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FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE Announcement

Date: December 7, 2021

The FreeBSD Release Engineering Team is pleased to announce the availability of FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE. This is the fourth release of the stable/12 branch.

Some of the highlights:

    Updates to various networking drivers.

    Several updates to upstream contributed software.

    Several userland application improvements and kernel bug fixes.

    And much more…

For a complete list of new features and known problems, please see the online release notes and errata list, available at:

    https://www.FreeBSD.org/releases/12.3R/relnotes/

    https://www.FreeBSD.org/releases/12.3R/errata/

For more information about FreeBSD release engineering activities, please see:

    https://www.FreeBSD.org/releng/

Dedication

The FreeBSD Project dedicates the FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE to the memory of Ian Lepore.
Availability

FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE is now available for the amd64, i386, powerpc, powerpc64, sparc64, armv6, armv7, and aarch64 architectures.

FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE can be installed from bootable ISO images or over the network. Some architectures also support installing from a USB memory stick. The required files can be downloaded as described in the section below.

SHA512 and SHA256 hashes for the release ISO, memory stick, and SD card images are included at the bottom of this message.

PGP-signed checksums for the release images are also available at:

    https://www.FreeBSD.org/releases/12.3R/signatures/

A PGP-signed version of this announcement is available at:

    https://www.FreeBSD.org/releases/12.3R/announce.asc

The purpose of the images provided as part of the release are as follows:

dvd1

    This contains everything necessary to install the base FreeBSD operating system, the documentation, debugging distribution sets, and a small set of pre-built packages aimed at getting a graphical workstation up and running. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode. This should be all you need if you can burn and use DVD-sized media.

    Additionally, this can be written to a USB memory stick (flash drive) for the amd64 architecture and used to do an install on machines capable of booting off USB drives. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode.

    As one example of how to use the memstick image, assuming the USB drive appears as /dev/da0 on your machine something like this should work:

    # dd if=FreeBSD-12.3-RELEASE-amd64-dvd1.iso \
        of=/dev/da0 bs=1m conv=sync

    Be careful to make sure you get the target (of=) correct.
disc1

    This contains the base FreeBSD operating system. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode. There are no pre-built packages.

    Additionally, this can be written to a USB memory stick (flash drive) for the amd64 architecture and used to do an install on machines capable of booting off USB drives. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode. There are no pre-built packages.

    As one example of how to use the memstick image, assuming the USB drive appears as /dev/da0 on your machine something like this should work:

    # dd if=FreeBSD-12.3-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso \
        of=/dev/da0 bs=1m conv=sync

    Be careful to make sure you get the target (of=) correct.
bootonly

    This supports booting a machine using the CDROM drive but does not contain the installation distribution sets for installing FreeBSD from the CD itself. You would need to perform a network based install (e.g., from an HTTP or FTP server) after booting from the CD.

    Additionally, this can be written to a USB memory stick (flash drive) for the amd64 architecture and used to do an install on machines capable of booting off USB drives. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode. There are no pre-built packages.

    As one example of how to use the memstick image, assuming the USB drive appears as /dev/da0 on your machine something like this should work:

    # dd if=FreeBSD-12.3-RELEASE-amd64-bootonly.iso \
        of=/dev/da0 bs=1m conv=sync

    Be careful to make sure you get the target (of=) correct.
memstick

    This can be written to a USB memory stick (flash drive) and used to do an install on machines capable of booting off USB drives. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode. There are no pre-built packages.

    As one example of how to use the memstick image, assuming the USB drive appears as /dev/da0 on your machine something like this should work:

    # dd if=FreeBSD-12.3-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img \
        of=/dev/da0 bs=1m conv=sync

    Be careful to make sure you get the target (of=) correct.
mini-memstick

    This can be written to a USB memory stick (flash drive) and used to boot a machine, but does not contain the installation distribution sets on the medium itself, similar to the bootonly image. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode. There are no pre-built packages.

