Re: serial console device, and installboot vs. /boot.cfg

[Greg Troxel <gdt%lexort.com@localhost>]

Steve Rikli <sr%genyosha.net@localhost> writes:

>> 4) what is "-o console=auto" intended to do with installboot? I tried
>> 
>> I think it's 'do some kind of default' which is sort of useful when you
>> have no idea about the system hardware and no idea what somebody might
>> want.  It does not seem like a good choice for someone who knows what
>> they want.
>
> Well, what I really want :-) is to be able to switch between a COM serial
> port and a Pc keyboard without re-configuring NetBSD, and that's what I
> was hoping for with auto.
>
> "auto" activates the serial console in my config, but the Pc keyboard+VGA
> sees no boot messages or menus, which feels like "auto" and "com0" are
> effectively the same in my setup. More experiments warranted.

I think what you want is "dual" not "auto", to use both com0 and vga, to
output to both, and to read from either.  I have no reason to think
there is any code to do this.

> with the same (working) results as near as I can tell. installboot(8)
> says options are comma separated, so I used my syntax rather than
> multiple "-o" like in your example. Apparently equivalent?

probably.