Announcing NetBSD 6.0

Introduction

The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce NetBSD 6.0, the fourteenth major release of the NetBSD operating system. Changes from the previous release include scalability improvements on multi-core systems, many new and updated device drivers, Xen and MIPS port improvements, and brand new features such as a new packet filter.

Some NetBSD 6.0 highlights are: support for thread-local storage (TLS), Logical Volume Manager (LVM) functionality, rewritten disk quota subsystem, new subsystems to handle flash devices and NAND controllers, an experimental CHFS file system designed for flash devices, support for Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) protocol, and more. This release also introduces NetBSD Packet Filter (NPF) - a new packet filter, designed with multi-core systems in mind, which can do TCP/IP traffic filtering, stateful inspection, and network address translation (NAT).

In addition to many other features, NetBSD 6.0 includes significant developments in various ports. Some highlights:

  • SMP support for Xen domU kernels, initial suspend/resume support for Xen domU, PCI pass-through support for Xen3, and addition of the balloon driver.
  • Major rework of MIPS port adding support for SMP and 64-bit (O32, N32, N64 ABIs are supported) processors, DSP v2 ASE extension, various NetLogic/RMI processor models, Loongson family processors, and new SoC boards.
  • Improved SMP on PowerPC port and added support for Book E Freescale MPC85xx (e500 core) processors.
  • ARM has gained support for Cortex-A8 processors, various new SoCs, and initial support for Raspberry Pi. Full support for Raspberry Pi and major ARM improvements to come in a future NetBSD release.
  • time_t is now a 64-bit quantity on all NetBSD ports. This means that the NetBSD world no longer ends in 2037.

Please read below for a full list of changes in NetBSD 6.0.

The generous donations of companies and individuals to the NetBSD Foundation in previous years has enabled TNF to sponsor some exciting developments in NetBSD 6.0, including the Xen DOMU multiprocessor support. See below for information about how you or your company can donate to help sponsor future projects!

Complete source and binaries for NetBSD 6.0 are available for download at many sites around the world. A list of download sites providing FTP, AnonCVS, SUP, and other services may be found at https://www.NetBSD.org/mirrors/. We encourage users who wish to install via ISO or USB disk images to download via BitTorrent by using the torrent files supplied in the images area. A list of hashes for the NetBSD 6.0 distribution has been signed with the well-connected PGP key for the NetBSD Security Officer: https://ftp.NetBSD.org/pub/NetBSD/security/hashes/NetBSD-6.0_hashes.asc

NetBSD is free. All of the code is under non-restrictive licenses, and may be used without paying royalties to anyone. Free support services are available via our mailing lists and website. Commercial support is available from a variety of sources. More extensive information on NetBSD is available from our website:

www.NetBSD.org/

Dedication

NetBSD 6.0 is dedicated to the memory of Allen Briggs, who passed away in March of 2012.

Allen's technical contributions to NetBSD were significant, and many. He was a NetBSD developer from the very beginning of the project, and was the main driving force behind the initial import of some of our hardware ports. He also served on NetBSD's core team from 2003 until 2006. More than that, however, he was a mentor to many on the project, and always willing to help when he could. Even for those he didn't mentor, his civilized example was often a guiding influence. He worked with many of us on the project, and in a field where prickly personalities are common, he was always pleasant and kind regardless of your status or technical expertise. He will be sorely missed.

6.0 Fund Drive

Your donation to the NetBSD Foundation allows the project to make major improvements to the code base. With the release of NetBSD 6.0, the 6.0 Fund Drive targets raising 60,000 USD by the end of 2012. We would like to continue funded development in various areas, including:

  • Improving network stack concurrency and performance.
  • Development of modern file systems and improvement of existing ones.
  • Features which are useful in embedded environments, such as high resolution timers and execute in place (XIP) support.
  • Automatic testing and quality assurance.
We have recently made some changes to the way we accept and honor your donations. For more information about donating, visit https://www.NetBSD.org/donations/. The NetBSD Foundation is a 501(c)(3) organization in the US, and donations may be tax deductible.