    As one example of how to use the mini-memstick image, assuming the USB drive appears as /dev/da0 on your machine something like this should work:

    # dd if=FreeBSD-12.3-RELEASE-amd64-mini-memstick.img \
        of=/dev/da0 bs=1m conv=sync

    Be careful to make sure you get the target (of=) correct.
FreeBSD/arm SD card images

    These can be written to an SD card and used to boot the supported arm system. The SD card image contains the full FreeBSD installation, and can be installed onto SD cards as small as 512Mb.

    For convenience for those without console access to the system, a freebsd user with a password of freebsd is available by default for ssh(1) access. Additionally, the root user password is set to root, which it is strongly recommended to change the password for both users after gaining access to the system.

    To write the FreeBSD/arm image to an SD card, use the dd(1) utility, replacing KERNEL with the appropriate kernel configuration name for the system.

    # dd if=FreeBSD-12.3-RELEASE-arm-armv6-KERNEL.img \
        of=/dev/da0 bs=1m conv=sync

    Be careful to make sure you get the target (of=) correct.

FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE can also be purchased on CD-ROM or DVD from several vendors. One of the vendors that will be offering FreeBSD 12.3-based products is:

    FreeBSD Mall, Inc. https://www.freebsdmall.com

Pre-installed virtual machine images are also available for the amd64 (x86_64), i386 (x86_32), and AArch64 (arm64) architectures in QCOW2, VHD, and VMDK disk image formats, as well as raw (unformatted) images.

FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE amd64 is also available on these cloud hosting platforms:

    FreeBSD/amd64 Amazon® EC2™:
    AMIs are available in the following regions:

      af-south-1 region: ami-0eb5b520bc6ffdf3c
      eu-north-1 region: ami-049a940cffe531b08
      ap-south-1 region: ami-0ce01cde4f9be6450
      eu-west-3 region: ami-0ea2db3e85025dcfa
      eu-west-2 region: ami-0265b59a89510e50f
      eu-south-1 region: ami-0d3fa75e54398c77c
      eu-west-1 region: ami-0d5cd35746013f7e3
      ap-northeast-3 region: ami-00a2c8bfc41fbbcc1
      ap-northeast-2 region: ami-0df9578e64d2a7ad8
      me-south-1 region: ami-046b86645e3576f9b
      ap-northeast-1 region: ami-09e3ff0f870e14442
      sa-east-1 region: ami-072830fc32709dca5
      ca-central-1 region: ami-03a70893a7eb10727
      ap-east-1 region: ami-0cda17669412af91b
      ap-southeast-1 region: ami-0c8858a5e3610b112
      ap-southeast-2 region: ami-003a185d6bc902f22
      eu-central-1 region: ami-08d7faf045c4b7a52
      us-east-1 region: ami-0762f1426163a4437
      us-east-2 region: ami-046c54f1c7e8cd30b
      us-west-1 region: ami-051d9d9e981f07e53
      us-west-2 region: ami-0c29a972614f0eaa0

    AMIs are also available in the Amazon® Marketplace at:
    https://aws.amazon.com/marketplace/pp/B07L6QV354/

These AMI IDs can be retrieved from the Systems Manager Parameter Store in each region using the keys:

   /aws/service/freebsd/amd64/base/ufs/12.3/RELEASE

+ FreeBSD/arm64 Amazon® EC2™:
AMIs are available in the following regions:

+

  af-south-1 region: ami-0bafdb11f21d34857
  eu-north-1 region: ami-03aa15943bced5272
  ap-south-1 region: ami-07f3cf46b968d2857
  eu-west-3 region: ami-01d2b426e49f9e1ec
  eu-west-2 region: ami-00a23846ec16aed8a
  eu-south-1 region: ami-0f0c9c73e88f129bf
  eu-west-1 region: ami-090898b9e7da158fc
  ap-northeast-3 region: ami-05f946201fabf1abb
  ap-northeast-2 region: ami-00be59b6a951c98f2
  me-south-1 region: ami-0767087d3bfee825d
  ap-northeast-1 region: ami-077df7c7a330a0dc3
  sa-east-1 region: ami-0ab88db91655bb3d3
  ca-central-1 region: ami-068e2a023de403a70
  ap-east-1 region: ami-0c66499e650e24834
  ap-southeast-1 region: ami-0641f80688e885d72
  ap-southeast-2 region: ami-018fb7e6d549595e7
  eu-central-1 region: ami-00e003af907b57862
  us-east-1 region: ami-09a739e49858e7222
  us-east-2 region: ami-02a0f1c14934f37b6
  us-west-1 region: ami-081310253bb966725
  us-west-2 region: ami-05d8a3e81f9e22c16

