FreeBSD installers from CURRENT, 11-STABLE, 11-RELEASE assume you do not need a proxy to access the internet. This assumption is not correct. Most organizations require you to use proxies. Since you can't configure a proxy within the installer installation may fail if files are to be downloaded from an accessible server.
Created attachment 243611 [details] 0001-netconfig-add-support-for-setting-network-proxies.patch The patch attached adds a prompt after the "netconfig" phase, allowing users to set a HTTP or a FTP proxy. I have tested it successfully in isolation on a stripped-down copy of bsdinstall, found at at https://github.com/khorben/bsdinstall.
I'm loathe to add yet more dialogs to the mess that netconfig already is. Can these at least be gated behind a "Do you need a proxy to access the internet?" question that defaults to No? Needing an FTP proxy also points out how antiquated we are in using FTP rather than HTTP to download from the mirrors. Surely in this day and age we should use the latter and confine FTP downloads to the dustbin of history?
(In reply to Jessica Clarke from comment #2) I agree that it's already too many dialog prompts in the installer. However adding a question "do you want to configure a proxy?" adds one more dialog to the process of setting up a proxy... It is too late to redesign bsdinstall to be ready on time for the next release, but this change would add support for setting up network proxies as part of the installation process right away. Therefore I think the benefit in added functionality outweighs the minor usability annoyance. As reported by the initial submitter, in some environments network proxies are a must (e.g., business, finance, governmental) and other means of deployment may not be convenient or authorised.