The most complete authoritative technical guide to the FreeBSD kernel's internal structure has
now been extensively updated to cover all major improvements between Versions 5 and 11.
Approximately one-third of this edition's content is completely new and another one-third has
been extensively rewritten. Three long-time FreeBSD project leaders begin with a concise
overview of the FreeBSD kernel's current design and implementation. Next they cover the
FreeBSD kernel from the system-call level down-from the interface to the kernel to the
hardware. Explaining key design decisions they detail the concepts data structures and
algorithms used in implementing each significant system facility including process management
security virtual memory the I O system filesystems socket IPC and networking. This Second
Edition * Explains highly scalable and lightweight virtualization using FreeBSD jails and
virtual-machine acceleration with Xen and Virtio device paravirtualization * Describes new
security features such as Capsicum sandboxing and GELI cryptographic disk protection * Fully
covers NFSv4 and Open Solaris ZFS support * Introduces FreeBSD's enhanced volume management and
new journaled soft updates * Explains DTrace's fine-grained process debugging profiling *
Reflects major improvements to networking wireless and USB support Readers can use this guide
as both a working reference and an in-depth study of a leading contemporary portable open
source operating system. Technical and sales support professionals will discover both FreeBSD's
capabilities and its limitations. Applications developers will learn how to effectively and
efficiently interface with it system administrators will learn how to maintain tune and
configure it and systems programmers will learn how to extend enhance and interface with it.
Marshall Kirk McKusick writes consults and teaches classes on UNIX- and BSD-related subjects.
While at the University of California Berkeley he implemented the 4.2BSD fast filesystem. He
was research computer scientist at the Berkeley Computer Systems Research Group (CSRG)
overseeing development and release of 4.3BSD and 4.4BSD. He is a FreeBSD Foundation board
member and a long-time FreeBSD committer. Twice president of the Usenix Association he is also
a member of ACM IEEE and AAAS. George V. Neville-Neil hacks writes teaches and consults on
security networking and operating systems. A FreeBSD Foundation board member he served on
the FreeBSD Core Team for four years. Since 2004 he has written the Kode Vicious column for
Queue and Communications of the ACM. He is vice chair of ACM's Practitioner Board and a member
of Usenix Association ACM IEEE and AAAS. Robert N.M. Watson is a University Lecturer in
systems security and architecture in the Security Research Group at the University of
Cambridge Computer Laboratory. He supervises advanced research in computer architecture
compilers program analysis operating systems networking and security. A FreeBSD Foundation
board member he served on the Core Team for ten years and has been a committer for fifteen
years. He is a member of Usenix Association and ACM.
