My FreeBSD Development Setup

I do my FreeBSD development using git , tmux , vim and cscope .

I keep a FreeBSD fork on my github, I have forked https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd to https://github.com/adventureloop/freebsd

On my fork I have the freebsd/freebsd repo set as an upstream

$ git remote -v
origin  git@github.com:adventureloop/freebsd.git (fetch)
origin  git@github.com:adventureloop/freebsd.git (push)
upstream        https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd.git (fetch)
upstream        https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd.git (push)

See this article for information on setting this up https://help.github.com/en/articles/configuring-a-remote-for-a-fork

I do all work on branches using worktrees, keeping the master branch clean.

Periodically I sync the master branch with the FreeBSD upstream:

$ cd ~/code/freebsd-dev/freebsd-git
$ git checkout master
$ git fetch upstream
$ git merge upstream/master
$ git push

I have a development setup based on Ian Lapore's arm set up documented on the FreeBSD wiki https://wiki.freebsd.org/FreeBSD/arm/crossbuild

I have a freebsd-dev directory in my code directory. It their I keep a copy of FreeBSD in freebsd-git , and obj directory for build output and a projects directory for in progress code.

$ tree -L2
.
├── diffs
│   ├── D15222.diff
│   └── old
├── dstdir
│   ├── boot
│   ├── METALOG
│   └── usr
├── freebsd-git
│   ├── bin
│   ├── sbin
...
│   └── usr.sbin
├── obj
│   └── usr
├── projects
│   ├── atomicstats
│   ├── axp288
│   ├── bugsquash
│   ├── byebyejumbograms
...

I use git worktrees for ongoing projects. git worktrees allow you to have a shallow file system copy on a git branch in a directory.

When starting a new project I do something like:

$ cd ~/code/freebsd-dev/freebsd-git
$ git worktree add thj/newdevelopment ../projects/newdevelopment master
$ cd ../projects/newdevelopment

Once the worktree is set up I launch a tmux session in the projects directory. Each random idea or itch I have, if there is enough there, ends up with a project worktree and a tmux session.

tmux allows me to have many windows in a session, I have a serious tmux problem. Right now I have 11 sessions with 42 windows across them. This is a good indicator of my focus level.

I do FreeBSD development with cscope and vim . With tmux splits I normally have an open file and I use other cscope instances in tmux windows to search for things I need in the tree.

I do testing in a bhyve vm and leave the serial port in a tmux window somewhere. I follow the setup in the FreeBSD handbook and back each vm with a zfs dataset.

I do FreeBSD kernel builds using a command like:

env MAKEOBJDIRPREFIX=/home/tom/code/freebsd-dev/obj make -j 44 buildkernel \
        -DKERNFAST installkernel \
    -DNO_ROOT DESTDIR=/home/tom/code/freebsd-dev/dstdir

I then ship kernels to the test vm with scp. jhb@ has a nicer method using the bhyve-loader , but I am yet to try it.

When changes are maturing I create reviews for them using arcanist, manu@ has a good article on doing this