Re: NetBSD install and usage by the blind

[mlelstv%serpens.de@localhost (Michael van Elst)]

arthompson1990%gmail.com@localhost (Adam Thompson) writes:

>I'm not sure if the box has serial, thinking about it it may well do.  In w=
>hich
>case, how does one get an appropriately configured install cd?

When building a CD image the source file

distrib/amd64/cdroms/installcd/boot.cfg.in

is used as a template for the bootloader configuration file that
ends on the CD image.

Build release from source.
Modify the boot.cfg.in file in source tree by adding the line:

consdev com0

at the beginning should be sufficient.

Build iso-image.



>> Saying this. It's probably not much work to create a version of the
>> install system that does a DHCP network configuration and starts sshd.

>That'd be great since I know the machine's set up for this kind of installa=
>tion
>(it has previously been installed this way with a different os and I never
>altered the boot order) and I already run a dhcp server which I can set up =
>to do
>this.  Any idea how to go about creating that kind of installer?

An install kernel is a kernel with an embedded RAM disk. Extracting the
ramdisk is currently broken. But when building a release it is left
in the object directory as ramdisk.fs.

The RAM disk is just a standard filesystem that you can mount with the
help of the vnd driver, modify and then embed into the install kernel
with the mdsetimage tool.

Unfortunately it doesn't inlcude an sshd, all commands are statically
linked into a big "crunched" binary, it is limited in size and the
default sshd build includes every feature but the kitchen sink.

Maybe security/dropbear (from pkgsrc) gets us a smaller ssh daemon.

Ideally you would have merged the sshd into the crunched binary.

If you have an sshd, you copy it and the libraries it needs into the
ramdisk. Change the .profile in the RAM disk to run dhcpcd and sshd
instead of sysinst. You will also need a sshd configuration that
allows root login and maybe set a password.

So that's a plan, but creating the sshd binary is probably difficult.


-- 
-- 
                                Michael van Elst
Internet: mlelstv%serpens.de@localhost
                                "A potential Snark may lurk in every tree."