Major Changes Between 5.0 and 6.0

Some highlights include:

General kernel

  • time_t and dev_t are now 64 bits.
  • Much-improved compat_linux support for running Linux binaries.
  • Added a generic producer/consumer queue.
  • Added a new ptree ( Patricia / RADIX tree ) implementation.
  • Removed MALLOC() and FREE() macros.
  • Compute kern.ipc.shmmaxpages on startup based on physical memory. Can be overridden via sysctl(8).
  • kmem_alloc(9): Add more extensive runtime debugging facilities.
  • File descriptor access performance improvements were made.
  • cpu_reboot(9): tear down stacks of devices and file systems in an orderly fashion during shutdown.
  • Added 'show vmem' and 'show all vmems' commands to ddb(4).
  • Added high-priority xcall(9) support.
  • Added direct select()/poll() support.
  • Add PCU (Per-CPU Unit) interface to unify synchronization of per CPU context, like lazy FPU management.
  • Added new system calls pipe2(2), paccept(2), kqueue1(2), flags SOCK_CLOEXEC/SOCK_NONBLOCK to socket(2), socketpair(2), F_DUPFD_CLOEXEC to fcntl(2), and a MSG_CMSG_CLOEXEC to recvfrom(2) to be able to set close-on-exec to all newly created file descriptors.
  • Major improvements to uvm_map(9), uvm_km(9), vmem(9), and kmem(9) layers.
  • Removed ltsleep(9) and wakeup_one(9).
  • Rewrote most of the entropy-gathering and entropy-distributing code, separating the rnd(4) pseudodevice from the bitstream generation code cprng(9) and entropy-pool code rnd(9).
  • Kernel support for posix_spawn(3).

Networking

  • ip(4): added IP_RECVTTL option to let recvmsg(2) return the TTL of the received datagram.
  • ip(4): added IP_MINTTL option to discard packets with a TTL lower than the option value.
  • Added SOCK_SEQPACKET for local sockets.
  • Added net.inet.icmp.bmcastecho sysctl(7), to disable ICMP replies to the braodcast address.
  • Make TCP window size autoscaling the default.
  • Derive the mbuf cluster (NMBCLUSTERS) at boot time from the available memory. The default can be raised by changing kern.mbuf.nmbclusters.
  • Added NPF, the NetBSD Packet Filter.
  • udp(4): implement RFC6056 port selection algorithms.

File systems

  • Added CHFS, a file system for flash devices.
  • The default behavior when mounting empty msdosfs file systems has been changed to assume long filenames. The behavior with populated file systems has not changed.
  • UDF: Added support for session opening/closing on sequential media.
  • ext2fs: Added support for >128 byte inodes.
  • Import OpenSolaris ZFS code. Experimental-only; does not work yet.
  • ffs: New quota support. This adds a new on-disk format to store disk quota usage and limits, integrated with ffs metadata. Usage is checked by fsck_ffs(8) (no more quotacheck) and is covered by the WAPBL journal. Enabled with kernel option QUOTA2.

Security

Drivers

  • Audio:

    • Added gcscaudio(4) driver for AMD Geode CS5536.
    • Added hdaudio(4), a new standards-compliant Intel High Definition Audio driver written to replace azalia(4).
    • audio(9): Audio drivers are now MP-safe. This should fix skips under load sometimes seen in NetBSD 5.

  • Hardware Monitoring:

  • Networking:

    • Added support for more chip revisions to re(4). Added hardware checksum support for newer PCIe 8168C/8111C/8102E chips.
    • Switch ath(4) from the binary HAL to the open-source HAL from Sam Leffler.
    • Added bwi(4) driver for Broadcom AirForce / Apple Airport Extreme network cards.
    • Added flow control and RTL8211C(L) PHY support to rgephy(4).
    • Added age(4) and atphy(4) drivers for Attansic/Atheros L1 Gigabit Ethernet and F1 PHY, respectively.
    • Added support for flow control to sk(4).
    • Added TCPv4/UDPv4 RX hardware checksum support for i82559 and later chips to fxp(4).
    • wm(4): Added ICH10, PCH, PCH2, 82575, 82576, 82580 and I350 devices support. Added some other improvements and workarounds.
    • bge(4): added misc quirk code for chip specific bugs.
    • Added ale(4): Attansic/Atheros L1E Gigabit Ethernet.
    • agr(4): added support for layering vlans on top, and allow LACP to be disabled.
    • alc(4): Add a driver for Atheros AR813x/AR815x Ethernet.
    • aue(4): Add support for I-O DATA ETX-US2.
    • bnx(4): Added support for Broadcom BCM5709 and BCM5716 chips. Add support for Broadcom BCM5709S (SerDes) chip.
    • et(4), etphy(4): Add a driver for Agere/LSI ET1310/ET1301 10/100/Gigabit Ethernet device and the Agere/LSI ET1011 TruePHY Gigabit Ethernet PHY.
    • kue(4): fixed unaligned memory accesses so it now works on ARM and MIPS machines.
    • ne(4): add proper support for NE2000 8-bit mode.
    • nfe(4): Add support for flow control for MCP65.
    • otus(4): Atheros AR9100U driver.
    • smsh(4): Add a SMSC LAN9118 Family Ethernet driver.
    • upgt(4): Add a driver for Conexant/Intersil PrismGT SoftMAC USB IEEE 802.11b/g WLAN.

