Chapter 24 The Cutting Edge

Table of Contents
24.1 Synopsis
24.2 FreeBSD-CURRENT vs. FreeBSD-STABLE
24.3 Synchronizing Your Source
24.4 Rebuilding “world”
24.5 Tracking for Multiple Machines
Restructured, reorganized, and parts updated by Jim Mock. Original work by Jordan Hubbard, Poul-Henning Kamp, John Polstra, and Nik Clayton.

24.1 Synopsis

FreeBSD is under constant development between releases. For people who want to be on the cutting edge, there are several easy mechanisms for keeping your system in sync with the latest developments. Be warned--the cutting edge is not for everyone! This chapter will help you decide if you want to track the development system, or stick with one of the released versions.

After reading this chapter, you will know:

Before reading this chapter, you should:

Note: Throughout this chapter, the cvsup command is used to obtain and update FreeBSD sources. To use it, you will need to install a port or package like net/cvsup-without-gui. If you are using FreeBSD 6.2-RELEASE or later, you may wish to substitute this with csup(1), which is now part of the base system.

This, and other documents, can be downloaded from ftp://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/doc/.

For questions about FreeBSD, read the documentation before contacting <questions@FreeBSD.org>.
For questions about this documentation, e-mail <doc@FreeBSD.org>.