From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Feb 11 02:44:38 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0A02D106566B for ; Thu, 11 Feb 2010 02:44:38 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from martin@dc.cis.okstate.edu) Received: from dc.cis.okstate.edu (dc.cis.okstate.edu [139.78.103.93]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D61248FC13 for ; Thu, 11 Feb 2010 02:44:37 +0000 (UTC) Received: from dc.cis.okstate.edu (localhost.cis.okstate.edu [127.0.0.1]) by dc.cis.okstate.edu (8.14.2/8.13.8) with ESMTP id o1B2iLuH002659 for ; Wed, 10 Feb 2010 20:44:21 -0600 (CST) (envelope-from martin@dc.cis.okstate.edu) Message-Id: <201002110244.o1B2iLuH002659@dc.cis.okstate.edu> To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Date: Wed, 10 Feb 2010 20:44:21 -0600 From: Martin McCormick Subject: Re: sysinstall and mfs Great News and another Question X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 11 Feb 2010 02:44:38 -0000 J65nko writes: > IMHO it is easier to to install FreeBSD without using sysinstall at all. > > See the "FreeBSD Install Without Sysinstall" guide at > http://www.daemonforums.org/showthread.php?t=1538 This looks very possible with a couple of changes. Am I right in my reading of the man page of mdconfig that the memory disk image will gobble up at least as much RAM as the image, itself? In this case, that's about 600 times more than I have available. mfsbsd seems as solid as a rock as long as you don't do something that needs lots of buffer space as there is only about a megabyte or two left over. tar works fine and I can copy either an iso image or a tar ball made from the file system over to the newly-formatted drive where it can be unpacked. It may be necessary to run chroot /mnt so as not to munch mfs when running the install.sh scripts but I think this should install the system. I really have given up on sysinstall for this purpose. It is hard to script and it appears that if you use the custom installation, you almost get a system but the effort is hardly worth it. One still has to install the kernel and many of the configuration files like /etc/rc.conf. I don't know why but another artickel I read on remote installation of FreeBSD that uses sysinstall describes this so I know it isn't just me doing something stupid. I feel kind of stupid spending almost 3 weeks finding out what doesn't work. When using mfsbsd, one already has enough information in the interface configuration and resolv.conf to populate /etc/rc.conf, /etc/hosts and /etc/resolv.conf to match the present network configuration. The local time zone is a copy of one of the rule sets for computing time placed as /etc/localtime. In the middle of the United States, it is /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Chicago copied, not linked, to /etc/localtime. The goal is to run the script I will build under mfsbsd and then boot the system in working order as if it had been installed via sysinstall by someone sitting at a console. Martin McCormick WB5AGZ Stillwater, OK Systems Engineer OSU Information Technology Department Telecommunications Services Group