Newbie Port Filter Question on 4.10stable

[Erick Mechler]

:: Can anyone point me to a clear resource on what I should do to start, stop
:: and flush the port filter rules and whether or not I was working in the
:: correct place to begin with.

Always start with the Handbook:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/firewalls.html

Then, the list archives (specifically this thread that started on the 20th 
on -security):

http://docs.freebsd.org/cgi/getmsg.cgi?fetch=56843+0+archive/2004/freebsd-security/20041121.freebsd-security

Best practice would be to take what you want out of /etc/rc.firewall and 
build your own ruleset in another file.  That way you can't accidentally 
overwrite it the next time you run mergemaster.

Cheers - Erick