A Guide to FreeBSD Performance Tuning

submited 28 January 2025

FreeBSD is known for its robust design, reliability, and advanced networking features, but like any operating system, it benefits significantly from performance tuning. This guide provides an extensive overview of FreeBSD performance tuning, covering kernel parameters, memory management, storage subsystems, networking, and more. It highlights key principles such as evaluating workloads, applying incremental modifications, and documenting changes thoroughly. The article also delves into specific tuning areas like process limits, virtual memory, network stack settings, and storage optimizations. Experienced BSD users will find detailed instructions on using sysctl, adjusting ZFS and UFS settings, and configuring network offloading. Additionally, it emphasizes the importance of monitoring and benchmarking to ensure that tuning efforts yield the desired performance improvements.

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29 January 2025
BSD Weekly - issue 218  

FreeBSD at FOSDEM 2025, Valuable News weekly series, BSD Now 595 highlights and more.

FreeBSD Software Pick for February 2025  

It's not all serious work with FreeBSD, we users can have a little bit of fun too....and in this video we present some games that we have picked for you to try during February. They all revolve around shapes ...sort of.

28 January 2025
A Guide to FreeBSD Performance Tuning  

FreeBSD is known for its robust design, reliability, and advanced networking features, but like any operating system, it benefits significantly from performance tuning. This guide provides an extensive overview of FreeBSD performance tuning, covering kernel parameters, memory management, storage subsystems, networking, and more. It highlights key principles such as evaluating workloads, applying incremental modifications, and documenting changes thoroughly. The article also delves into specific tuning areas like process limits, virtual memory, network stack settings, and storage optimizations. Experienced BSD users will find detailed instructions on using sysctl, adjusting ZFS and UFS settings, and configuring network offloading. Additionally, it emphasizes the importance of monitoring and benchmarking to ensure that tuning efforts yield the desired performance improvements.

FreeBSD at FOSDEM 2025  

Heading to FOSDEM 2025? Visit the FreeBSD Stand in Building K to connect with contributors and learn about the latest updates. The event features several FreeBSD-focused talks, including discussions on security audits, modern standby implementation, and more. This is an excellent opportunity for BSD enthusiasts to deepen their knowledge and engage with the community. Don't miss the chance to grab some cool swag and meet fellow enthusiasts.

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27 January 2025
Valuable News – 2025/01/27  

The Valuable News weekly series is dedicated to provide summary about news, articles and other interesting stuff mostly but not always related to the UNIX/BSD/Linux systems.

23 January 2025
BSD Now 595 - Arc: the Triumph  

This episode of BSD Now covers the application of the ARC algorithm, advancements in cloud-native containers on FreeBSD with Podman testing highlights, and running web browsers in a FreeBSD jail. It also discusses fixing pf to allow IPv6 traffic on FreeBSD, the history of Minitel in France, and why Google stores billions of lines of code in a single repository.

Fault-Tolerant Reverse Proxy with FreeBSD  

This guide walks you through setting up a fault-tolerant reverse proxy using FreeBSD and HAProxy. It covers configuring CARP for failover, installing and setting up HAProxy, and adjusting firewall rules. This setup ensures high availability and reliability for your services, making it valuable for BSD users looking to enhance their network infrastructure.

Key Considerations for Benchmarking Network Storage Performance  

This article delves into the key factors that influence network storage performance, focusing on protocols like SMB, NFS, and iSCSI. It highlights the importance of understanding these protocols and their unique challenges when testing NAS setups. The article provides insights into optimizing NAS configurations for accurate benchmarking, making it valuable for BSD users looking to enhance their network storage performance. It covers specific considerations for each protocol, including the use of tools like CrystalDiskMark and fio, and discusses the impact of multi-channel support and record sizes on performance.

22 January 2025
FreeBSD Foundation Announces Zero-Trust Builds Project  

The FreeBSD Foundation has initiated a project to deliver zero-trust builds starting January 2025. Commissioned by the Sovereign Tech Agency, this project aims to enhance the security of FreeBSD's build process by enabling release processes to run without root access and ensuring build artifacts are reproducible. The updates will simplify the build process and are expected to be completed before the release of FreeBSD 15.0. This initiative is part of a broader effort to advance Zero Trust builds, Software Bill of Materials (SBOM), and other security improvements.

BSD Weekly - Issue 217  

NixBSD fork for FreeBSD, GhostBSDCon 2025 announced, new FreeBSD Journal and more.

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