+ AMIs are also available in the Amazon® Marketplace at:
https://aws.amazon.com/marketplace/pp/B081NF7BY7/

These AMI IDs can be retrieved from the Systems Manager Parameter Store in each region using the keys:

   /aws/service/freebsd/arm64/base/ufs/12.3/RELEASE

    Google® Compute Engine™:
    Instances can be deployed using the gcloud utility:

          % gcloud compute instances create INSTANCE \
            --image freebsd-12-3-release-amd64 \
            --image-project=freebsd-org-cloud-dev
          % gcloud compute ssh INSTANCE

    Replace INSTANCE with the name of the Google Compute Engine instance.

    FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE is also expected to be available in the Google Compute Engine™ Marketplace once they have completed third-party specific validation at:
    https://console.cloud.google.com/launcher/browse?filter=category:os&filter=price:free

    Hashicorp/Atlas® Vagrant™:
    Instances can be deployed using the vagrant utility:

          % vagrant init freebsd/FreeBSD-12.3-RELEASE
          % vagrant up

Download

FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE may be downloaded via https from the following site:

    https://download.freebsd.org/ftp/releases/ISO-IMAGES/12.3/

FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE virtual machine images may be downloaded from:

    https://download.freebsd.org/ftp/releases/VM-IMAGES/12.3-RELEASE/

For instructions on installing FreeBSD or updating an existing machine to 12.3-RELEASE please see:

    https://www.FreeBSD.org/releases/12.3R/installation/

Support

Based on the new FreeBSD support model, the FreeBSD 12 release series will be supported until at least June 30, 2024. This point release, FreeBSD 12.3-RELEASE, will be supported until at least three months after FreeBSD 12.4-RELEASE. Additional support information can be found at:

    https://www.FreeBSD.org/security/

Please note that 12.2 will be supported until three months from the 12.3 release date, currently scheduled for March 31, 2022.
Acknowledgments

Many companies donated equipment, network access, or human time to support the release engineering activities for FreeBSD 12.3 including:

The FreeBSD Foundation

Rubicon Communications, LLC (netgate.com)

Tarsnap

NetApp

Internet Systems Consortium

ByteMark Hosting

CyberOne Data

Sentex Data Communications

New York Internet

Juniper Networks

NetActuate

Department of Computer Science, National Chiao Tung University

NLNet Labs

iXsystems

The release engineering team for 12.3-RELEASE includes:

Glen Barber <gjb@FreeBSD.org>
   

Release Engineering Lead, 12.3-RELEASE Release Engineer

Konstantin Belousov <kib@FreeBSD.org>
   

Release Engineering

Antoine Brodin <antoine@FreeBSD.org>
   

Package Building

Bryan Drewery <bdrewery@FreeBSD.org>
   

Release Engineering, Package Building

Marc Fonvieille <blackend@FreeBSD.org>
   

Release Engineering, Documentation

Xin Li <delphij@FreeBSD.org>
   

Release Engineering, Security Team Liaison

Ed Maste <emaste@FreeBSD.org>
   

Security Officer Deputy

Colin Percival <cperciva@FreeBSD.org>
   

Release Engineering Deputy Lead

Hiroki Sato <hrs@FreeBSD.org>
   

Release Engineering, Documentation

Gleb Smirnoff <glebius@FreeBSD.org>
   

Release Engineering

Gordon Tetlow <gordon@FreeBSD.org>
   

Security Officer

Special thanks to Tom Rhodes <trhodes@FreeBSD.org> for his work on the release notes.
Trademark

FreeBSD is a registered trademark of The FreeBSD Foundation.