# $FreeBSD: docs/README.TXT 117 2013-01-13 22:58:33Z gjb $

This directory contains FreeBSD installation snapshots for the main/ and
stable/ branches.  The snapshot installation media are organized in the
same hierarchy as the FreeBSD release installers, for example:

        snapshots/amd64/amd64/ISO-IMAGES/
        snapshots/i386/i386/ISO-IMAGES/

Please note: currently non-x86 architecture builds are cross-built,
not natively generated on their respective platform.

The FTP structure is also available for bootonly.iso installers.

These snapshots do not include a package distribution, and do not
include the release notes documentation.

Snapshots are expected to be generated weekly.  Snapshot retention is
expected to be the the past two prior weeks in general.  The FTP
directory will always contain the distribution sets for the most
recent snapshot, povided there are no build failures.

Snapshots are named as:

        FreeBSD-{BRANCH}-{ARCH}-{DATE}-{GITREV}

or for 12.x:

        FreeBSD-{BRANCH}-{ARCH}-{DATE}-{SVNREV}

where BRANCH is the official branch name (such as 14.0-CURRENT, or
13.1-STABLE), ARCH is the target architecure the release was built,
DATE is the day the snapshot was built in YYYYMMDD format, and
GITREV is the associated Git commit revision at the point in time
the snapshot was generated.

The CHECKSUM.SHA512 and CHECKSUM.SHA256 files are suffixed with the
date the snapshots were generated.

In general, it can be expected that all snapshots will be built with
the same commit, as to avoid inconsistencies between images built
on the same day.

Be sure to check the mailing lists for those architectures (e.g.,
freebsd-current) before taking one of those snapshots.  The specific
testing purpose that snapshot was generated for should be mentioned
there.  The snapshot ISOs in those architecture directories may not
be suitable for general use.

Those who wish to keep up-to-date on the latest snapshot availability
are advised to subscribe to the freebsd-snapshots@ mailing list, where
new snapshots will be announced, including the image checksums and
any notable information regarding a particular snapshot set, including
but not limited to build failures across a particular branch.