Subject: Re: ELC with pc532
To: Jon Buller <jonb@metronet.com>
From: matthew green <mrg@eterna.com.au>
List: port-sparc
Date: 06/21/1996 10:48:48
From: matthew green <mrg@eterna.com.au>
> There are 3 files here. One is a kernel boot floppy image,
> one is a microroot filesystem image, and one is a miniroot
> filesystem image. The first two go together. You boot from
> the boot disk, and when it ejects that floppy, you put in
> the second and press return. Then NetBSD loads that
> filesystem into RAM and uses it as the root device. The
> idea is here to allow disk formatting, etc. The final
> filesystem image is larger than a floppy and is the full
> miniroot used on several NetBSD ports. It is planned that
> the microroot will automagically load the miniroot for you
> but at this point, you need to load it manually into the
> swap partition and then boot it.
Well, my ELC doesn't have a floppy so I guess using the first 2
files are out. 8-) Can I just put the miniroot on a tape (or disk)
and boot /netbsd from in there? And in my case, do I need a
disklabel if I put it on a disk? David's root, although large was
very simple to use. Just" gzcat root.gz | dd of=/dev/sd1c", move
a disk, and boot with /netbsd. Do/will we have something that
simple for tape, floppies, CD-ROM, and disk? I don't have any
problem with "Insert second floppy now" messages for small media,
but this doesn't sound quite that clean. Are you trying to move
it in that direction, or am I reading it to be harder than it is?
the miniroot is designed to be generic enough to be loadable
from anywhere: the network, a tape, a disk, floppies, etc.
i suggest putting it on a b partition somewhere and booting
from there. it should allow you to install netbsd (indeed,
it should have the install program).
i'll be looking at the boot.fs problem later.
.mrg.