How to install DragonFlyBSD

DragonFlyBSD originated as a fork of FreeBSD 4.8. The original goal of DragonFlyBSD was to provide a clustered operating system—a distributed system spanning multiple machines. Over time, the project’s focus shifted toward building a multi-master clustered storage system.

Administration of DragonFlyBSD is similar to FreeBSD. Historically it used pkgsrc for packages and later adopted the dports tree. The system includes features found in Linux ecosystems such as a unique /proc implementation and an LVM-like volume layer. Supported filesystems include UFS and Hammer. Hammer is DragonFly-specific: a modern filesystem designed for multi-master replication. Unlike ZFS, Hammer is a traditional filesystem and is not designed to replace RAID functionality.

Before installing, ensure you have a machine with at least 10 GiB of disk space to accommodate the chosen filesystem.

Download the ISO from the DragonFly website: http://www.dragonflybsd.org/download/

Installation

DragonFlyBSD installs the base system first and defers configuration to a separate step. Boot the installer from the CD or ISO and follow the on-screen prompts.

The initial installer screen allows logging in as root to use the live environment for recovery tasks, or using the installer user to run the guided installer.

The dialog-style installer may look old-fashioned, but it is straightforward. Choose Install DragonFly BSD to proceed. Confirm the installation and ensure you have backups if you are overwriting another OS.

Select the target disk (for example ad1) and choose whether to use the entire disk or a partition—select Use Entire Disk for a single-OS setup.

Choose a filesystem: Hammer or UFS. UFS is the traditional BSD filesystem; Hammer supports multi-master replication and generally offers better performance. For this guide we use Hammer.

Adjust the partition table if needed (the defaults are usually fine). You may reduce /boot to 500 MB and choose to encrypt some partitions; /boot cannot be encrypted. Encrypting swap can be useful for security.

The installer warns that Hammer is not ideal for volumes under ~50 GiB; using it on volumes smaller than 10 GiB carries risk, though it may be acceptable in a test VM.

Start the installation by selecting Begin Installing Files. The installer will format and mount volumes, copy system files, and install boot blocks. Enabling Packet Mode is recommended.

When installation finishes, choose Configure this System to perform initial configuration (you can also reboot and configure manually as root).

Configuration

Begin by setting the timezone (Select Timezone -> region -> city). Next, configure the keyboard layout.

This example uses an AZERTY keyboard with accents; choose fr.iso.acc.kbd if appropriate. Next set the root account.

Enter the root password and then add any additional user accounts.

Provide username and password for each account. Users who should be allowed to run su must be members of the wheel group (add wheel under “Other Group Memberships”). Next, configure network interfaces.

In this example the network interface is named ed0. On Intel hardware you might see em0, fxp0, or xgbe0; Broadcom devices typically use bge0 or bnx0. Configure the interface for DHCP or static addressing as appropriate.

Finally, set the hostname and domain, then reboot.

Installation is complete. For administration, consult the DragonFly Handbook: http://www.dragonflybsd.org/docs/newhandbook/