and i2c on both the RPi 1 and 2. Simple wrappers around FreeBSD's GPIO ioctl can be found at https://github.com/gonzoua/freebsd-gpio https://github.com/gonzoua/freebsd-gpio
  - jlarocco 11y ago
    I'm more curious if WiringPi is usable or ported over?
eschaton 11y ago
I thought the RPi 2 was armv7, why is the image for it using armv6? Does BSD support fat/multi-architecture binaries?
- jpablo 11y ago
  It's the same approach the official Linux Raspberry PI images follow that way you can support all raspberry pi versions with a single images. There potentially could be an speed up by rebuilding everything for armv7 (specially for NEON-fp) but no one has done it yet.
  - aerique 11y ago
    Any idea what kind of speedup one could expect?
    - feld 11y ago
      I don't know, but I would assume it's similar to setting CPUTYPE in your make.conf so binaries are built with some cpu-specific asm for your specific flavor of x86 CPU: you'll get a performance boost, but nothing mind-blowing.
- zxombie 11y ago
  Because, on FreeBSD, armv6 is for 32-bit ARMv6 and later platforms. The userland is shared between all armv6 SoCs, however the kernel is targeted depending on the architectures it will boot on and will be built for ARMv7 when applicable.
gregwtmtno 11y ago
I put FreeBSD on my Raspberry Pi B a few months back. (Similar images were previously published as well.) I had to abandon the project, though, because there were very limited binary ports and base-system updates available. Compiling things on the Pi is a pain when possible at all. I did get a fairly decent cross-compile setup going, but in the end, it was more trouble than it was worth.
- josh64 11y ago
  I was pleased to see the following on this site: > Currently work is ongoing to build and publish offical FreeBSD packages. Once those are published, these images will use them.
tdicola 11y ago
That's awesome, it's always great to have more choices of OS. Cool to see they're looking at other boards like the BeagleBone Black too.
sigjuice 11y ago
Why aren't such images available at the official location http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/arm/ http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/arm/ (or a mirror) ?
- Sanddancer 11y ago
  There are official images http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/arm/armv6/ISO-IMAGES/11.0/ http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/arm/armv6/ISO-I... . This project seems to be aiming to be the PC-BSD for arm-based boards, with different defaults for people new to FreeBSD, etc.
mirimir 11y ago
I would love to see pfSense (based on FreeBSD) on the Banana Pi. It has a real gigabit NIC :)
mvanotti 11y ago
I've tried freeBSD in a Raspberry Pi 1, but I couldn't get any binaries precompiled for ARM :(. I would like to have an easy way to cross-compile ports from my main machine.
- corv 11y ago
  Take a look here: http://blog.ignoranthack.me/?p=212 http://blog.ignoranthack.me/?p=212
hibbelig 11y ago
Is there something similar for the Cubietruck?
- dijit 11y ago
  https://wiki.freebsd.org/FreeBSD/arm/Cubieboard https://wiki.freebsd.org/FreeBSD/arm/Cubieboard
poseid 11y ago
might be nice to have this freebsd on an intel edison too

126 points by fcambus 11y ago

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

How does FreeBSD work with the GPIO pins, and also things like i2c ? I'd love to not use Linux, but i use my Raspi as more than just a tiny computer

skreuzer 11y ago
FreeBSD has full support for GPIO and i2c on both the RPi 1 and 2. Simple wrappers around FreeBSD's GPIO ioctl can be found at https://github.com/gonzoua/freebsd-gpio https://github.com/gonzoua/freebsd-gpio
- jlarocco 11y ago
  I'm more curious if WiringPi is usable or ported over?

eschaton 11y ago

I thought the RPi 2 was armv7, why is the image for it using armv6? Does BSD support fat/multi-architecture binaries?

jpablo 11y ago
It's the same approach the official Linux Raspberry PI images follow that way you can support all raspberry pi versions with a single images. There potentially could be an speed up by rebuilding everything for armv7 (specially for NEON-fp) but no one has done it yet.
- aerique 11y ago
  Any idea what kind of speedup one could expect?
  - feld 11y ago
    I don't know, but I would assume it's similar to setting CPUTYPE in your make.conf so binaries are built with some cpu-specific asm for your specific flavor of x86 CPU: you'll get a performance boost, but nothing mind-blowing.
zxombie 11y ago
Because, on FreeBSD, armv6 is for 32-bit ARMv6 and later platforms. The userland is shared between all armv6 SoCs, however the kernel is targeted depending on the architectures it will boot on and will be built for ARMv7 when applicable.

gregwtmtno 11y ago

I put FreeBSD on my Raspberry Pi B a few months back. (Similar images were previously published as well.) I had to abandon the project, though, because there were very limited binary ports and base-system updates available. Compiling things on the Pi is a pain when possible at all. I did get a fairly decent cross-compile setup going, but in the end, it was more trouble than it was worth.

josh64 11y ago
I was pleased to see the following on this site: > Currently work is ongoing to build and publish offical FreeBSD packages. Once those are published, these images will use them.

tdicola 11y ago

That's awesome, it's always great to have more choices of OS. Cool to see they're looking at other boards like the BeagleBone Black too.

sigjuice 11y ago

Why aren't such images available at the official location http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/arm/ http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/arm/ (or a mirror) ?

Sanddancer 11y ago
There are official images http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/arm/armv6/ISO-IMAGES/11.0/ http://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/snapshots/arm/armv6/ISO-I... . This project seems to be aiming to be the PC-BSD for arm-based boards, with different defaults for people new to FreeBSD, etc.

mirimir 11y ago

I would love to see pfSense (based on FreeBSD) on the Banana Pi. It has a real gigabit NIC :)

mvanotti 11y ago

I've tried freeBSD in a Raspberry Pi 1, but I couldn't get any binaries precompiled for ARM :(. I would like to have an easy way to cross-compile ports from my main machine.

corv 11y ago
Take a look here: http://blog.ignoranthack.me/?p=212 http://blog.ignoranthack.me/?p=212

hibbelig 11y ago

Is there something similar for the Cubietruck?

dijit 11y ago
https://wiki.freebsd.org/FreeBSD/arm/Cubieboard https://wiki.freebsd.org/FreeBSD/arm/Cubieboard

poseid 11y ago

might be nice to have this freebsd on an intel edison too