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 July 25, 2014 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 ".Pa /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 ".Pa 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 firmware/ 57Loadable modules containing binary firmware for hardware that needs 58firmware downloaded to it to function 59.It Pa kernel/ 60pure kernel executable (the operating system loaded into memory 61at boot time) 62.It Pa modules/ 63third-party loadable kernel modules; 64see 65.Xr kldstat 8 66.It Pa zfs/ 67Contains 68.Xr zfs 8 69zpool cache files. 70.El 71.It Pa /cdrom/ 72default mount point for CD-ROM drives 73.It Pa /compat/ 74normally a link to 75.Pa /usr/compat . 76If not, then the 77.Pa /usr/compat 78comments apply 79.It Pa /dev/ 80device special files managed by 81.Xr devfs 5 82.Pp 83.Bl -tag -width ".Pa net/" -compact 84.It Pa fd/ 85file descriptor files; 86see 87.Xr \&fd 4 88.It Pa net/ 89network devices 90.El 91.It Pa /etc/ 92system configuration files and scripts 93.Pp 94.Bl -tag -width ".Pa bluetooth/" -compact 95.It Pa defaults/ 96default system configuration files; 97see 98.Xr rc 8 99.It Pa bluetooth/ 100bluetooth configuration files 101.It Pa localtime 102local timezone information; 103see 104.Xr ctime 3 105.It Pa mail/ 106Sendmail control files 107.It Pa mtree/ 108mtree configuration files; 109see 110.Xr mtree 8 111.It Pa pam.d/ 112configuration files for the Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) 113library 114.It Pa periodic/ 115scripts that are run daily, weekly, and monthly, via 116.Xr cron 8 ; 117see 118.Xr periodic 8 119.It Pa rc.d/ 120System and daemon startup/control scripts; 121see 122.Xr rc 8 123.It Pa security/ 124OpenBSM audit configuration files; 125see 126.Xr audit 8 127.It Pa ppp/ 128ppp configuration files; 129see 130.Xr ppp 8 131.It Pa ssh/ 132OpenSSH configuration files; 133see 134.Xr ssh 1 135.It Pa ssl/ 136OpenSSL configuration files 137.El 138.It Pa /lib/ 139critical system libraries needed for binaries in 140.Pa /bin 141and 142.Pa /sbin 143.Pp 144.Bl -tag -width ".Pa geom/" -compact 145.It Pa geom/ 146class-specific libraries for the 147.Xr geom 8 148utility 149.El 150.It Pa /libexec/ 151critical system utilities needed for binaries in 152.Pa /bin 153and 154.Pa /sbin 155.It Pa /media/ 156contains subdirectories to be used as mount points 157for removable media such as CDs, USB drives, and 158floppy disks 159.It Pa /mnt/ 160empty directory commonly used by 161system administrators as a temporary mount point 162.It Pa /proc/ 163process file system; 164see 165.Xr procfs 5 166.It Pa /rescue/ 167statically linked programs for emergency recovery; 168see 169.Xr rescue 8 170.It Pa /root/ 171root's HOME directory 172.It Pa /sbin/ 173system programs and administration utilities 174fundamental to both single-user and multi-user environments 175.It Pa /tmp/ 176temporary files that are not guaranteed to persist across system reboots 177.It Pa /usr/ 178contains the majority of user utilities and applications 179.Pp 180.Bl -tag -width ".Pa libdata/" -compact 181.It Pa bin/ 182common utilities, programming tools, and applications 183.It Pa compat/ 184files needed to support binary compatibility with other operating systems, 185such as Linux 186.It Pa games/ 187useful and semi-frivolous programs 188.It Pa include/ 189standard C include files 190.Pp 191.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 192.It Pa altq/ 193C include files for alternate queueing 194.It Pa arpa/ 195C include files for Internet service protocols 196.It Pa bsnmp/ 197C include files for the SNMP daemon 198.It Pa c++/ 199C++ include files 200.It Pa cam/ 201C include files for the Common Access Methods Layer 202.