  • Storage:

    • Added an experimental in-kernel iSCSI initiator, from Wasabi Systems.
    • viaide(4): Added VT8237S Integrated SATA controller support, and VT6410 PATA RAID controller support (without RAID).
    • Added LVM functionality with dm(4) driver and lvm2 userland tools.
    • Added support for 82965PM to piixide(4).
    • vnd(4): implemented DIOCCACHESYNC. Also, allow vnd(4) to be backed by a sparse file.
    • Added sdmmc(4) driver for SD/MMC.
    • mvsata(4): support the Marvell Hercules-I/II SATA controllers.
    • flash(9): Add a subsystem to handle flash memory devices, and nand(9), a subsystem to handle NAND controllers.
    • mfi(4): Add support for LSI's newer (GEN2) RAID controller.
    • nside(4): Add a driver for the National Semiconductor PC87415 IDE controller.
    • raid(4):
      • RAIDFrame parity maps, which greatly improve parity rewrite times after unclean shutdown.
      • Added support for non 512-byte sector devices.
      • Added support for >2TB devices.

  • USB:

    • uftdi(4): Added support for REX-USB60F.
    • ehci(4): work around USB subsystem freeze for SB600/SB700 chipsets.
    • ums(4): Added touchpanel support.

  • Graphics and Video:

    • drm(4): updated to mesa-drm 85b9f737db0d2a845e4d7e2bbf9ad12ff9e2227c.
    • acpivga(4): ACPI Video Extensions driver.
    • agp(4): Added support for Intel G35, Intel G45, and Intel 82855GM.
    • auvitek(4): Add a driver for Auvitek AU0828 family USB video capture controllers.
    • dtv(4): Add new digital TV framework.
    • cxdtv(4): Add driver for Conexant CX23880-based DTV cards.
    • emdtv(4): Add a driver for Empia EM28xx family USB video capture controllers.
    • omapfb(4): a simple driver for OMAP 3xxx on-chip video, especially the Beagleboard.

  • Miscellaneous:

    • Added Elantech multi-touch trackpad support to pms(4).
    • Added the altmem(4) “alternative memory” disk driver, which allows memory that is normally inaccessible by the machine-dependent pmap(9) to be used (as swap space).
    • ichlpcib(4): support 82801IEM LPC Interface Bridge.
    • Complete rework of gpio(4) to integrate with kauth(9), allow for runtime driver attachment, and naming of individual pins.
    • Added gpiosim(4) driver to simulate a gpio(4) device for testing purposes.
    • Added gpioiic(4) driver to bit-bang an I2C bus using GPIO pins.
    • btmagic(4): Apple Magic Mouse driver.
    • vmt(4): Add a VMware Tools driver, from OpenBSD.

