Pi-hole is free and open-source software that acts as a DNS sinkhole to block ads and tracking domains on your network. This tutorial will guide you through the installation process of Pi-hole on FreeBSD.
Before installing Pi-hole, make sure you have the following prerequisites:
To install Pi-hole, we need to update the package repository first. Open the terminal and type:
pkg update && pkg upgrade
Pi-hole has a few dependencies that we need to install before actually installing it. These are lighttpd, php, and php-cgi. We can install these by running the following command:
pkg install lighttpd php74 php74-cgi
Now we're ready to install Pi-hole. To do so, we need to clone the Pi-hole repository from GitHub. First, cd into a directory where you want to place the Pi-hole files. In this tutorial, we'll use /usr/local/www/:
cd /usr/local/www/
Next, clone the Pi-hole repository from GitHub:
git clone https://github.com/pi-hole/pi-hole.git
After cloning the repository, cd into the Pi-hole directory:
cd pi-hole/
Finally, install Pi-hole by running the installation script:
./basic-install.sh
The installation script will guide you through the installation process. You'll be asked to select your upstream DNS provider, configure your network settings, and choose any additional blocklists.
After installing Pi-hole, you need to configure your system DNS to use Pi-hole as the default DNS server. Open the /etc/resolv.conf file in your favorite text editor:
vi /etc/resolv.conf
Add the following line at the beginning of the file:
nameserver <ip_address_of_your_pi-hole_server>
Save the file and exit your text editor.
To verify that Pi-hole is working correctly, open your browser and navigate to http://<ip_address_of_your_pi-hole_server>/admin/. You should see the Pi-hole dashboard, which shows statistics about the number of ads and tracking domains that have been blocked.
Pi-hole is a powerful tool that allows you to block ads and tracking domains on your network. By following this tutorial, you should now have Pi-hole up and running on your FreeBSD machine. Happy browsing!
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