Sam Carleton <sam@linux-info.net>  wrote:
 > This subject pretty much says it all, how does one go about applying
 > the IP packet filter rules (ipf.conf and ipnat.conf) without rebooting
 > the NetBSD machine?

I'm sure there's a better way to do it but what I do, if I'm not
completely confident that a change I made will be correct, is:

ipf -D ; ipf -E -f /etc/ipf.conf ; ipnat -f /etc/ipnat.conf ; sleep 30 ; ipf -D

I hit return and after a couple seconds, I hit ^C.  If the ^C makes it,
then it doesn't "ipf -D". If not, then I know I only have to wait about
30 seconds before I'll have access to the machine again.