1.\" Copyright (c) 1990, 1993 2.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 6.\" are met: 7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 8.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 11.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 12.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 13.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 14.\" without specific prior written permission. 15.\" 16.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 17.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 18.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 19.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 20.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 21.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 22.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 23.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 24.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 25.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 26.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 27.\" 28.\" @(#)hier.7 8.1 (Berkeley) 6/5/93 29.\" $FreeBSD$ 30.\" 31.Dd January 20, 2020 32.Dt HIER 7 33.Os 34.Sh NAME 35.Nm hier 36.Nd layout of file systems 37.Sh DESCRIPTION 38A sketch of the file system hierarchy. 39.Bl -tag -width "/libexec/" 40.It Pa / 41root directory of the file system 42.It Pa /bin/ 43user utilities fundamental to both single-user and multi-user environments 44.It Pa /boot/ 45programs and configuration files used during operating system bootstrap 46.Pp 47.Bl -tag -width "defaults/" -compact 48.It Pa defaults/ 49default bootstrapping configuration files; see 50.Xr loader.conf 5 51.It Pa dtb/ 52Compiled flattened device tree (FDT) files; see 53.Xr fdt 4 54and 55.Xr dtc 1 56.It Pa efi/ 57Mount point for EFI System Partition (ESP) on UEFI systems. 58.It Pa firmware/ 59loadable kernel modules containing binary firmware for hardware that needs 60firmware downloaded to it to function 61.It Pa kernel/ 62pure kernel executable (the operating system loaded into memory 63at boot time) and kernel modules 64.It Pa modules/ 65third-party loadable kernel modules; 66see 67.Xr kldstat 8 68.It Pa overlays/ 69Compiled flattened device tree (FDT) overlays; see 70.Xr fdt 4 71and 72.Xr dtc 1 73.It Pa zfs/ 74.Xr zfs 8 75zpool cache files 76.El 77.It Pa /cdrom/ 78default mount point for CD-ROM drives 79.It Pa /compat/ 80normally a link to 81.Pa /usr/compat . 82If not, then the 83.Pa /usr/compat 84comments apply 85.It Pa /dev/ 86device special files managed by 87.Xr devfs 5 88.Pp 89.Bl -tag -width "defaults/" -compact 90.It Pa fd/ 91file descriptor files; 92see 93.Xr \&fd 4 94.El 95.It Pa /etc/ 96system configuration files and scripts 97.Pp 98.Bl -tag -width "defaults/" -compact 99.It Pa defaults/ 100default system configuration files; 101see 102.Xr rc 8 103.It Pa bluetooth/ 104bluetooth configuration files 105.It Pa localtime 106local timezone information; 107see 108.Xr ctime 3 109.It Pa mail/ 110Sendmail control files 111.It Pa mtree/ 112mtree configuration files; 113see 114.Xr mtree 8 115.It Pa pam.d/ 116configuration files for the Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) 117library 118.It Pa periodic/ 119scripts that are run daily, weekly, and monthly, via 120.Xr cron 8 ; 121see 122.Xr periodic 8 123.It Pa rc.d/ 124system and daemon startup/control scripts; 125see 126.Xr rc 8 127.It Pa security/ 128OpenBSM audit configuration files; 129see 130.Xr audit 8 131.It Pa ppp/ 132ppp configuration files; 133see 134.Xr ppp 8 135.It Pa ssh/ 136OpenSSH configuration files; 137see 138.Xr ssh 1 139.It Pa ssl/ 140OpenSSL configuration files 141.El 142.It Pa /lib/ 143critical system libraries needed for binaries in 144.Pa /bin 145and 146.Pa /sbin 147.Pp 148.Bl -tag -width "defaults/" -compact 149.It Pa casper/ 150service-specific 151.Xr libcasper 3 152Capsicum support libraries 153.It Pa geom/ 154class-specific libraries for the 155.Xr geom 8 156utility 157.It Pa nvmecontrol/ 158vendor-specific libraries to extend the 159.Xr nvmecontrol 8 160utility 161.El 162.It Pa /libexec/ 163critical system utilities needed