man/man7/hier.7

.\" Copyright (c) 1990, 1993
.\"	The Regents of the University of California.  All rights reserved.
.\"
.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
.\" are met:
.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
.\"    documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors
.\"    may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
.\"    without specific prior written permission.
.\"
.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
.\" ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
.\" SUCH DAMAGE.
.\"
.Dd February 6, 2024
.Dt HIER 7
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm hier
.Nd layout of file systems
.Sh SYNOPSIS
An overview of the file system hierarchy.
.Sh DESCRIPTION
.Bl -tag -width "/libexec/"
.It Pa /
root directory
.It Pa /bin/
user utilities that are fundamental to single-user and multi-user modes
.It Pa /boot/
programs and configuration files used during bootstrap of the operating system
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "nvmecontrol/" -compact
.It Pa defaults/
default bootstrap configuration files; see
.Xr loader.conf 5
.It Pa dtb/
compiled flattened device tree (FDT) files; see
.Xr fdt 4
and
.Xr dtc 1
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "overlays/" -compact
.It Pa overlays/
compiled flattened device tree (FDT) overlays; these can be applied using the
.Va fdt_overlays
setting in
.Xr loader.conf 5
.El
.Pp
.It Pa efi/
mount point for the EFI System Partition (ESP) on UEFI systems
.It Pa firmware/
loadable kernel modules containing binary firmware, for hardware to which
firmware must be downloaded
.It Pa kernel/
pure kernel executable (the operating system loaded into memory at boot time)
and kernel modules
.It Pa modules/
third-party loadable kernel modules, such as those associated with
.Xr ports 7
.It Pa zfs/
.Xr zfs 8
pool cache files
.El
.It Pa /compat/
files supporting binary compatibility with other operating systems
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "nvmecontrol/" -compact
.It Pa linux/
default location for
.Xr linux 4
compatibility run-time
.El
.Pp
.It Pa /dev/
the normal mount point for
.Xr devfs 5
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "nvmecontrol/" -compact
.It Pa fd/
file descriptor files; see
.Xr fd 4
.El
.It Pa /etc/
system configuration files and scripts
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "nvmecontrol/" -compact
.It Pa bluetooth/
bluetooth configuration files
.It Pa defaults/
default system configuration files; see
.Xr rc 8
.It Pa localtime
local timezone information; see
.Xr ctime 3
.It Pa mail/
.Xr sendmail 8
control files
.It Pa mtree/
.Xr mtree 8
configuration files
.It Pa pam.d/
configuration files for the Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) library; see
.Xr pam 3
.It Pa periodic/
scripts that are run daily, weekly, or monthly by
.Xr cron 8 ;
see
.Xr periodic 8
.It Pa ppp/
PPP configuration files; see
.Xr ppp 8
.It Pa rc.d/
system and daemon startup/control scripts; see
.Xr rc 8
.It Pa security/
OpenBSM audit configuration files; see
.Xr audit 8
.It Pa ssh/
OpenSSH configuration files; see
.Xr ssh 1
.It Pa ssl/
OpenSSL configuration files
.El
.It Pa /home/
users' home directories; whilst the layout is not standardized, the typical home for an interactive user
.Dv beastie
would be
.Pa /home/beastie/
.It Pa /lib/
system libraries that are critical to binaries in
.Pa /bin
and
.Pa /sbin
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "nvmecontrol/" -compact
.It Pa geom/
class-specific libraries for the
.Xr geom 8
utility
.It Pa nvmecontrol/
vendor-specific libraries to extend the
.Xr nvmecontrol 8
utility
.El
.It Pa /libexec/
system utilities that are critical to binaries in
.Pa /bin
and
.Pa /sbin
.It Pa /media/
empty directory commonly containing mount points for removable media such as
USB drives, CDs, and DVDs
.It Pa /mnt/
empty directory commonly used by system administrators as a temporary mount
point
.It Pa /net/
automounted NFS shares; see
.Xr auto_master 5
.It Pa /nonexistent/
a non-existent directory; conventionally, a home directory for special user
accounts that do not require a home directory.  See also
.Pa /var/empty/
.It Pa /proc/
process file system; see
.Xr procfs 5
.It Pa /rescue/
statically-linked programs for emergency recovery; see
.Xr rescue 8
.It Pa /root/
home directory of the root user
.It Pa /sbin/