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 203.It Pa scsi/ 204The SCSI device on top of CAM 205.El 206.It Pa dev/ 207C include files for programming various 208.Fx 209devices 210.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 211.It Pa ic/ 212Various header files describing driver- and bus-independent 213hardware circuits 214.It Pa ofw/ 215Open Firmware support 216.It Pa pbio/ 2178255 PPI cards; 218see 219.Xr pbio 4 220.It Pa ppbus/ 221The parallel port bus; 222see 223.Xr ppbus 4 224.It Pa usb/ 225The USB subsystem 226.It Pa utopia/ 227Physical chip driver for ATM interfaces; 228see 229.Xr utopia 4 230.It Pa wi/ 231The 232.Xr wi 4 233WaveLAN driver 234.El 235.It Pa fs/ 236.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 237.It Pa cd9660/ 238iso9660 file system 239.It Pa fdescfs/ 240per-process file descriptors file system 241.It Pa fifofs/ 242.St -p1003.1 243FIFOs file system 244.It Pa msdosfs/ 245MS-DOS file system 246.It Pa nfs/ 247C include files for NFS (Network File System) version 2, 3 and 4 248.It Pa nullfs/ 249loopback file system 250.It Pa procfs/ 251process file system 252.It Pa smbfs/ 253SMB/CIFS file system 254.It Pa udf/ 255UDF file system 256.It Pa unionfs 257union file system 258.El 259.It Pa geom/ 260GEOM framework 261.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 262.It Pa concat/ 263CONCAT GEOM class 264.It Pa gate/ 265GATE GEOM class 266.It Pa mirror/ 267MIRROR GEOM class 268.It Pa nop/ 269NOP GEOM class 270.It Pa raid3/ 271RAID3 GEOM class 272.It Pa stripe/ 273STRIPE GEOM class 274.El 275.Pp 276.It Pa isc/ 277ISC utility library libisc include files 278.It Pa libmilter/ 279C include files for libmilter, 280the 281.Xr sendmail 8 282mail filter API 283.It Pa machine/ 284machine-specific C include files 285.It Pa net/ 286miscellaneous network C include files 287.It Pa net80211/ 288C include files for 802.11 wireless networking; 289see 290.Xr net80211 4 291.It Pa netinet/ 292C include files for Internet standard protocols; 293see 294.Xr inet 4 295.It Pa netinet6/ 296C include files for Internet protocol version 6; 297see 298.Xr inet6 4 299.It Pa netipsec/ 300kernel key-management service; 301see 302.Xr ipsec 4 303.It Pa netnatm/ 304NATM include files; 305see 306.Xr natm 4 307.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 308.It Pa api/ 309include files for the signalling API 310.It Pa msg/ 311include files that describe signalling messages and 312declare associated functions 313.It Pa saal/ 314include files for the signalling AAL layer 315.It Pa sig/ 316include files for the UNI signalling protocol 317.El 318.It Pa netsmb/ 319SMB/CIFS requester 320.It Pa nfs/ 321C include files for NFS (Network File System) version 2 and 3 (legacy) 322.It Pa objc/ 323Objective C include files 324.It Pa openssl/ 325OpenSSL (Cryptography/SSL toolkit) headers 326.It Pa pccard/ 327PC-CARD controllers 328.It Pa protocols/ 329C include files for Berkeley service protocols 330.It Pa readline/ 331get a line from a user, with editing; 332see 333.Xr readline 3 334.It Pa rpc/ 335remote procedure calls; 336see 337.Xr rpc 3 338.It Pa rpcsvc/ 339definition of RPC service structures; see 340.Xr rpc 3 341.It Pa security/ 342PAM; see 343.Xr pam 8 344.It Pa sys/ 345system C include files (kernel data structures) 346.\" .It Pa tcl/ 347.\" Tcl language; 348.\" see 349.\" .Xr Tcl n 350.\" .Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 351.\" .It Pa generic/ 352.\" ??? 353.\" .It Pa unix/ 354.\" ??? 355.\" .El 356.It Pa ufs/ 357C include files for UFS (The U-word File System) 358.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 359.It Pa ffs/ 360Fast file system 361.It Pa ufs/ 362UFS file system 363.El 364.It Pa vm/ 365virtual memory; 366see 367.Xr vmstat 8 368.El 369.Pp 370.It Pa lib/ 371shared and archive 372.Xr ar 1 Ns -type 373libraries 374.