for binaries in 164.Pa /bin 165and 166.Pa /sbin 167.It Pa /media/ 168contains subdirectories to be used as mount points 169for removable media such as CDs, USB drives, and 170floppy disks 171.It Pa /mnt/ 172empty directory commonly used by 173system administrators as a temporary mount point 174.It Pa /net/ 175automounted NFS shares; 176see 177.Xr auto_master 5 178.It Pa /proc/ 179process file system; 180see 181.Xr procfs 5 182.It Pa /rescue/ 183statically linked programs for emergency recovery; 184see 185.Xr rescue 8 186.It Pa /root/ 187root's HOME directory 188.It Pa /sbin/ 189system programs and administration utilities 190fundamental to both single-user and multi-user environments 191.It Pa /tmp/ 192temporary files that are not guaranteed to persist across system reboots 193.It Pa /usr/ 194contains the majority of user utilities and applications 195.Pp 196.Bl -tag -width "defaults/" -compact 197.It Pa bin/ 198common utilities, programming tools, and applications 199.It Pa compat/ 200files needed to support binary compatibility with other operating systems, 201such as Linux 202.It Pa include/ 203standard C include files 204.Pp 205.Bl -tag -width "kerberos5/" -compact 206.It Pa arpa/ 207C include files for Internet service protocols 208.It Pa bsnmp/ 209C include files for the SNMP daemon 210.It Pa c++/ 211C++ include files 212.It Pa cam/ 213C include files for the Common Access Methods Layer 214.Bl -tag -width "kerberos5/" -compact 215.It Pa scsi/ 216SCSI device on top of CAM 217.El 218.It Pa dev/ 219C include files for programming various 220.Fx 221devices 222.Bl -tag -width "kerberos5/" -compact 223.It Pa ic/ 224various header files describing driver- and bus-independent 225hardware circuits 226.It Pa ofw/ 227Open Firmware support 228.It Pa pbio/ 2298255 PPI cards; 230see 231.Xr pbio 4 232.It Pa ppbus/ 233parallel port bus; 234see 235.Xr ppbus 4 236.It Pa usb/ 237USB subsystem 238.It Pa wi/ 239.Xr wi 4 240WaveLAN driver 241.El 242.It Pa fs/ 243.Bl -tag -width "kerberos5/" -compact 244.It Pa fdescfs/ 245per-process file descriptors file system 246.It Pa msdosfs/ 247MS-DOS file system 248.It Pa nfs/ 249C include files for NFS (Network File System) version 2, 3 and 4 250.It Pa nullfs/ 251loopback file system 252.It Pa procfs/ 253process file system 254.It Pa smbfs/ 255SMB/CIFS file system 256.It Pa udf/ 257UDF file system 258.It Pa unionfs 259union file system 260.El 261.It Pa geom/ 262GEOM framework 263.Bl -tag -width "kerberos5/" -compact 264.It Pa concat/ 265CONCAT GEOM class 266.It Pa gate/ 267GATE GEOM class 268.It Pa mirror/ 269MIRROR GEOM class 270.It Pa nop/ 271NOP GEOM class 272.It Pa raid3/ 273RAID3 GEOM class 274.It Pa stripe/ 275STRIPE GEOM class 276.El 277.It Pa libmilter/ 278C include files for libmilter, 279the 280.Xr sendmail 8 281mail filter API 282.It Pa machine/ 283machine-specific C include files 284.It Pa net/ 285miscellaneous network C include files 286.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 287.It Pa altq/ 288C include files for alternate queueing 289.El 290.It Pa net80211/ 291C include files for 802.11 wireless networking; 292see 293.Xr net80211 4 294.It Pa netinet/ 295C include files for Internet standard protocols; 296see 297.Xr inet 4 298.It Pa netinet6/ 299C include files for Internet protocol version 6; 300see 301.Xr inet6 4 302.It Pa netipsec/ 303kernel key-management service; 304see 305.Xr ipsec 4 306.It Pa netsmb/ 307SMB/CIFS requester 308.It Pa nfs/ 309C include files for NFS (Network File System) version 2 and 3 (legacy) 310.It Pa openssl/ 311OpenSSL (Cryptography/SSL toolkit) headers 312.It Pa protocols/ 313C include files for Berkeley service protocols 314.It Pa rpc/ 315remote procedure calls; 316see 317.Xr rpc 3 318.It Pa rpcsvc/ 319definition of RPC service structures; see 320.Xr rpc 3 321.It Pa security/ 322PAM; see 323.Xr pam 8 324.It Pa sys/ 325system C include files (kernel data structures) 326.\" .It Pa tcl/ 327.\" Tcl language; 328.\" see 329.\" .Xr Tcl n 330.\" .Bl -tag -width "kerberos5/" -compact 331.\" .It Pa generic/ 332.\" ??? 333.\" .It Pa unix/ 334.\" ??? 335.