Boot Environments.FreeBSD has a fantastic featurecalled Boot Environments, which are like a snapshotof your Boot Environment,of your your operating system.A bit of akin to it's not it's there's nothing like it really.I was going to say it's a bit like thethe rollback feature in Windows, but it's not even like that.There's just nothing like it.So what this allows you to do, which is what I use it formainly, is what am I doing with my hands?What's this? I don't do that.So what I use this for is when I'm doing a load of system updates,I will take a snapshot of the boot environment to the updates.If it goes wrong, which nine times out of ten it doesn't.But if there's,for instance,something I'm going to update with PHPand that the applicationuses PHP doesn't work with sayversion 8 as opposed to version 7.I can just roll back to the other boot environment and it still works.So let's have a look at it and see what what it is and how it works shall we?So looking at my terminal here,I'm logged into a vanilla FreeBSD 13.1release and let's do a bectlSo there are two tools that you can use for this, there's bectlor you can install beadmB E A D M which gives youless options, but it's easier to use,so it might be better for you to use this one. SoI'm going to use bectl for now.So there we go.If we list it, it will tell you what environments we've got at the moment.Just the default, nice and simpleand it was created on first of the 2022.Today when I installed the system, fairly simple.So let'screate one and see what we can do with that.Should weso, B E C T L createand it will tell you where I've gone wrongand the namenice and easy.So let's go testlist.So there's our two boot environments.So if I now install some software,let's goinstall vim.I don't use vim.It's not something I would normally install.There we go.So there isThat's why I hate vimcan never remember the commands. Right,So if I now look at my boot environments.So what can I do with that?Well, let's say for argument's sake, thatwhen I install vim, it screws something up.Clearly it did and it wouldn't.But what can I do?Well, I can boot into the boot environment that I created a few minutes ago.Reboot. And it's like it's not installed.So let's do that. So, B E C T Ll there we go.So if I do my list again and then I reboot.So let's go tothe system to see it rebooting.Just so that you know that I'm not cheating.Okay.So you can see that that is now restarted.Let's go back andrestart this session, clear it Let's do a bectl list.So there you go.The test is now active, soprobably should have picked some better than VI, to be honest.So Vim and there we go, not installedabsolutely invaluable.So if I now reactivate the defaultboot environmentHelpsif I actually spell correctly.Here we go.So that's now the one that'sactive and then reboot againVIM will be installed again.That's interesting.Dunno what happened there...reboot not restart.So go back to the box itself.They got restarting.Beep.Up it comestime and dateThere we go.Let's restart,restart the terminalThere we go, andI'm back into that one.So when I do vim, they go, it's back.There we go.So there's also beadmwhich again, does the same thing, but it doesn't have so many of thethe switches that you could put on the end.So if you look atit's got more of it.But yeah, I find this absolutely invaluable.I have got into the routine now where if I'm doingupdates on, make sure that I take a snapshotof my boot environment because I lose the server.I've got to go on site and I've got to fix it physically.I don't want to do that.I'd much rather just be able to go,There we go, activate that,Let's go back.Absolutely fantastic.So there's a little insight into boot environments on FreeBSD.As I say, complete game changer and totally invaluableto what I do as a server administrator.I'm sure there are more in-depth things that you can do with it, butfor me, having a list of boot environments that I can boot intoafter I've done some updates is just total game changer.Hope you enjoyed this video.Like I said, not not amassive one, not an in-depth thing.Just a quick look at boot environments.on FreeBSD, how they help me specifically.And maybe you can start using themjust to cover your back when you're doing updates.If you want tohope you've enjoyed it, subscribe for more videos.They come out once a week in the holidays at the moment.And after that will go back to twice a week.Give it a like if you like it.Don't forget this cool link in the description.Tell me if you're usingboot environments in the comments down below.Be interesting to see how many of you are and if you're using it in a specific way,an advanced way, let me know in the comments as always.I'll see you in next video. Take care.