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 375.It Pa aout/ 376a.out archive libraries 377.It Pa compat/ 378shared libraries for compatibility 379.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 380.It Pa aout/ 381a.out backward compatibility libraries 382.El 383.It Pa dtrace/ 384DTrace library scripts 385.It Pa engines/ 386OpenSSL (Cryptography/SSL toolkit) dynamically loadable engines 387.It Pa private/ 388Private system libraries not for use by third-party programs. 389ABI and API stability are not guaranteed. 390.El 391.Pp 392.It Pa libdata/ 393miscellaneous utility data files 394.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 395.It Pa gcc/ 396.Xr gcc 1 397configuration data 398.It Pa ldscripts/ 399linker scripts; 400see 401.Xr ld 1 402.It Pa lint/ 403various prebuilt lint libraries; 404see 405.Xr lint 1 406.El 407.Pp 408.It Pa libexec/ 409system daemons & system utilities (executed by other programs) 410.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 411.It Pa aout/ 412utilities to manipulate a.out executables 413.It Pa elf/ 414utilities to manipulate ELF executables 415.It Pa lpr/ 416utilities and filters for LP print system; 417see 418.Xr lpr 1 419.It Pa sendmail/ 420the 421.Xr sendmail 8 422binary; 423see 424.Xr mailwrapper 8 425.It Pa sm.bin/ 426restricted shell for 427.Xr sendmail 8 ; 428see 429.Xr smrsh 8 430.El 431.Pp 432.It Pa local/ 433local executables, libraries, etc. 434Also used as the default destination for the 435.Fx 436ports framework. 437Within 438.Pa local/ , 439the general layout sketched out by 440.Nm 441for 442.Pa /usr 443should be used. 444Exceptions are the 445.Pa man 446directory 447.Po directly under 448.Pa local/ 449rather than under 450.Pa local/share/ Ns Pc , 451ports documentation 452.Po in 453.Pa share/doc/<port>/ Ns Pc , 454and 455.Pa /usr/local/etc 456.Po mimics 457.Pa /etc Ns Pc . 458.It Pa obj/ 459architecture-specific target tree produced by building the 460.Pa /usr/src 461tree 462.It Pa ports/ 463The 464.Fx 465ports collection (optional). 466.It Pa sbin/ 467system daemons & system utilities (executed by users) 468.It Pa share/ 469architecture-independent files 470.Pp 471.Bl -tag -width ".Pa calendar/" -compact 472.It Pa calendar/ 473a variety of pre-fab calendar files; 474see 475.Xr calendar 1 476.It Pa dict/ 477word lists; 478see 479.Xr look 1 480.Pp 481.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 482.It Pa freebsd 483.Fx Ns -specific 484terms, proper names, and jargon 485.It Pa words 486common words 487.It Pa web2 488words from Webster's 2nd International 489.It Pa papers/ 490reference databases; 491see 492.Xr refer 1 493.El 494.Pp 495.It Pa doc/ 496miscellaneous documentation; 497source for most of the printed 498.Bx 499manuals (available 500from the 501.Tn USENIX 502association) 503.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 504.It Pa FAQ/ 505Frequently Asked Questions 506.It Pa IPv6/ 507implementation notes for IPv6 508.It Pa bind/ 509documents pertaining to BIND (the Berkeley Internet Name Domain) 510.It Pa es/ 511Spanish translations of documents in /usr/share/doc 512.It Pa handbook/ 513.Fx 514Handbook 515.It Pa ja/ 516Japanese translations of documents in /usr/share/doc 517.It Pa legal/ 518License files for vendor supplied firmwares 519.It Pa ncurses/ 520HTML documents pertaining to ncurses; 521see 522.Xr ncurses 3 523.It Pa ntp/ 524HTML documents pertaining to the Network Time Protocol 525.It Pa papers/ 526UNIX Papers 527.It Pa psd/ 528UNIX Programmer's Supplementary Documents 529.It Pa ru/ 530Russian translations of documents in /usr/share/doc 531.It Pa smm/ 532UNIX System Manager's Manual 533.It Pa tutorials/ 534.Fx 535tutorials 536.It Pa usd/ 537UNIX User's Supplementary Documents 538.It Pa zh/ 539Chinese translations of documents in /usr/share/doc 