And again @stefano outperformed me While I'm writing my home control system in #C for #NetBSD , he already preparing talk about his home control system for BSDCan

Thats the difference between North, with it's cold weather and low atmospheric pressure, and the South with humane environment :-D

@bsdcan

Make your own Read-Only Device with NetBSD

One detail that is often overlooked when dealing with embedded (or remote) devices is a key point of vulnerability: the file system.

https://it-notes.dragas.net/2024/09/10/make-your-own-readonly-device-with-netbsd/

#NetBSD #RunBSD #EmbeddedDevices #OwnYourData #ITNotes

This is a clever use of secmodel+kauth to implement jail-like process isolation on #netbsd

https://www.petermann-digital.de/blog/netbsd-secmodel_jail/

System Administration: Week 3: Files go hier(7)

In this video, we're wrapping up our discussion of filesystems and partitions with a look at file types and partitions and filesystems mounted by default on #NetBSD, #FreeBSD, #OmniOS, and Fedora Linux. We close with a look at the filesystem hierarchy as defined in the hier(7) manual page.

https://youtu.be/J0ontdqxpUg

#sysadmin #devops #sre

System Administration: Week 3: Resizing a file system

In these two videos, we show how to resize an existing filesystem. First on #NetBSD using the resize_ffs(8) tool, where we first increase the size of a 512MB partition to 1GB, then shrink it down to 256MB. Next we repeat the same exercise on #Debian Linux, using the resize2fs(8) tool.

https://youtu.be/9l-g3keN48g

https://youtu.be/4V15y5Klo9Y

#sysadmin #devops #sre

As the @bsdcan lists of talks and tutorials have been posted, I can officially announce my presentation:

Don't Freeze in the Cloud: Reclaiming Home Control with NetBSD

In 2010, I was taking more flights than cups of coffee. After a two-week trip, I returned home to a nasty, albeit expected, surprise: an indoor temperature of 7.8°C (46 F). Possessing more time than money, I decided to solve the problem my own way. I built a custom Python-based control system, accessible only via VPN, to manage my heating.

In 2015, after moving houses, this system was demoted to a secondary role, replaced by a shiny, commercial "smart" thermostat. However, I continued to maintain and update my custom solution for fun.

Fast forward to October 2025: major cloud providers faced significant outages. My commercial thermostat became dumber than a mechanical switch. I was reduced to manual two-hour overrides, with no visibility into settings or usage. It was a wake-up call: keeping my home warm should not depend on someone else's server.

I dusted off my solution and adapted it to modern needs - powered, of course, by NetBSD, running on the very same hardware that served my previous home for years.

In this talk, I will share the journey, the technical challenges, and the architectural decisions behind the project. I will demonstrate how NetBSD’s stability and low footprint make it the ideal operating system for long-term, "set-and-forget" home automation, allowing us to reclaim control from the cloud.

#NetBSD #BSDCan #BSDCan2026 #RunBSD #OwnYourData #Presentation #Talk

@thedarkener
Any reason you went specifically with #NetBSD?

Why run containers when we have microVMs? For example: " New MICROVM kernel for x86, supporting both i386 and amd64, NetBSD 11.0 introduces a dedicated MICROVM kernel designed for extremely fast virtual machines boot, leveraging PVH boot, VirtIO MMIO, and multiple kernel optimizations, it can boot in about 10 ms on 2020-era x86 CPUs." https://netbsd.org/releases/formal-11/NetBSD-11.0.html
#NetBSD #docker #podman

Amazingly, there appears to be a Rust compiler available on #NetBSD #riscv. I guess I will see tomorrow, once we have spent the night compiling LLVM.

Build 10MB #NetBSD VMs That Boot in 10ms Using #smolBSD

https://ostechnix.com/build-10mb-netbsd-vms-boot-10ms-smolbsd/

Registration for BSDCan 2026 is open at https://www.bsdcan.org/2026/registration.html + tutorial schedule published.

#bsdcan #freebsd #openbsd #netbsd #development #networking #devops #sysadmin #conferences

For more on BSD and the BSD conferences, see https://nxdomain.no/~peter/what_is_bsd_come_to_a_conference_to_find_out.html (or tracked https://bsdly.blogspot.com/2025/11/what-is-bsd-come-to-conference-to-find.html +
https://medium.com/@peter.hansteen/what-is-bsd-come-to-a-conference-to-find-out-06acd7d77fd8 )

Learn how smolBSD creates minimal (10 MB) NetBSD VMs that boot in 10ms. Full UNIX system, Docker-like workflow, runs on QEMU and Firecracker.

Full guide here: https://ostechnix.com/build-10mb-netbsd-vms-boot-10ms-smolbsd/

#smolbsd #netbsd #microvm #unix #virtualmachine #opensource #qemu #firecracker

📢 The Call for Papers is open for BSD-NL Conference – Spring 2026 📢

We are looking for talks on any *BSD 🐡😈⛳ topic!

