In a new, bare, clean Debian 8 64-bit machine, execute the following as root, from the command line (following is repository for FreeSWITCH 1.6; for 1.8, please search for latest instructions on http://freeswitch.org/confluence):

    apt-get update
    apt-get -y upgrade
    apt-get install -y wget ca-certificates
    wget -O - https://files.freeswitch.org/repo/deb/debian/freeswitch_archive_g0.pub | apt-key add -
    echo "deb http://files.freeswitch.org/repo/deb/freeswitch-1.6/ jessie main" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/freeswitch.list
    apt-get update
    apt-get install -y freeswitch-meta-all
  

A FreeSWITCH installation, complete with all its accessories, files, and default configuration, is now deployed on the machine.

We still have an (optional, but very useful) thing to do, because the layout on hard disk after a package installation is different from what you will read in this book and in all documentation. We create the /usr/local/freeswitch directory that is referred to everywhere in docs, and symlinks from there to the various FreeSWITCH components. Again, as root, from the command line, execute the following:

    mkdir -p /usr/local/freeswitch/bin
    ln -s /usr/bin/freeswitch /usr/local/freeswitch/bin/
    ln -s /usr/bin/fs_* /usr/local/freeswitch/bin/
    ln -s /usr/bin/fsxs /usr/local/freeswitch/bin/
    ln -s /usr/bin/tone2wav /usr/local/freeswitch/bin/
    ln -s /usr/bin/gentls_cert /usr/local/freeswitch/bin/
    ln -s /etc/freeswitch /usr/local/freeswitch/conf
    ln -s /var/lib/freeswitch/* /usr/local/freeswitch/
    ln -s /var/log/freeswitch /usr/local/freeswitch/log
    ln -s /var/run/freeswitch /usr/local/freeswitch/run
    ln -s /etc/freeswitch/tls /usr/local/freeswitch/certs
    ln -s /usr/lib/freeswitch/mod /usr/local/freeswitch/
    rm /usr/local/freeswitch/lang

We have now installed from packages a complete FreeSWITCH system, stable, always up to date with the latest security, bug fixes, and features, and completely compatible with official documentation, community knowledge, and broscience.

Now, reboot the machine and you'll find FreeSWITCH is automatically run as freeswitch user (and freeswitch group).

We update the whole platform periodically using the command line (as root):

    apt-get clean
    apt-get update
    apt-get dist-upgrade