system programs and administration utilities that are fundamental to
single-user and multi-user modes
.It Pa /tmp/
temporary files that may be removed by
.Xr rc 8 ;
see the
.Va clear_tmp_enable
variable of
.Xr rc.conf 5
.It Pa /usr/
contains the majority of user utilities and applications
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "freebsd-dist/" -compact
.It Pa bin/
common utilities, programming tools, and applications
.It Pa freebsd-dist/
distribution files
.Pq like base.txz ; see
.Xr release 7
and
.Xr bsdinstall 8
.It Pa include/
standard C include files
.It Pa lib/
shared and archive
.Xr ar 1 Ns -type
libraries
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa compat/
shared libraries for compatibility
.It Pa debug/
standalone debug data for the kernel and base system libraries and binaries
.It Pa dtrace/
DTrace library scripts
.It Pa engines/
OpenSSL (Cryptography/SSL toolkit) dynamically loadable engines
.El
.Pp
.It Pa libdata/
miscellaneous utility data files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa gcc/
GCC configuration data
.It Pa ldscripts/
linker scripts; see
.Xr ld 1
.It Pa pkgconfig/
.Xr pc 5 Pq Pa ports/devel/pkgconf
files; collections of compiler flags, linker flags, and other information
relevant to library use
.El
.Pp
.It Pa libexec/
system daemons and system utilities that are executed by other programs
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa aout/
utilities to manipulate a.out executables
.It Pa elf/
utilities to manipulate ELF executables
.It Pa lpr/
utilities and filters for LP print system; see
.Xr lpr 1
.It Pa sendmail/
the
.Xr sendmail 8
binary; see
.Xr mailwrapper 8
.It Pa sm.bin/
restricted shell for
.Xr sendmail 8 ;
see
.Xr smrsh 8
.El
.Pp
.It Pa local/
local executables, libraries, etc.
Also used as the default destination for the
.Xr ports 7
framework.
Within
.Pa local/ ,
the general layout sketched out by
.Nm
for
.Pa /usr
should be used.
Exceptions are the ports documentation
.Po in
.Pa share/doc/<port>/ Ns Pc ,
and
.Pa /usr/local/etc
.Po mimics
.Pa /etc Ns Pc .
.It Pa obj/
architecture-specific target tree produced by building
.Fx
from source; see
.Xr build 7
.It Pa ports/
.Fx
ports collection; see
.Xr ports 7
.It Pa sbin/
system daemons and system utilities that are executed by users
.It Pa share/
architecture-independent files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa calendar/
system-wide calendar files; see
.Xr calendar 1
.It Pa dict/
word lists; see
.Xr look 1
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa freebsd
.Fx Ns -specific
terms, proper names, and jargon
.It Pa web2
words from Webster's Second International
.El
.Pp
.It Pa doc/
miscellaneous documentation
.It Pa examples/
various examples for users and programmers
.It Pa firmware/
firmware images loaded by userland programs
.It Pa games/
used by various games
.It Pa keys/
known trusted and revoked keys
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa pkg/
fingerprints for
.Xr pkg 7
and
.Xr pkg 8
.El
.Pp
.It Pa locale/
localization files; see
.Xr setlocale 3
.It Pa man/
manual pages
.It Pa misc/
miscellaneous system-wide files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa termcap
terminal characteristics database; see
.Xr termcap 5
.El
.Pp
.It Pa mk/
templates for make; see
.Xr make 1
.It Pa nls/
national language support files
.It Pa security/
data files for security policies such as
.Xr mac_lomac 4
.It Pa sendmail/
.Xr sendmail 8
configuration files
.It Pa skel/
example
.Pa .\&
(dot) files for new accounts
.It Pa snmp/
MIBs, example files and tree definitions for the SNMP daemon
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa defs/
tree definition files for use with
.Xr gensnmptree 1
.It Pa mibs/
MIB files
.El
.Pp
.It Pa syscons/
.Xr syscons 4
files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa fonts/
console fonts; see
.Xr vidcontrol 1
and
.Xr vidfont 1
.It Pa keymaps/
console keyboard maps; see
.Xr kbdcontrol 1
and
.Xr kbdmap 1
.It Pa scrnmaps/
console screen maps
.El
.Pp
.It Pa sysroot/
files necessary for the -sysroot compiler/linker argument to build non-native
binaries
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa VERSION/
files for
.Fx
release VERSION.
By convention,
.Dq VERSION
matches
.Xr uname 1
.Fl r .
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa MACHINE.MACHINE_ARCH/
represent the binary ABI for these files.