Platforms

  • x86 (i386, amd64):
    • pxeboot(8) now parses boot.cfg(5).
    • The bootloader has been enhanced to support framebuffer consoles using VESA BIOS extensions. x86 ports now work with the genfb(4) framebuffer, and the i386-only vesafb(4) framebuffer has been obsoleted.
    • Added ucas(9) support for x86.
    • sysinst(8) now defaults to UFS2 for x86 platforms.
    • CPU topology detection suport for AMD processors.
    • Enable Ext2fs support in bootloader.
    • Booting from a disk with a GUID Partition Table (GPT) is now possible.
    • Support userconf(4) command in boot.cfg(5).
  • i386:
    • Use “i486” as GNU_ARCH.
    • Added PAE (Physical Address Extension) support.
    • Better support for VIA C7 CPUs.
  • amd64:
    • Added direct map support (mapping of all physical memory using large pages).
  • alpha:
    • X11: add support for X11FLAVOUR=xorg.
    • Support for Avalon A12 removed.
    • Converted Alpha to use PCU to manage FPU.
  • amiga:
    • Added basic PCI support.
    • efa(4): ELBOX FastATA 1200 driver.
    • Add a driver for BlizzardPPC 603e+ SCSI.
  • amigappc:
    • A CSPPC system with ahsc(4) or cbiiisc(4) boots into multiuser;
    • Onboard serial now works.
    • efa(4): ELBOX FastATA 1200 driver.
  • ARM ports (acorn26, acorn32, cats, evbarm, hpcarm, iyonix, netwinder, shark, zaurus):
    • Cortex-A8 CPU support is available.
    • i.MX51 SoC support is available.
  • atari:
    • Add support for the SMC Elite Ultra Ethernet with the SMC_TT VME-ISA bridge.
    • Add support for the EtherNEC, ISA NE2000 based Ethernet connected to Atari ROM cartridge slot.
  • bebox:
    • Support xserver. Tested on s3(TRIO 64V+).
  • cobalt:
    • Add LBA48 support to bootloader so that it can safely load a kernel from NetBSD partition beyond >137GB boundary.
  • dreamcast:
    • Fixed a long standing GD-ROM driver bug so that file system on GD-ROM works properly.
    • Build and put a raw binary format kernel into distribution.
    • Switch to using Xorg servers and binaries.
  • evbarm:
    • Improved GPIO support on the EP93xx processors.
    • Added support for Gumstix Verdex and Verdex Pro.
    • Support Marvell Sheevaplug and some Marvell SoC NAS boxes.
    • Add initial support for Sharp NetWalker MID.
    • Add driver for OMAP NAND controllers.
    • Add FriendlyARM Mini2440 support.
    • Add initial support for the RaspberryPi. No support yet for the USB controller, the Ethernet interface, or the video chip. Serial console works, and boots multiuser.
  • evbmips:
    • Added voyagerfb(4) driver, for the Gdium Liberty 1000's video controller.
    • Added support for RMI XLS6ATX_7A board and XL SoC family.
    • Added support for RMI (NetLogic) XLS/XLR models.
  • evbppc:
    • Enable builds for OEA, ibm4xx and Book-E modules.
  • evbsh3:
    • Add support for Alpha Project MS104-SH4, TAC T-SH7706LAN Rev.3 and TAC T-SH7706LSR Rev.1.
  • hp300:
    • Switch NetBSD/hp300 to wscons with rasops.
    • Add support for framebuffers on HP362 and HP382.
    • Add support for Apollo Domain keyboard.
  • hppa:
    • Added support for UFS2 boot.
    • pmap update: Support PA 2.0 machines in 32 bit mode. Improve support for machines without the PA7100LC or PA7300LC CPUs.
    • Added ucas(9) support for hppa.
    • com(4) at dino now works.
    • lcd(4): Driver for hppa lcds added.
    • Add support for elroy(4), astro(4), and ssio(4) based 64-bit machines running in 32-bit mode.
    • Update sti(4) and add pci(4) attachment.
    • Add support for HIL devices.
    • Support added for machines with the uturn(4) I/O subsystem.
  • hpcarm:
    • Add support for Sharp W-ZERO3 series.
    • Use rtc_offset passed from hpcboot.
    • Bump MAXPARTITIONS from 8 to 16.
    • Switch to using Xorg servers and binaries.
    • Improve console speed on W-ZERO3 machines using write through mapping for framebuffer memory.
    • Improve install on JORNADA720.
  • hpcmips:
    • Switch to using Xorg servers and binaries.
  • hpcsh:
    • Switch to using Xorg servers and binaries.
    • Add sysinst(8) support.
  • landisk:
    • Added UFS2 boot support.
    • Enable to build a bootable install disk image.
  • luna68k:
    • Enable LUNA to load -current kernels director from firmware.
    • Make SCSI work properly.
    • Use the original OMRON font derived from 4.4BSD-Lite/luna68k rather than gallant19 which is used on Sun workstations.
    • Complete LUNA-II support.
  • mac68k:
    • Add timecounter support to the CSI Hurdler Centronics Parallel Interface cpi(4) driver.
  • macppc:
