Chris Cammack's Mostly FreeBSD Notes

Configure Syncoid on FreeBSD

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 11 Oct 2025 08:23:23 -0400

Here’s a quick guide to configure Syncoid on FreeBSD for use with removable drives as an off-site backup solution.

Configure a Fast Org Backlog Function in Doom Emacs

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 16 Aug 2025 12:33:54 -0400

My projects.org file tends to grow, but I’m pretty happy with its overall outline structure, so I use this function to quickly refile the current subtree into the someday.org backlog file.

Open Elfeed Posts in an External Browser on Windows

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 17 Jun 2023 12:35:00 -0700

Elfeed includes a command to open feed items an an external browser, but doing so causes the browser to steal the focus from Emacs. I don’t know of any way to force the browser to remain in the background on Windows, but it’s simple enough to configure Emacs to immediately steal the focus back using an external AutoHotkey script. First, install AutoHotkey from the main site or by using Chocolatey, then write a short AutoHotkey script to wait for Emacs to lose focus and then immediately steal it back.

Jail Dovecot on FreeBSD

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 06 May 2023 10:50:52 -0700

There are many software packages designed to archive email, but it’s pretty simple to just run a full IMAP server on local hardware and move messages to the archive using an email client. Because IMAP is a standard email protocol, the archive will be accessible to any device on the network running practically any email client one might want to use.

Clear Leftover ZFS Metadata

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 30 Jul 2022 11:18:29 -0700

Redeploying an old drive that previously had zpools on it can potentially cause name conflicts when trying to import the new pool into the system unless the leftover ZFS metadata has been cleared first.

Verify ZFS Backups Using zxfer and mtree

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 07 May 2022 15:54:03 -0700

Even if you trust your backup process, the only way to make sure the archive contains what you expect is to perform an occasional test restore using a recent backup and compare it to the original source data. Here’s one way to do that on FreeBSD using zxfer to restore and mtree to compare.

Configure a Wi-Fi Client on FreeBSD

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 13 Nov 2021 10:05:09 -0800

If you need a GUI-based Wi-Fi manager for a FreeBSD desktop environment, consider using networkmgr or wifimgr. For console-based servers or IOT devices, the bsdconfig wireless command should allow one to configure a supported wireless device on FreeBSD after installation, but I have never been able to get it to work properly on my devices.

Install Doom Emacs on Windows

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 24 Jul 2021 21:35:54 -0700

I recently noticed that Xah had trouble installing Doom Emacs on Windows. Here’s how to install it on Windows 7, 8 and 10+ using Chocolatey in case it helps someone else.

Manage Your Configuration Files Using Git

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 20 Mar 2021 19:45:53 -0700

There are dozens of popular ways to manage user dotfile configurations, but I think the simplest might be to just use a bare git repository for each platform.

Automatically Crop Screenshots Using ImageMagick

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 17 Oct 2020 09:49:39 -0700

I don’t like editing images by hand, but occasionally find myself needing to cut down a full page screenshot to extract something of interest like a dialog box with an open menu.

Protect Your zpools From Running Out of Space

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sun, 20 Sep 2020 21:30:41 -0700

One quirk of ZFS is that deleting a file actually uses a small amount of additional drive space to record the deletion, which causes significant problems if a zpool is ever allowed to fill up 100%.

Trigger Software Events Using a Generic 433MHz Wireless Remote

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 25 Jul 2020 20:54:14 -0700

Combine an inexpensive software-defined radio with a generic key fob remote and some open source software to trigger events on a computer.

Create a Centralized Backup Server With FreeBSD

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sun, 26 Apr 2020 13:24:37 -0700

To back up data inexpensively, using removable drives that you swap and carry off-site, install a 5.25" to 3.5" hot swap bay in an old machine and centralize the backup process for all of your hosts onto a dedicated backup server running FreeBSD with ZFS.

Display Server Notifications Using a blink(1)

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sun, 19 Apr 2020 20:24:57 -0700

The blink(1) is an open source USB notification light that can be controlled from the command line.

Back Up ZFS to a Removable Drive Using zxfer

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Mon, 30 Mar 2020 21:01:50 -0700

The zxfer shell script wraps the zfs send and zfs receive commands and provides one of the easiest ways to back up a ZFS-based system to a remote server. It also works just as well to back up data to a local hard drive. Run zpool scrub on the backup drives to detect bit rot, rotate through several drives to maintain multiple copies of the data and store them off-site to create a reliable and inexpensive backup solution.