.Dq MACHINE
matches
.Xr uname 1
.Fl m .
.Dq MACHINE_ARCH
matches
.Xr uname 1
.Fl p .
.El
.El
.Pp
.It Pa tabset/
tab description files for a variety of terminals; used in the termcap file;
see
.Xr termcap 5
.It Pa vi/
localization support and utilities for
.Xr vi 1
.It Pa vt/
.Xr vt 4
files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa fonts/
console fonts; see
.Xr vidcontrol 1
and
.Xr vidfont 1
.It Pa keymaps/
console keyboard maps; see
.Xr kbdcontrol 1
and
.Xr kbdmap 1
.\" .It Pa scrnmaps/
.\" console screen maps
.El
.Pp
.It Pa zoneinfo/
timezone configuration information; see
.Xr tzfile 5
.El
.Pp
.It Pa src/
.Fx
source code; see
.Xr development 7 .
The layout of the source tree is described by the top-level
.Pa README.md
file.
.Pp
.It Pa tests/
the
.Fx
test suite; see
.Xr tests 7
.El
.It Pa /var/
log, temporary, transient, and spool files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "preserve/" -compact
.It Pa account/
system accounting files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa acct
execution accounting file; see
.Xr acct 5
.El
.Pp
.It Pa at/
timed command scheduling files; see
.Xr at 1
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa jobs/
job files
.It Pa spool/
output spool files
.El
.Pp
.It Pa backups/
miscellaneous backup files
.It Pa cache/
miscellaneous cache files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa pkg/
cached packages for
.Xr pkg 8
.El
.Pp
.It Pa crash/
default directory for kernel crash dumps; see
.Xr crash 8
and
.Xr savecore 8
.It Pa cron/
.Xr cron 8
files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa tabs/
.Xr crontab 5
files
.El
.Pp
.It Pa db/
miscellaneous automatically-generated system-specific database files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "freebsd-update/" -compact
.It Pa freebsd-update/
temporary files and downloads for
.Xr freebsd-update 8
.El
.Pp
.It Pa empty/
for use by programs that require an empty directory.
Uses include privilege separation by
.Xr sshd 8
.It Pa games/
miscellaneous game status and score files
.It Pa heimdal/
Kerberos server databases; see
.Xr kdc 8
.It Pa log/
miscellaneous system log files
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "utx.lastlogin" -compact
.It Pa utx.lastlogin
last login log; see
.Xr getutxent 3
.It Pa utx.log
login/logout log; see
.Xr getutxent 3
.El
.Pp
.It Pa mail/
user mailbox files
.It Pa msgs/
system messages database; see
.Xr msgs 1
.It Pa preserve/
unused, present for historical reasons
.It Pa quotas/
file system quota information files
.It Pa run/
files containing information about the operating system since it was booted
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact
.It Pa bhyve/
.Xr bhyve 8
virtual machine
.Xr unix 4 Ns -domain sockets
.It Pa ppp/
writable by the
.Dq network
group for command connection sockets; see
.Xr ppp 8
.It Pa utx.active
database of current users; see
.Xr getutxent 3
.El
.Pp
.It Pa rwho/
rwho data files; see
.Xr rwhod 8 ,
.Xr rwho 1 ,
and
.Xr ruptime 1
.It Pa spool/
miscellaneous printer and mail system spooling directories
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "clientmqueue/" -compact
.It Pa clientmqueue/
undelivered submission mail queue; see
.Xr sendmail 8
.It Pa ftp/
ftp root directory; see
.Xr ftpd 8
.It Pa mqueue/
undelivered mail queue; see
.Xr sendmail 8
.It Pa output/
line printer spooling directories
.El
.Pp
.It Pa tmp/
temporary files that are not removed by
.Xr rc 8
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width "vi.recover/" -compact
.It Pa vi.recover/
.Xr vi 1
recovery files
.El
.Pp
.It Pa yp/
the NIS maps; see
.Xr yp 8
.El
.El
.Sh NOTES
This manual page documents the default
.Fx
file system layout.
The actual hierarchy on a given system is defined at the system
administrator's discretion.
A well-maintained installation will include a customized version of
this document.
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr apropos 1 ,
.Xr find 1 ,
.Xr grep 1 ,
.Xr ls 1 ,
.Xr whereis 1 ,
.Xr which 1
.Sh HISTORY
A
.Nm
manual page appeared in
.At v7 .