    • Support new-style module(7) kernel modules.
  • m68k ports (amiga, atari, cesfic, hp300, luna68k, mac68k, mvme68k, news68k, next68k, sun2, sun3, x68k):
    • Re-enable m68k optimized in_cksum routine.
    • Support module(7) loading.
    • Fixed a regression in FPU_EMULATE code that caused weird awk(1) behavior.
    • Add hyperbolic and trigonometric functions to m68k FPE.
  • mips ports (algor, arc, cobalt, emips, evbmips, ews4800, hpcmips, mipsco, newsmips, pmax, sbmips, sgimips):
    • Added support for 64-bit MIPS processors (O32, N32, N64 ABIs are supported).
    • Added SMP support for MIPS architecture.
    • Rewritten interrupt handling to be much more efficient, added "fast" software interrupts and kernel preemption.
    • Converted MIPS to use PCU to manage FPU.
    • Added MIPS32R2 and MIPS64R2 support.
    • Rework Atheros MIPS-based SoC support. Add initial support for AR71xx (24K) and AR9344 (74K) SoCs
    • Added support for ralink RT3883 SoC from CradlePoint Technologies.
    • Added support for MIPS DSP v2 ASE.
  • ofppc:
    • Support Gigabit Ethernet Controller for MV64361 on PegasosII.
    • Support for RDB partitions.
  • pmax:
    • Added UFS2 boot support.
  • powerpc ports (amigappc, bebox, evbppc, ibmnws, macppc, mvmeppc, ofppc, pmppc, prep, rs6000, sandpoint, walnut):
    • Add support for using secure PLT (thereby allowing data and bss of powerpc programs and shared library to be set non-executable).
    • Added support for Book E Freescale MPC85xx (e500 core) processors. Added "fast" software interrupts support and SOFTFLOAT for PowerPC (Book E only), reworked FPU/VEC support for e500 SPE, other improvements.
    • Converted PowerPC to use PCU to manage FPU/AltiVec/SPE.
    • Initial SMP support for MPC85xx, reworked and unified IPI code, various other improvements.
    • Switch to using direct-mapped uareas (pcb + kernel stacks).
    • The generic PIC code now supports Matt Thomas's fast softintr code.
  • prep:
    • Support Xserver. Tested with on-board s3(864).
  • sandpoint:
    • Added support for Marvell-SKnet in netboot.
    • D-Link DSM-G600 support.
    • Add support for booting from RAID 1.
    • Iomega Storcenter support.
    • Netronix NH-230/231 and compatible NAS are supported.
  • sgimips:
    • Added support for Personal IRIS 4D/20 and 4D/25 (IP6 and IP10).
    • mec(4): Added RX hardware checksum support on O2.
  • sh3 ports (dreamcast, evbsh3, hpcsh, landisk, mmeye):
    • Add some support for SH7706.
  • shark:
  • sparc:
    • Switch sparc port to use wscons(4)
    • zx(4): added wscons(4) support.
    • tcx(4): support wsdisplay(4) and acceleration.
    • apc(4): a driver for the Aurora Personality Chip (APC) found on SPARCstation-4/5 and qemu. Allows to idle the CPU when in the idle loop.
    • Re-enable sparc optimized in_cksum routine.
    • Added support for module(7)-style kernel modules.
  • sparc64:
    • zx(4): added wscons(4) support.
    • Add a driver for LOMlite lights out management hardware monitor and watchdog timer.
    • Add real UltraSPARC-III* CPU support.
    • Add initial support for Fujitsu SPARC64 systems, not yet stable.
    • ffb(4): Added EDID (Extended Display Identification Data) reading, and video mode setting support.
    • Added fast softint(9) support.
    • Add support for Enterprise (3000, 3500, 4000, 4500, 500x, 5500, 600x, 6500, 10000) systems.
  • x68k:
    • Switched pow(4) to use powerd(8).
    • Fix bootloader failure on X68030+060turbo.
    • Removed pow(4) and rtcalarm(8).
    • powsw(4): a revised power switch driver.
  • xen:
    • Add PCI pass-through support for Xen3. Dom0 kernel gets a pciback(4) driver, to which the device specified in the pciback.hide boot parameter will attach. DomU kernels get a xpci(4) driver, to which PCI busses will attach.
    • Added XEN3PAE_DOM0, an i386 dom0 kernel with PAE support. Requires an i386PAE or x86_64 hypervisor.
    • balloon(4): Balloon driver now enabled for all Xen kernels.
    • Dropped Xen 2 support. Xen 3.1 or later is now required.
    • Added support for request-rx-copy in the virtual network device backend.
    • Provide experimental support for suspend/resume in NetBSD domUs.
    • Enable no-execute bit feature for i386pae and amd64 kernels.
    • Added support for feature-flush-cache in block device backend, used in block device frontend for DIOCCACHESYNC.
  • zaurus:
    • Added zboot.
    • Added playback and recording support to zaudio(4).
    • Add Xorg support.
    • Add ioexp driver for SL-C1000.
    • Add PXA25x based Zaurus SL-C700/750/760/860 support.

