On Mon, 19 Aug 2002 13:36:17 +1000, grant beattie <grant@netbsd.org> wrote:
> On Sun, Aug 18, 2002 at 10:24:40PM -0500, Brian Grayson (home) wrote:
> 
> >   It's been a few years since I've done an install from scratch,
> > and a couple of things bugged me when I actually tried it with a
> > near-1.6-ish CD that Wasabi gave me (@ SNDF, FWIW).  Unfortunately, my
> > main machine is not in much of a state for me to do much besides mention
> > it here.

...

> >   3.  I had a partition set aside, and gave it ID 169, but did not
> >   newfs it.  When I ran sysinst, it assumed that since the ID was
> >   ready to go, it had been newfs'd.  So, when it tried to mount it,
> >   the mount failed.  Since so many disk partition tools allow one to
> >   specify the ID, it would be nice if it said "Hm.  NetBSD ID on the
> >   partition, but FFS partition not found.  Do you want me to newfs this
> >   for you?"
> 
> I'm not sure of this behavior, though it sounds like a useful
> potential addition.

This reminder me of a nasty problem, when upgading with install. Install
tries to mount all ffs makred filesystems found in "/etc/fstab" on the
system to upgrage and do not honore the "noauto" flag. As I use exchange
able harddisk with one system I have to prepare a special "/etc/fstab"
for upgading. I have last found this when upgrading to 1.5.2, so it may
be allready sloved, on the other hand it is a very uncommon configuration.

A other Problem I found there, was that install dose refuse to work, if
it ses it backup of /etc from a previous run, which failed for somereason
later. The user normaly knowes that, so he could be ask for the status
of that backup. Posible answers should be:
  1. Backup is ok, no need for an other one; continue upgarding.
  2. Bakup is old, tose it and make a new one.
  3. Give me a shell for looking up for details; ask me aggain.
  4. Give up an reboot the old system.

Thanks.
Bernd Salbrechter

PS. To Brian: two 2-year-olds sound like more fund than one 3-year-old
and a reset button :-)