Whether you’re a seasoned speaker or just starting out, we’d love to hear from you.

Share your ideas and join us in Utrecht!
🔗 https://events.bsdnl.nl/early2026/

📆 2026-05-09 / May 9th 2025
🕐 10:00-23:00 CET
📍 Brouwerij Maximus (Utrecht)
🌐 https://bsdnl.nl

#BSDNL #RUNBSD #BSD #OpenBSD #FreeBSD #NetBSD #HardenedBSD #SecBSD #DragonflyBSD

Alt...

Tom Hanks as Joe Fox in the movie "You've Got Mail" acting like the godfather. It has the text: Submit!

Having some fun with my old Thinkpad

#bsd #netbsd #thinkpad

Apparently one of the issues with DRM on the Wii U is that the radeon driver expects the GPU to be PCI and it isn't.

... but what if it was?

(this is either really clever or really stupid, let's find out!)

#NetBSD

As I wrote before (https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@evgandr/115912395421390028) I tried to use TURN server for communication with my relatives, but failed to setup secure enough solution. So, I decided to try an old and reliable solution — Asterisk. With the help of a book "Asterisk: The Definitive Guide" from J.V. Meggelen & R. Bryant & L. Madsen, of course.

First, I was forced to build the asterisk package by myself (from ports, ofc), since the binary version from NetBSD repository compiled with the all DB support, except my favourite PostgreSQL database.

By the way, adding users and writing dialplan with the help of aforementioned book was not so hard as I expected . Same for network setup. Since, I'm using PJSIP I just opened SIPS port and a range of UDP ports for RTP protocol on the my firewall. Despite, my home network hidden behind NAT on the router, there are no big problems with networking — end-user devices and an Asterisk server connected with use of simple star topology.

Surpisingly, the quality of the voice call is excellent comparing with service, provided by local cellular network operators. I suppose, that the secret in used codecs, or it is because there are not so much users (only 2) of my service.

#Asterisk #NetBSD #sip #VoIP

Alt...

Hand-drawn diagram of connection between my Asterisk server and the two end-users with mobile phones (with Linphone application on these phones).

Built #Lagrange for #NetBSD 10.1 bit it fails to launch, throws a SIGSEGV. Unless I run it as root. But of course then it finds no X11 session to auth, so it runs but doesn't run. But at least no SIGSEGV. That's only for my user. What's going on?!

#NetBSD 11 RC1 released!

No official announcement yet but Phoronix has the deets: https://www.phoronix.com/news/NetBSD-11.0-RC1

Victory is mine! #NetBSD 11 RC1 is working!

Overall, pretty uneventful...

Now, I will let it rest for a little while, until qemu 9.2.4 has finished compiling.

Alt...

A white on black console whowing, in bold ASCII letters "NetBSD 11.0_RC1 amd64"

Just a shout out to everyone directly or loosly involved in *BSD world here on fedi and elsewhere.
Thanks for having me here. It's been a couple of years now since I migrated from Linux and really enjoying it.

be safe and keep up the excellent work,

#appreciation #bsd #kiss #unix #freebsd #openbsd #netbsd #dragonfly #runbsd #illumos

@ParadeGrotesque

I believe 'man 7 entropy' will explain what #NetBSD uses that for. On my machine, file "/var/db/entropy-file" gets recreated on every boot.

#NetBSD 11, you are doing the packages in alphabetical order, right?

RIGHT? 😂

Alt...

A qemu console showing the NetBSD sysinst trying to download the 'xbase' package. As with the previous screenshots, the sysinst is trying an IPv6 address first.

[3348/9317] Compiling C object libqemu-mipsn32el-linux-user.a.p/linux-user_signal.c.o

So, roughly 30% done. I think the #NetBSD VM will be done first!

The good side of this, is that I can keep an eye on both the #NetBSD 11 VM and the compilation of qemu on my #Slackware server! 😋

It works, but it is going to be painful: since the qemu network emulation provides the VM with an IPv6 address through DHCP, #NetBSD sysinst tries IPv6 first, times out, then tries IPv4... all of this to be redirected by the web server and go through IPv6 - timeout - IPv4 again.

In other words: it downloads, but really really slowly. ☹️

Any help getting out of that painful loop is greatly appreciated (I know how to do it on an installed machine, just not in sysinst)

Alt...

A white-on-blue NetBSD installation console showing error messages, such as: /sets/modules.tar.xz ftp: Can't connect to [2ad4:ded2:1d::262]:80: No route to host

It seems #NetBSD 'sysinst' still has issues with the 'curses' qemu console, but it remains readable, so onward!

Alt...

A qemu console showing a NetBSD installation disk selection menus. Little display bugs (strange glyphs and added blank spaces) can be seen here and there...

Well, well, well... What do we have here?

Hello #NetBSD 11!

Alt...