Userland

  • 3rd party software updates:

    • acpi(4): ACPICA 20110623.
    • atf(7) 0.15.
    • ISC cron(8) 4.1.
    • OpenSSH 5.9
    • OpenSSL 1.0.1c
    • lvm2tools 2.02.44 and libdevmapper 1.02.30
    • dhcpcd 5.5.4
    • am-utils updated from head; adds UDF support and -uu
    • CVS 1.12.13
    • BIND 9.9.1-P4.
    • libbind 6.0-rc1.
    • FSF binutils 2.21.1a.
    • httpd(8): bozohttpd 20111118
    • file(1) 5.09
    • ntp 4.2.6p5
    • flex(1) 2.5.35.
    • gcc(1) 4.5.3.
    • gdb(1) 7.3.1.
    • GNU MP 5.0.2.
    • less(1) 444.
    • libfetch 2.23
    • Lua 5.1.4
    • OpenLDAP 2.4.23
    • SQLite 3.6.9
    • tmux(1) 1.5
    • trousers-0.3.8; tmp-tools 1.3.7.1
    • xz(1) 5.0.0
    • byacc 20110908
    • tzdata2011n
    • dns-sd(1): Import mDNSResponder 212.1.

  • Libraries:

    • libc:
      • Add new ptree (Patricia / RADIX tree) implementation.
      • Added fopendir(3).
      • Added RFC 2045 MIME Quoted-Printable support.
      • Added glob_pattern_p(3).
      • Added memrchr(3).
      • Added stpcpy(3), stpncpy(3), and strnlen(3).
      • Added %s (seconds since the Epoch) to strptime(3), for symmetry with strftime(3).
      • Added the getdate(3) and getdate_err value, conforming to IEEE Std 1003.1 (“POSIX.1”) and the Open Group Base Specifications X/Open System Interfaces extension (“XSI”).
      • Added getdelim(3) and getline(3).
      • Added posix_spawn(3).
      • Added a space-efficient write-once database (cdbr(3), cdbw(3)).
      • Provide a re-entrant and thread-safe set of timezone APIs that don't require locking and can operate on user-specified timezones.
    • libm: Add f{dim,max,min}{,f,l} from FreeBSD.
    • Replaced termcap with terminfo(3).
    • perfuse: Add the PUFFS RElay to FUSE library, which bridges the kernel level API for FUSE filesystems with native PUFFS.
    • rump(3)
      • Moved VFS functionality from librump to a new library, librumpvfs.
      • Added support for remote system calls.
      • Add IPv6 support to rumpnet.
      • Support kernel config framework and devices in rumpdev.
      • rumpfs: support registering exernal files which are accessed from the host OS file system namespace instead of from within the rump virtual kernel.
      • rumpvfs: Use the unmodified kernel vnode pager.
    • bluetooth(3): updated the Bluetooth service discovery API and merged it into libbluetooth, retiring the separate libsdp.

  • Installer (sysinst):

    • Default to wapbl(4) logging for UFS partitions.
    • Make sure the installer rejects UFS2 for root partitions on ports whose bootloaders don't support booting from UFS2.

