I got OpenBSD installed onto my laptop, and am really thinkin about just using it as something like a Snort box, maybe a bit of a firewall as well, but really don't have any idea of how to do it. I've managed to install a very few packages (bash being the first ) and can manage my way around the box as it's similar in layout and controls as Linux.

However...

I have a few questions just to ease my progress that by trial and error I may find out, but I'm looking for some experienced user to assist me in my trials:

Can I just grab source like I do with linux and compile? Is it very similar, or not at all? If it is indeed similar, is my compiler GCC?

I'm a Slackware user, will setting up this box be more in depth than it was the first time setting up Slackware (For those who have of course )?

How in tune with the force will I have to be to become a BSD master Obiwon?

That's about all that comes to mind immediately, a few things about this box:
I won't run X on it, for several reasons (size, video constraints, HD size), so what are my options as far as browsers go? I guess this extends back to my first question, if I can just grab source and go, then I really don't need to worry about this as I'll sort that out later.

Thanks for any info, and if you feel I'm missing something, feel free to add it as well

For those who may think I'm an idiot and point me to the afterboot page, I've been there. I've read most of the documents aimed at 'newbies' but they, like many other pages, seemed to be aimed at newbies who have some sort of Official training with the OS.

Again, Thank You for any info

Cool

Go to your favorite OpenBSD mirror. Mine is... surprise: ftp.oss.cc.gatech.edu, from the top level of the 3.3 directory, download the ports.tar.gz file, move it to /usr and untar it. This will take a very very very long time.

Actually... the ports tree from 3.3 doesn't have a good browser in it. -current and snapshots have a ports tree that won't compile right on a 3.3 release... hmm.

Download this one:

www.clockwatching.net/~fin/temp/ports.tar.gz

Its a snapshot of the ports tree from around mid-may, under /usr/ports/www you'll have firebird, about version 0.6-ish.

cd /usr/ports/www/mozilla-firebird
make

Then wait... about er, p133? about 10 hours, maybe 15. It'll download and build all of gtk necessary to get firebird working, unzip, zip, the graphics libs, etc...

Poke through the ports collection, there's a ton of stuff in there. Normal source packages tend not to compile cleanly, they always take a patch or two to get running, which is what the ports collection is for.

Cheers,

Finegan

Thanks Fin! The only problem with the above is that I won't be running X, at least, I'm not planning on running X because of my size restraints (~700MB HD, 32MB Ram, P100), but if you think I can and should, I'll definitely throw that on there and then compile the ports package (I got it, thanks!).

Cool

It'll run buggedy ass slow, but X will be alright... with 24megs of RAM I've got an almost useable firebird on a 133, with 40 I was free and clear. Dunno... toss up man. It'll make an alright snort box for sure. Airsnort I don't know about, if its in the ports then its been patched to deal with the different command set necessary to get a BSD wireless card into monitor mode. I know Snort works out of ports... that's no biggie.

Cheers,

Finegan

I'm pretty new to BSD myself. I just installed FreeBSD on a pentium 133, 16Mb RAM, 631Mb box...and I'm using fluxbox with no problems.

Heh, mine too.

This is do to the a.out to elf switch on OpenBSD. You might be better off at this point getting the 3.4 BETA out of the snapshots dir.

Might also want to read the afterboot man page, a lot of good info in there as well.

Sounds good everyone, thanks for all the replies. Will throw X on it and watch it cough up blood trying to keep up

Cool

Ok, so I'm sitting here getting ready to 'make' firebird, however, I haven't install X yet, will make take care of that for me, or should I install the x package that was available during initial setup? And if so, how would I go about adding those packages that were available at that time?



Ah yeah, how nice it is to be a n00b again

Cool

You can grab the X distribution off the ftp site. Just untar the needed packages.

You'll need to set the kernel aperture to run X on OpenBSD if you didn't set that during the install. I think this is done in /etc/sysctl.conf

From there you should be able to install Mozilla-firebird, which btw is what I'm posting from right now. Runs flawlessly on OBSD.

Congrats on the install...it's a great OS, I'm sure you'll like it. And your Slack skills will translate quickly to the new system.

I say more power to you for not running x on the box, though if you've chosen already, no biggie. Lynx does come with the system out of the box, so if you really need info in a hurry, you have that as an option.

Regards,

Dave

I suppose you choosed OpenBSD because you wanted security. Why you risk it with X?
Lynx is there for browsing - though there are always webpages that have no respect to command line browsers... I myself rather avoid browsing on my BSD box than using X.
As for installation from source: my experiences mainly concern FreeBSD, where it is flowless, and I even prefer it over the ports tree. (I have some ancient systems with ancient ports trees, so I had more troubles with installation from ports than with installation from source )

Thanks for all the replies So far I'm just toying with it, learning now things work with OpenBSD, "getting my feet wet" basically. Once I go to using it solely as the packet sniffer/firewall, I'll definitely secure the pup back up

Got X installed, now working on a window manager (P1's are definitely not compiling platforms ), then I'll add a browser (thanks for the lynx info!).

Cool

I use Lynx on my OpenBSD box when I have to, actually same with my FreeBSD box. I run OBSD headless on a SPARCstation so I only have console. On the FreeBSD I do have KVM but I didn't want X hogging resources. If you just want to view HTML format manuals and test reachability of local or remote websites, I would stick to Lynx. No reason to install bloatware 9000 (X) if you don't have to.