A qemu console showing the sysinst installation programme from NetBSD Blue background, white text

From:

https://nycdn.netbsd.org/pub/NetBSD-daily/netbsd-11/20260206082425Z/amd64/INSTALL.html#Features%20to%20be%20removed%20in%20a%20later%20release

The following features are to be removed from #NetBSD in the future:

- groff(1). Man pages are now handled with mandoc(1), and groff(1) can still be found in pkgsrc as textproc/groff.

- pf(4). This packet filter is obsolete and unmaintained in NetBSD. It will be eventually removed due to possible long-standing security issues and lack of multiprocessor support. New installations should use npf(7).

No 'npf mastery' book so I really need to read that man page...

$ /usr/local/bin/qemu-img create -f qcow2 /opt/qemu/netbsd11.img 20G

20GB should be enough for most installations I suppose... #netbsd

I had to use a breadboard to set up a serial console, but I got #NetBSD working on the VisionFive 2! 🥳

Ethernet works great, so I will mostly talk to it over SSH, I suppose.

~/files/download/ISO/NetBSD$ curl -O https://nycdn.netbsd.org/pub/NetBSD-daily/netbsd-11/20260206082425Z/amd64/installation/cdrom/boot.iso

Yeah, going to test #NetBSD 11-RC1 like a savage as usual... 🤓

XFCE4 and the Palemoon browser running on #NetBSD Wii U. All three CPUs are online, the system is booting from micro SD, and swap + extra storage is on a SATA SSD.

#NetBSD

https://youtu.be/Tv6Q4MZS5LI

We got #CentOS Mascot before #GTA6
https://blog.centos.org/2025/05/release-the-quokka/

Let's go #NetBSD we should get Mascot other than logo

I was only getting around 140MB/s max from the old Samsung 840. Swapped in this Crucial BX500 and now I’m getting around 266MB/s. This will be a huge win for #NetBSD on the Wii U.

Once again #KDE tries to get rid of minority distributions. This time by replacing SDDM with PLM (plasma login manager). PLM depends on systemd.
So sooner or later no KDE for #alpineLinux, #FreeBSD, #Gentoo, #NetBSD, #OpenBSD, #Slackware, #VoidLinux, etc.

For #BLFS it is no problem as BLFS itself recently discontinued its non-systemd version.
#LFS

RE: https://mstdn.social/@osnews/116008893698862289

Rust is everywhere

#NetBSD is everywherer

Rust in the Kernel, and other odd decisions
#NetBSD

https://bentsukun.ch/posts/netbsd-rust-kernel/

My BSDCan submission has been approved!

It will be wonderful to be back in Ottawa, meet again all the "old" (and new) friends from the BSD world and, this time, present something that has saved me more than once... and it’s based on NetBSD!

#BSDCan #BSDCon #NetBSD #FreeBSD #OpenBSD #DragonFlyBSD #RunBSD #BSDCan2026 #Ottawa #Canada #BSD

I’ve just received a wonderful email. I’m so excited!

More about this in the coming days.

#RunBSD #NetBSD

#NetBSD peeps! There is a (mostly) working #Valgrind implementation for NetBSD at https://github.com/paulfloyd/valgrind-netbsd. It would be great if we could get a (binary) package for it!

This morning I was thinking about something: one of the reasons why every enthusiast should consider going to a BSDCon is simple.

I eat a lot and I still come back slimmer 😄

2024 - EuroBSDCon: ate twice as much as usual, came back from Dublin 1 kg lighter.
2025 - BSDCan: breakfasts that could cover a whole day’s calories, huge delicious meals... came back from Ottawa 0.5 kg lighter.
2025 - EuroBSDCon: double breakfast (sweet + savory), massive lunches, delicious dinners (including a huge pizza, as @outofcreativity, @angie and @mwl can confirm) and still came back 0.5 kg lighter.

Positive emotions burn calories.

So come to BSDCons: you’ll come back happy and slimmer!

#RunBSD #FreeBSD #NetBSD #OpenBSD #DragonFlyBSD #BSDCon #AsiaBSDCon #BSDCan #EuroBSDCon

System Administration, Week 1: Warming up to EC2

In this short video, we prepare for our first homework assignment and demonstrate how to launch a #NetBSD instance in AWS EC2.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cA_pgRH0IDw

Note: the AMI in the video is outdated; I have up to date images listed here:
https://stevens.netmeister.org/615/netbsd-amis.html

Or you can create your own:
https://www.netmeister.org/blog/creating-netbsd-ec2-amis.html

#sysadmin #devops #sre

Deadline this weekend - apply by Feb 1st, 2026!

Do you want to go to EuroBSDCon https://2026.eurobsdcon.org/ but need support to do so?

Or do you know someone in that situation? Apply for the Paul Schenkeveld Travel Grant before February 1st, 2026!

https://eurobsdconfoundation.org/travel-grant.html

#eurobsdcon #netbsd #openbsd #freebsd #conference #travelgrant