FreeBSD_Install_Gnome

Shell script to set up GNOME on a fresh FreeBSD install. Tested on 14.x.

Before running

You need a working FreeBSD system with your user in the wheel group. If you just installed from DVD1.iso you should be most of the way there.

As root:

pkg update && pkg upgrade -y
pkg install -y sudo git
visudo   # uncomment %wheel ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL

Running it

Log back in as your normal user, then:

git clone https://github.com/BenGoldberg0/FreeBSD_Install_Gnome
cd FreeBSD_Install_Gnome
chmod +x main.sh
sudo ./main.sh

The script picks up your username from $SUDO_USER. If that's empty for some reason it'll just ask.

What it does

• pkg install xorg gnome
• enables dbus, gdm, gnome and the linux compat layer in rc.conf
• adds proc and fdescfs to fstab (GNOME breaks without them) and mounts them
• adds your user to video and wheel
• drops a polkit rule so wheel members can authenticate as admin
• offers to reboot

It's idempotent, so re-running it shouldn't double up fstab lines or anything.

Graphics

This is the part that bites everyone. The base system has no KMS driver, so without drm-kmod you're going to boot to a black screen.

sudo pkg install -y drm-kmod

Then pick the right module for your GPU:

sudo sysrc kld_list+=i915kms     # Intel
sudo sysrc kld_list+=amdgpu      # AMD (recent)
sudo sysrc kld_list+=radeonkms   # AMD (older)

NVIDIA is its own thing — pkg install nvidia-driver nvidia-modeset and add nvidia-modeset to kld_list.

If it doesn't work

service gdm status
less /var/log/Xorg.0.log
tail -n 200 /var/log/messages
mount | grep -E 'proc|fdescfs'

Xorg.0.log saying "no screens found" almost always means your KMS module didn't load. Check kldstat and re-read the Graphics section.

License

GPL-3.0.