540.El 541.Pp 542.It Pa examples/ 543various examples for users and programmers 544.It Pa games/ 545ASCII text files used by various games 546.It Pa groff_font/ 547device description file for device name 548.It Pa info/ 549GNU Info hypertext system 550.It Pa keys/ 551known trusted and revoked keys. 552.Bl -tag -width ".Pa keys/pkg/" -compact 553.It Pa keys/pkg/ 554fingerprints for 555.Xr pkg 7 556and 557.Xr pkg 8 558.El 559.Pp 560.It Pa locale/ 561localization files; 562see 563.Xr setlocale 3 564.It Pa man/ 565manual pages 566.It Pa mdocml/ 567data files used by mdocml 568.It Pa me/ 569macros for use with the me macro package; 570see 571.Xr me 7 572.It Pa misc/ 573miscellaneous system-wide ASCII text files 574.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 575.It Pa fonts/ 576??? 577.It Pa termcap 578terminal characteristics database; 579see 580.Xr termcap 5 581.El 582.It Pa mk/ 583templates for make; 584see 585.Xr make 1 586.It Pa nls/ 587national language support files; 588see 589.Xr mklocale 1 590.It Pa security/ 591data files for security policies such as 592.Xr mac_lomac 4 593.It Pa sendmail/ 594.Xr sendmail 8 595configuration files 596.It Pa skel/ 597example 598.Pa .\& 599(dot) files for new accounts 600.It Pa snmp/ 601MIBs, example files and tree definitions for the SNMP daemon. 602.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 603.It Pa defs/ 604Tree definition files for use with 605.Xr gensnmptree 1 606.It Pa mibs/ 607MIB files 608.El 609.It Pa syscons/ 610files used by syscons; 611see 612.Xr syscons 4 613.Bl -tag -width ".Pa scrnmaps/" -compact 614.It Pa fonts/ 615console fonts; 616see 617.Xr vidcontrol 1 618and 619.Xr vidfont 1 620.It Pa keymaps/ 621console keyboard maps; 622see 623.Xr kbdcontrol 1 624and 625.Xr kbdmap 1 626.It Pa scrnmaps/ 627console screen maps 628.El 629.It Pa tabset/ 630tab description files for a variety of terminals; used in 631the termcap file; 632see 633.Xr termcap 5 634.It Pa tmac/ 635text processing macros; 636see 637.Xr nroff 1 638and 639.Xr troff 1 640.It Pa vi/ 641localization support and utilities for 642.Xr vi 1 643.It Pa zoneinfo/ 644timezone configuration information; 645see 646.Xr tzfile 5 647.El 648.It Pa vt/ 649files used by vt; 650see 651.Xr vt 4 652.Bl -tag -width ".Pa scrnmaps/" -compact 653.It Pa fonts/ 654console fonts; 655see 656.Xr vidcontrol 1 657and 658.Xr vidfont 1 659.It Pa keymaps/ 660console keyboard maps; 661see 662.Xr kbdcontrol 1 663and 664.Xr kbdmap 1 665.\" .It Pa scrnmaps/ 666.\" console screen maps 667.El 668.It Pa src/ 669.Bx , 670third-party, and/or local source files 671.Pp 672.Bl -tag -width ".Pa kerberos5/" -compact 673.It Pa bin/ 674source code for files in /bin 675.It Pa cddl/ 676Utilities covered by the Common Development and Distribution License 677.It Pa contrib/ 678source code for contributed software 679.It Pa crypto/ 680source code for contributed cryptography software 681.It Pa etc/ 682source code for files in 683.Pa /etc 684.It Pa games/ 685source code for files in 686.Pa /usr/games 687.It Pa gnu/ 688Utilities covered by the GNU General Public License 689.It Pa include/ 690source code for files in 691.Pa /usr/include 692.It Pa kerberos5/ 693build infrastructure for kerberos version 5 694.It Pa lib/ 695source code for files in 696.Pa /usr/lib 697.It Pa libexec/ 698source code for files in 699.Pa /usr/libexec 700.It Pa release/ 701files required to produce a 702.Fx 703release 704.It Pa sbin/ 705source code for files in 706.Pa /sbin 707.It Pa secure/ 708build directory for files in 709.Pa /usr/src/crypto 710.It Pa share/ 711source for files in 712.Pa /usr/share 713.It Pa sys/ 714kernel source code 715.It Pa tools/ 716tools used for maintenance and testing of 717.Fx 718.It Pa usr.bin/ 719source code for files in 720.Pa /usr/bin 721.It Pa usr.sbin/ 722source code for files in 723.Pa /usr/sbin 724.El 725.Pp 726.It Pa tests/ 727The 728.Fx 729test suite. 