  • Changes to the way make(1) processes .for loops.
  • makefs(8): Added support for encoding RISC OS metadata into ISO9660 file systems.
  • mount(8): Added -o rump, which mounts the file system as a userspace server via puffs(4) and rump(3) instead of using a kernel drver.
  • dkctl(8): Display cache, strategy and list of wedges if no command is specified on the command line.
  • ar(1): Added support for “deterministic mode”.
  • Added crash(8), a new utility to debug kernel images, based on the in-kernel debugger, ddb(4).
  • eject(1) now has amd(8) support.
  • mtree(8): add -S option to sort entries.
  • Imported netpgp(1), a BSD-licensed PGP implementation.
  • install(1): Added support for writing sha256, sha384, or sha512 hashes to a METALOG.
  • rpcgen(1): Added support for hyper and quad keywords.
  • New wakeonlan(8) command to send Wake-on-LAN packets to machines on the local Ethernet.
  • Added nbperf(1), a minimal perfect hash function generator.
  • unzip(1): a libarchive-based unzip frontend.
  • apropos(1): new implementation using SQLite Full Text Index.
  • audiocfg(1): new tool to control audio defaults.
  • devpubd(8): Add a device publishing daemon for automatic device node creation.
  • disklabel(8): Disable COMPAT_386BSD_MBRPART.
  • dkctl(8): Display cache, strategy, and list of wedges if no command is specified in the command line.
  • fincore(1): Add a utility to query file cache.
  • ifconfig(8): Add the linkstr command which can be used to communicate an arbitrary string with the interface driver.
  • man(1): display a manpage when specified with a path.
  • mkubootimage(1): Added a tool to generate u-boot kernel images.

Besides this list, there have also been innumerable bug fixes and miscellaneous enhancements.

Components removed from NetBSD

In this release of NetBSD, the following software components have been removed from the system. Some were not useful anymore, or their utility did not justify the maintenance overhead. Others were not working properly and there was a lack of interest in fixing them.

  • Support for Xen 2 has been dropped. Xen 3.1 or later is now required to run NetBSD.
  • Support for LKMs (Loadable Kernel Modules) was dropped; use the new module(7) framework.
  • “softdep” support is no longer available in FFS; use wapbl(4) logging instead.
  • The playstation2 port was removed.
  • tn3270 was removed from base; it is available in pkgsrc.
  • Support for Darwin, Mach, IRIX and PECOFF emulation was retired.

NetBSD mirror sites

Please use a mirror site close to you.

System families supported by NetBSD 6.0

The NetBSD 6.0 release provides supported binary distributions for the following systems:

NetBSD/acorn26 Acorn Archimedes, A-series and R-series systems
NetBSD/acorn32 Acorn RiscPC/A7000, VLSI RC7500
NetBSD/algor Algorithmics, Ltd. MIPS evaluation boards
NetBSD/alpha Digital/Compaq Alpha (64-bit)
NetBSD/amd64 AMD family processors like Opteron, Athlon64, and Intel CPUs with EM64T extension
NetBSD/amiga Commodore Amiga and MacroSystem DraCo
NetBSD/amigappc PowerPC-based Amiga boards.
NetBSD/arc MIPS-based machines following the Advanced RISC Computing spec
NetBSD/atari Atari TT030, Falcon, Hades
NetBSD/bebox Be Inc's BeBox
NetBSD/cats Chalice Technology's CATS and Intel's EBSA-285 evaluation boards
NetBSD/cesfic CES FIC8234 VME processor board
NetBSD/cobalt Cobalt Networks' MIPS-based Microservers
NetBSD/dreamcast Sega Dreamcast game console
NetBSD/emips The Extensible MIPS architecture from Microsoft Research
NetBSD/evbarm Various ARM-based evaluation boards and appliances
NetBSD/evbmips Various MIPS-based evaluation boards and appliances
NetBSD/evbppc Various PowerPC-based evaluation boards and appliances
NetBSD/evbsh3 Various Hitachi Super-H SH3 and SH4-based evaluation boards and appliances
NetBSD/ews4800mips NEC's MIPS-based EWS4800 workstation
NetBSD/hp300 Hewlett-Packard 9000/300 and 400 series
NetBSD/hppa Hewlett-Packard 9000 Series 700 workstations
NetBSD/hpcarm StrongARM based Windows CE PDA machines
NetBSD/hpcmips MIPS-based Windows CE PDA machines
NetBSD/hpcsh Hitachi Super-H based Windows CE PDA machines
NetBSD/i386 IBM PCs and PC clones with i486-family processors and up
NetBSD/ibmnws IBM Network Station 1000
NetBSD/iyonix Castle Technology's Iyonix ARM based PCs
NetBSD/landisk SH4 processor based NAS appliances
NetBSD/luna68k OMRON Tateisi Electric's LUNA series
NetBSD/mac68k Apple Macintosh with Motorola 68k CPU
NetBSD/macppc Apple PowerPC-based Macintosh and clones
NetBSD/mipsco MIPS Computer Systems Inc. family of workstations and servers
NetBSD/mmeye Brains mmEye multimedia server
NetBSD/mvme68k Motorola MVME 68k Single Board Computers
NetBSD/mvmeppc Motorola PowerPC VME Single Board Computers
NetBSD/netwinder StrongARM based NetWinder machines
NetBSD/news68k Sony's 68k-based “NET WORK STATION” series
NetBSD/newsmips Sony's MIPS-based “NET WORK STATION” series
NetBSD/next68k NeXT 68k “black” hardware
NetBSD/ofppc OpenFirmware PowerPC machines
NetBSD/pmax Digital MIPS-based DECstations and DECsystems
NetBSD/prep PReP (PowerPC Reference Platform) and CHRP machines
NetBSD/rs6000 IBM RS/6000 MCA-based PowerPC machines.
NetBSD/sandpoint Motorola Sandpoint reference platform, including many PPC-based NAS boxes
NetBSD/sbmips Broadcom SiByte evaluation boards
NetBSD/sgimips Silicon Graphics' MIPS-based workstations
NetBSD/shark Digital DNARD (“shark”)
NetBSD/sparc Sun SPARC (32-bit) and UltraSPARC (in 32-bit mode)
NetBSD/sparc64 Sun UltraSPARC (in native 64-bit mode)
NetBSD/sun2 Sun Microsystems Sun 2 machines with Motorola 68010 CPU
NetBSD/sun3 Motorola 68020 and 030 based Sun 3 and 3x machines
NetBSD/vax Digital VAX
NetBSD/x68k Sharp X680x0 series
NetBSD/xen The Xen virtual machine monitor
NetBSD/zaurus Sharp ARM PDAs

Ports available in source form only for this release include the following:

NetBSD/ia64 Itanium family of processors

Acknowledgments

The NetBSD Foundation would like to thank all those who have contributed code, hardware, documentation, funds, colocation for our servers, web pages and other documentation, release engineering, and other resources over the years. More information on the people who make NetBSD happen is available at:

www.NetBSD.org/people/

We would like to especially thank the University of California at Berkeley and the GNU Project for particularly large subsets of code that we use. We would also like to thank the Internet Systems Consortium Inc. and the Network Security Lab at Columbia University's Computer Science Department for current colocation services.

About NetBSD

NetBSD is a free, fast, secure, and highly portable Unix-like Open Source operating system. It is available for a wide range of platforms, from large-scale servers and powerful desktop systems to handheld and embedded devices. Its clean design and advanced features make it excellent for use in both production and research environments, and the source code is freely available under a business-friendly license. NetBSD is developed and supported by a large and vibrant international community. Many applications are readily available through pkgsrc, the NetBSD Packages Collection.

About the NetBSD Foundation

The NetBSD Foundation was chartered in 1995, with the task of overseeing core NetBSD project services, promoting the project within industry and the open source community, and holding intellectual property rights on much of the NetBSD code base. Day-to-day operations of the project are handled by volunteers.

As a non-profit organization with no commercial backing, the NetBSD Foundation depends on donations from its users, and we would like to ask you to consider making a donation to the NetBSD Foundation in support of continuing production of our fine operating system. Your generous donation would be particularly welcome to help with ongoing upgrades and maintenance, as well as with operating expenses for the NetBSD Foundation.

Donations can be done via PayPal to , or via Google Checkout and are fully tax-deductible in the US. See www.NetBSD.org/donations/ for more information, or contact directly.

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