This project has been moved to CodeBerg: https://codeberg.org/thejessesmith/JailManager
A Bash shell script for creating, managing, and removing jails.
This project provides a simple shell script for creating and managing jails. It does not require any dependencies other than Bash and it works on any FreeBSD system (version 13.x and newer) in the -RELEASE branch with either the UFS or ZFS filesystem.
To get started, there are two options. The first is to simply install Jail Manager from FreeBSD's package repository:
pkg install jailmanager
Alternatively, you can install Jail Manager from this repository using the folling three commands. This will install the Bash shell, fetch the Jail Manager script, and install it on your system:
pkg install bash
fetch "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/slicer69/JailManager/refs/heads/main/jm"
cp jm /usr/local/bin/
Please note the above "pkg" and "cp" commands, as with the commands which follow in this document, should be run as root. Either directly or by using an access elevating tool such as "sudo" or "doas".
At this point the Jail Manager script has been installed. We can then run this one-time command to initialize the FreeBSD system for running jails.
jm init
The above command needs only to be run once, to prepare the system's directories and services.
To create a jail called "hello" run:
jm create hello
To start the new jail run:
jm start hello
To see a list of all jails, running or not, run:
jm list-all
To see a list of running jails run:
jm list
To launch a shell that runs inside the new jail run:
jm enter hello
The shell inside the jail can be terminated by running "exit".
To update an existing jail called hello run:
jm update hello
To stop a running jail called hello run:
jm stop hello
Old jails can be removed by running:
jm destroy hello