Check Hard Drive Health in FreeBSD

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 18:29:24 -0700

It’s wise to check a new hard drive for S.M.A.R.T. errors before using it the first time and also to keep an eye on it after it goes into production. In FreeBSD, the Smartmontools package provides a way to check drives for errors on demand using smartctl and on schedule using smartd.

Label GPT Partitions With Their Physical Locations

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Tue, 24 Mar 2020 21:02:40 -0700

Lucas and Jude recommend using GPT labels on each drive partition to indicate the hard drive’s physical location and serial number. This would obviously simplify things when working with large numbers of drives in a remote location, but it seems just as useful to me for a personal sever. Also, it’s really easy to do.

Create (or Expand) a ZFS Mirror in FreeBSD

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 21:42:46 -0700

Here’s a quick guide to convert a system created by the FreeBSD installer from a single-drive stripe into a 2-drive mirror. The same procedure also works to expand an existing mirror by adding additional drives.

Jail Gitea in FreeBSD

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 18 Jan 2020 16:07:26 -0800

Here’s the bare minimum required to run a local instance of Gitea inside a FreeBSD jail.

Schedule ZFS Snapshots Using zfs-auto-snapshot

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 16 Nov 2019 16:35:05 -0800

The ZFS Tools package offers an easy way to automatically create a rotating set of ZFS snapshots for backup purposes. Here’s how to set it up.

Jail Samba in FreeBSD

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sun, 03 Nov 2019 16:40:06 -0800

The release of FreeBSD 12 with VNET support has made it easy to jail a Samba file server using iocage.

Use iocage Plugins to Jail Common Applications

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Tue, 16 Jul 2019 18:20:58 -0700

The plugin feature in iocage makes it easy to create pre-configured container jails for many common applications.

Create VNET Jails in FreeBSD 12 Using iocage

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Tue, 09 Jul 2019 19:14:43 -0700

FreeBSD 12 enables VNET support by default, which gives each jail its own network stack and makes it easy to jail individual applications using iocage.

Install Ubuntu Server and Samba on the ODROID-HC1

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 09:51:04 -0800

The ODROID-HC1 is a simplified version of the ODROID-XU4 single-board computer that has been designed for use as a small headless server. It includes a built-in SATA connector and comes mounted in a stackable aluminum frame that acts both as a heat sink for the CPU and as a mount point for a 2.5" hard drive or SSD.

Schedule Street Cleaning Reminders in Org-mode

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 27 Oct 2018 23:04:21 -0700

Org-mode can parse Emacs diary entries that represent concepts such as the 4th Tuesday of the month, which makes it possible to schedule agenda reminders for periodic events like street sweeping.

Create Wrapper Scripts for youtube-dl

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 02 Jun 2018 23:45:37 -0700

The excellent command-line video downloader youtube-dl can be made even more useful by wrapping it with a couple of batch scripts to handle the most common cases.

Install FreeBSD on a Headless Server Over SSH

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Mon, 21 May 2018 04:15:51 -0700

It can be inconvenient to connect a keyboard and monitor to a headless server tucked away in a closet just to install an operating system. Instead, use VirtualBox to make a small number of changes to a FreeBSD installer image and use SSH to do the installation over the LAN.

Build Notepad++ From Source

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Wed, 11 Apr 2018 23:15:05 -0700

I don’t try to build Notepad++ from source very often, and I’ve never had much luck following the instructions on the github page, so here’s how I do it instead.

Install Cygwin and apt-cyg (and SSH)

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Fri, 30 Mar 2018 23:41:01 -0700

This is the easiest way I know of to install Cygwin and apt-cyg on Windows.

Install CommaFeed Reader on Windows

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 10 Feb 2018 19:51:04 -0700

Although Google Reader ceased operations in 2013, I still rely on RSS every day and won’t check a website regularly unless it offers a feed.

Print Address Labels From a LibreOffice Spreadsheet (Mail Merge)

chris@ccammack.com (Chris Cammack) — Sat, 27 Jan 2018 02:20:14 -0700

I only need to do this once a year, and every year I forget how. MailMerge in LibreOffice is somewhat fiddly and the recommended method seems to change from version to version. These instructions work with version 5.4.5.1.