730See 731.Xr tests 7 732for more details. 733.El 734.It Pa /var/ 735multi-purpose log, temporary, transient, and spool files 736.Pp 737.Bl -tag -width ".Pa preserve/" -compact 738.It Pa account/ 739system accounting files 740.Pp 741.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 742.It Pa acct 743execution accounting file; 744see 745.Xr acct 5 746.El 747.Pp 748.It Pa at/ 749timed command scheduling files; 750see 751.Xr \&at 1 752.Bl -tag -width ".Pa preserve/" -compact 753.It Pa jobs/ 754directory containing job files 755.It Pa spool/ 756directory containing output spool files 757.El 758.Pp 759.It Pa backups/ 760miscellaneous backup files 761.It Pa cache/ 762miscellaneous cached files 763.Bl -tag -width ".Pa pkg/" -compact 764.It Pa pkg/ 765cached packages for 766.Xr pkg 8 767.El 768.Pp 769.It Pa crash/ 770default directory to store kernel crash dumps; see 771.Xr crash 8 772and 773.Xr savecore 8 774.It Pa cron/ 775files used by cron; 776see 777.Xr cron 8 778.Bl -tag -width ".Pa preserve/" -compact 779.It Pa tabs/ 780crontab files; 781see 782.Xr crontab 5 783.El 784.Pp 785.It Pa db/ 786miscellaneous automatically generated system-specific database files 787.It Pa empty/ 788empty directory for use by programs that need a specifically empty directory. 789Used for instance by 790.Xr sshd 8 791for privilege separation. 792.It Pa games/ 793miscellaneous game status and score files 794.It Pa heimdal/ 795kerberos server databases; see 796.Xr kdc 8 797.It Pa log/ 798miscellaneous system log files 799.Pp 800.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 801.It Pa utx.lastlogin 802last login log; 803see 804.Xr getutxent 3 805.It Pa utx.log 806login/logout log; 807see 808.Xr getutxent 3 809.El 810.Pp 811.It Pa mail/ 812user mailbox files 813.It Pa msgs/ 814system messages database; 815see 816.Xr msgs 1 817.It Pa preserve/ 818temporary home of files preserved after an accidental death 819of an editor; 820see 821.Xr \&ex 1 822.It Pa quotas/ 823file system quota information files 824.It Pa run/ 825system information files describing various info about 826system since it was booted 827.Pp 828.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 829.It Pa ppp/ 830writable by the 831.Dq network 832group for command connection sockets; see 833.Xr ppp 8 834.It Pa utx.active 835database of current users; 836see 837.Xr getutxent 3 838.El 839.Pp 840.It Pa rwho/ 841rwho data files; 842see 843.Xr rwhod 8 , 844.Xr rwho 1 , 845and 846.Xr ruptime 1 847.It Pa spool/ 848miscellaneous printer and mail system spooling directories 849.Pp 850.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 851.It Pa clientmqueue/ 852undelivered submission mail queue; 853see 854.Xr sendmail 8 855.It Pa ftp/ 856commonly ~ftp; the anonymous ftp root directory 857.It Pa mqueue/ 858undelivered mail queue; 859see 860.Xr sendmail 8 861.It Pa output/ 862line printer spooling directories 863.El 864.Pp 865.It Pa tmp/ 866temporary files that are kept between system reboots 867.Bl -tag -width Fl -compact 868.It Pa vi.recover/ 869the directory where recovery files are stored 870.El 871.It Pa yp/ 872the NIS maps 873.El 874.El 875.Sh NOTES 876This manual page documents the default 877.Fx 878file system layout, but 879the actual hierarchy on a given system is defined at the system 880administrator's discretion. 881A well-maintained installation will include a customized version of 882this document. 883.Sh SEE ALSO 884.Xr apropos 1 , 885.Xr find 1 , 886.Xr finger 1 , 887.Xr grep 1 , 888.Xr ls 1 , 889.Xr whatis 1 , 890.Xr whereis 1 , 891.Xr which 1 , 892.Xr fd 4 , 893.Xr devfs 5 , 894.Xr fsck 8 895.Sh HISTORY 896A 897.Nm 898manual page appeared in 899.At v7 . 900