\" .El 336.It Pa ufs/ 337C include files for UFS (The U-word File System) 338.Bl -tag -width "kerberos5/" -compact 339.It Pa ffs/ 340Fast file system 341.It Pa ufs/ 342UFS file system 343.El 344.It Pa vm/ 345virtual memory; 346see 347.Xr vmstat 8 348.El 349.Pp 350.It Pa lib/ 351shared and archive 352.Xr ar 1 Ns -type 353libraries 354.Pp 355.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 356.It Pa aout/ 357a.out archive libraries 358.It Pa compat/ 359shared libraries for compatibility 360.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 361.It Pa aout/ 362a.out backward compatibility libraries 363.El 364.It Pa debug/ 365standalone debug data for the kernel and base system libraries and binaries 366.It Pa dtrace/ 367DTrace library scripts 368.It Pa engines/ 369OpenSSL (Cryptography/SSL toolkit) dynamically loadable engines 370.El 371.Pp 372.It Pa libdata/ 373miscellaneous utility data files 374.Pp 375.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 376.It Pa gcc/ 377.Xr gcc 1 378configuration data 379.It Pa ldscripts/ 380linker scripts; 381see 382.Xr ld 1 383.El 384.Pp 385.It Pa libexec/ 386system daemons & system utilities (executed by other programs) 387.Pp 388.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 389.It Pa aout/ 390utilities to manipulate a.out executables 391.It Pa elf/ 392utilities to manipulate ELF executables 393.It Pa lpr/ 394utilities and filters for LP print system; 395see 396.Xr lpr 1 397.It Pa sendmail/ 398the 399.Xr sendmail 8 400binary; 401see 402.Xr mailwrapper 8 403.It Pa sm.bin/ 404restricted shell for 405.Xr sendmail 8 ; 406see 407.Xr smrsh 8 408.El 409.Pp 410.It Pa local/ 411local executables, libraries, etc. 412Also used as the default destination for the 413.Xr ports 7 414framework. 415Within 416.Pa local/ , 417the general layout sketched out by 418.Nm 419for 420.Pa /usr 421should be used. 422Exceptions are the 423ports documentation 424.Po in 425.Pa share/doc/<port>/ Ns Pc , 426and 427.Pa /usr/local/etc 428.Po mimics 429.Pa /etc Ns Pc . 430.It Pa obj/ 431architecture-specific target tree produced by building the 432.Pa /usr/src 433tree 434.It Pa ports/ 435.Xr ports 7 , 436the 437.Fx 438ports collection. 439.It Pa sbin/ 440system daemons & system utilities (executed by users) 441.It Pa share/ 442architecture-independent files 443.Pp 444.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 445.It Pa calendar/ 446a variety of pre-fab calendar files; 447see 448.Xr calendar 1 449.It Pa dict/ 450word lists; 451see 452.Xr look 1 453.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 454.It Pa freebsd 455.Fx Ns -specific 456terms, proper names, and jargon 457.It Pa web2 458words from Webster's 2nd International 459.El 460.It Pa doc/ 461miscellaneous documentation; 462source for most of the printed 463.Bx 464manuals (available 465from the 466.Tn USENIX 467association) 468.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 469.It Pa FAQ/ 470Frequently Asked Questions 471.It Pa IPv6/ 472implementation notes for IPv6 473.It Pa es/ 474Spanish translations of documents in /usr/share/doc 475.It Pa handbook/ 476.Fx 477Handbook 478.It Pa ja/ 479Japanese translations of documents in /usr/share/doc 480.It Pa legal/ 481License files for vendor supplied firmware files 482.It Pa ncurses/ 483HTML documents pertaining to ncurses; 484see 485.Xr ncurses 3 486.It Pa ntp/ 487HTML documents pertaining to the Network Time Protocol 488.It Pa ru/ 489Russian translations of documents in /usr/share/doc 490.It Pa tutorials/ 491.Fx 492tutorials 493.It Pa zh/ 494Chinese translations of documents in /usr/share/doc 495.El 496.It Pa examples/ 497various examples for users and programmers 498.It Pa firmware/ 499firmware images loaded by userland programs 500.It Pa games/ 501ASCII text files used by various games 502.It Pa keys/ 503known trusted and revoked keys. 504.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 505.It Pa pkg/ 506fingerprints for 507.Xr pkg 7 508and 509.Xr pkg 8 510.El 511.It Pa locale/ 512localization files; 513see 514.Xr setlocale 3 515.It Pa man/ 516manual pages 517.It Pa misc/ 518miscellaneous system-wide ASCII text files 519.