FreeNAS is a free and open-source software network-attached storage (NAS) system based on FreeBSD and the ZFS file system, with a dedicated management web interface (originally written in PHP, then rewritten from scratch in Python/Django). It is licensed under the terms of the BSD License and runs on commodity 32 and 64-bit x86 hardware. FreeNAS supports Windows, OS X and Unix clients and various virtualization hosts such as XenServer and VMware using the CIFS, AFP, NFS, iSCSI, SSH, rsync and FTP/TFTP protocols. Advanced FreeNAS features include full-disk cryptography and a plug-in architecture for third-party software.The ZFS file system
FreeNAS supports the legacy Unix File System and the ZFS filesystem which provides data integrity checking to prevent data corruption, enable point in time snapshotting, replication and several levels of redundancy including striping, mirroring, mirrored striping (RAID 1+0), and three levels of RAID-Z.
User experience
FreeNAS is managed through a comprehensive web interface that is supplemented by a minimalistic shell console that handles essential administrative functions. The web interface supports storage array configuration, user management, sharing configuration and system maintenance.
As an embedded system appliance, FreeNAS boots from a 2GB image that typically resides on a USB Flash device or SATA DOM. This image can be configured using a bootable CD-ROM installer or by flashing the image directly using a utility like 'dd'. The FreeNAS operating system is fully independent of its storage arrays, allowing its configuration database and encryption keys to be backed up and restored to a fresh installation of the OS. This separation also allows for FreeNAS system upgrades to be performed through the web interface.
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