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 520.It Pa fonts/ 521??? 522.It Pa termcap 523terminal characteristics database; 524see 525.Xr termcap 5 526.El 527.It Pa mk/ 528templates for make; 529see 530.Xr make 1 531.It Pa nls/ 532national language support files 533.It Pa security/ 534data files for security policies such as 535.Xr mac_lomac 4 536.It Pa sendmail/ 537.Xr sendmail 8 538configuration files 539.It Pa skel/ 540example 541.Pa .\& 542(dot) files for new accounts 543.It Pa snmp/ 544MIBs, example files and tree definitions for the SNMP daemon. 545.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 546.It Pa defs/ 547tree definition files for use with 548.Xr gensnmptree 1 549.It Pa mibs/ 550MIB files 551.El 552.It Pa syscons/ 553files used by syscons; 554see 555.Xr syscons 4 556.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 557.It Pa fonts/ 558console fonts; 559see 560.Xr vidcontrol 1 561and 562.Xr vidfont 1 563.It Pa keymaps/ 564console keyboard maps; 565see 566.Xr kbdcontrol 1 567and 568.Xr kbdmap 1 569.It Pa scrnmaps/ 570console screen maps 571.El 572.It Pa tabset/ 573tab description files for a variety of terminals; used in 574the termcap file; 575see 576.Xr termcap 5 577.It Pa vi/ 578localization support and utilities for 579.Xr vi 1 580.It Pa vt/ 581files used by vt; 582see 583.Xr vt 4 584.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 585.It Pa fonts/ 586console fonts; 587see 588.Xr vidcontrol 1 589and 590.Xr vidfont 1 591.It Pa keymaps/ 592console keyboard maps; 593see 594.Xr kbdcontrol 1 595and 596.Xr kbdmap 1 597.\" .It Pa scrnmaps/ 598.\" console screen maps 599.El 600.It Pa zoneinfo/ 601timezone configuration information; 602see 603.Xr tzfile 5 604.El 605.Pp 606.It Pa src/ 607.Bx , 608third-party, and/or local source files 609.Pp 610.Bl -tag -width "kerberos5/" -compact 611.It Pa bin/ 612source code for files in /bin 613.It Pa cddl/ 614utilities covered by the Common Development and Distribution License 615.It Pa contrib/ 616source code for contributed software 617.It Pa crypto/ 618source code for contributed cryptography software 619.It Pa etc/ 620source code for files in 621.Pa /etc 622.It Pa gnu/ 623utilities covered by the GNU General Public License 624.It Pa include/ 625source code for files in 626.Pa /usr/include 627.It Pa kerberos5/ 628build infrastructure for Kerberos version 5 629.It Pa lib/ 630source code for files in 631.Pa /lib 632and 633.Pa /usr/lib 634.It Pa libexec/ 635source code for files in 636.Pa /usr/libexec 637.It Pa release/ 638files required to produce a 639.Fx 640release 641.It Pa rescue/ 642source code for files in 643.Pa /rescue 644.It Pa sbin/ 645source code for files in 646.Pa /sbin 647.It Pa secure/ 648build directory for files in 649.Pa /usr/src/crypto 650.It Pa share/ 651source for files in 652.Pa /usr/share 653.It Pa stand/ 654boot loader source code 655.It Pa sys/ 656kernel source code 657.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 658.It Pa amd64/ 659AMD64 architecture support 660.It Pa arm/ 661ARM architecture support 662.It Pa arm64/ 663ARMv8 architecture support 664.It Pa cam/ 665.Xr cam 4 666and 667.Xr ctl 4 668.It Pa cddl/ 669CDDL-licensed optional sources, including ZFS 670and DTrace 671.It Pa ddb/ 672.Xr ddb 4 673.It Pa fs/ 674most filesystems 675.It Pa dev/ 676device drivers 677.It Pa geom/ 678.Xr geom 4 679.It Pa i386/ 680i386 (32 bit) architecture support 681.It Pa kern/ 682main part of the kernel 683.It Pa mips/ 684MIPS architecture support 685.It Pa net80211/ 686.Xr net80211 4 687.It Pa netgraph/ 688.Xr netgraph 4 689.It Pa netinet/ 690.Xr inet 4 691.It Pa netinet6/ 692.Xr inet6 4 693.It Pa netipsec/ 694.Xr ipsec 4 695.It Pa netpfil/ 696.Xr ipfw 4 697and 698.Xr pf 4 699.It Pa opencrypto/ 700.Xr crypto 7 701.It Pa powerpc/ 702PowerPC/POWER architecture support 703.It Pa riscv/ 704RISC-V architecture support 705.It Pa security/ 706.Xr audit 4 707and 708.Xr mac 4 709.It Pa sparc64/ 710SPARC64 architecture support 711.It Pa sys/ 712kernel headers 713.It Pa ufs/ 714Unix File System 715.It Pa x86/ 716code shared by AMD64 and i386 architectures 717.El 718.It Pa targets/ 719support for experimental DIRDEPS_BUILD 720.It Pa tests/ 721source code for files in 722.Pa /usr/tests 723.It Pa tools/ 724tools used for maintenance and testing of 725.Fx 726.It Pa usr.bin/ 727source code for files in 728.Pa /usr/bin 729.It Pa usr.sbin/ 730source code for files in 731.Pa /usr/sbin 732.El 733.Pp 734.It Pa tests/ 735The 736.Fx 737test suite. 738See 739.Xr tests 7 740for more details. 741.El 742.It Pa /var/ 743multi-purpose log, temporary, transient, and spool files 744.Pp 745.Bl -tag -width "defaults/" -compact 746.It Pa account/ 747system accounting files 748.Pp 749.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 750.It Pa acct 751execution accounting file; 752see 753.Xr acct 5 754.El 755.Pp 756.It Pa at/ 757timed command scheduling files; 758see 759.Xr \&at 1 760.Pp 761.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 762.It Pa jobs/ 763directory containing job files 764.It Pa spool/ 765directory containing output spool files 766.El 767.Pp 768.It Pa backups/ 769miscellaneous backup files 770.It Pa cache/ 771miscellaneous cached files 772.Pp 773.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 774.It Pa pkg/ 775cached packages for 776.Xr pkg 8 777.El 778.Pp 779.It Pa crash/ 780default directory to store kernel crash dumps; see 781.Xr crash 8 782and 783.Xr savecore 8 784.It Pa cron/ 785files used by cron; 786see 787.Xr cron 8 788.Pp 789.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 790.It Pa tabs/ 791crontab files; 792see 793.Xr crontab 5 794.El 795.Pp 796.It Pa db/ 797miscellaneous automatically generated system-specific database files 798.It Pa empty/ 799empty directory for use by programs that need a specifically empty directory. 800Used for instance by 801.Xr sshd 8 802for privilege separation. 803.It Pa games/ 804miscellaneous game status and score files 805.It Pa heimdal/ 806Kerberos server databases; see 807.Xr kdc 8 808.It Pa log/ 809miscellaneous system log files 810.Pp 811.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 812.It Pa utx.lastlogin 813last login log; 814see 815.Xr getutxent 3 816.It Pa utx.log 817login/logout log; 818see 819.Xr getutxent 3 820.El 821.Pp 822.It Pa mail/ 823user mailbox files 824.It Pa msgs/ 825system messages database; 826see 827.Xr msgs 1 828.It Pa preserve/ 829temporary home of files preserved after an accidental death 830of an editor; 831see 832.Xr \&ex 1 833.It Pa quotas/ 834file system quota information files 835.It Pa run/ 836system information files describing various info about 837system since it was booted 838.Pp 839.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 840.It Pa ppp/ 841writable by the 842.Dq network 843group for command connection sockets; see 844.Xr ppp 8 845.It Pa utx.active 846database of current users; 847see 848.Xr getutxent 3 849.El 850.Pp 851.It Pa rwho/ 852rwho data files; 853see 854.Xr rwhod 8 , 855.Xr rwho 1 , 856and 857.Xr ruptime 1 858.It Pa spool/ 859miscellaneous printer and mail system spooling directories 860.Pp 861.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 862.It Pa clientmqueue/ 863undelivered submission mail queue; 864see 865.Xr sendmail 8 866.It Pa ftp/ 867commonly ~ftp; the anonymous ftp root directory 868.It Pa mqueue/ 869undelivered mail queue; 870see 871.Xr sendmail 8 872.It Pa output/ 873line printer spooling directories 874.El 875.Pp 876.It Pa tmp/ 877temporary files that are kept between system reboots 878.Pp 879.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 880.It Pa vi.recover/ 881the directory where recovery files are stored 882.El 883.Pp 884.It Pa yp/ 885the NIS maps 886.El 887.El 888.Sh NOTES 889This manual page documents the default 890.Fx 891file system layout, but 892the actual hierarchy on a given system is defined at the system 893administrator's discretion. 894A well-maintained installation will include a customized version of 895this document. 896.Sh SEE ALSO 897.Xr apropos 1 , 898.Xr find 1 , 899.Xr finger 1 , 900.Xr grep 1 , 901.Xr ls 1 , 902.Xr whatis 1 , 903.Xr whereis 1 , 904.Xr which 1 , 905.Xr fd 4 , 906.Xr devfs 5 , 907.Xr fsck 8 908.Sh HISTORY 909A 910.Nm 911manual page appeared in 912.At v7 . 913