From owner-freebsd-small Tue Oct 6 15:37:52 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id PAA17611 for freebsd-small-outgoing; Tue, 6 Oct 1998 15:37:52 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-small@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from smtp01.wxs.nl (smtp01.wxs.nl [195.121.6.61]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id PAA17486 for ; Tue, 6 Oct 1998 15:37:14 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from asmodai@wxs.nl) Received: from diabolique ([195.121.58.124]) by smtp01.wxs.nl (Netscape Messaging Server 3.6) with SMTP id AAG50E; Wed, 7 Oct 1998 00:37:09 +0200 Message-Id: X-Sender: skywise@pop.wxs.nl X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Demo Date: Wed, 07 Oct 1998 00:15:24 +0200 To: Andrzej Bialecki , Peter Wallace From: Jeroen Ruigrok/Asmodai Subject: Re: Command-line i/f (Re: PicoBSD) Cc: freebsd-small@FreeBSD.ORG In-Reply-To: References: Sender: owner-freebsd-small@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 At 14:19 06-10-98 , Andrzej Bialecki wrote: >On Mon, 5 Oct 1998, Peter Wallace wrote: >> On Mon, 5 Oct 1998, Mike Smith wrote: >> >> > > Whats the big deal about cramming this onto a single floppy... >> > > Wouldn't a real embedded FreeBSD application use a small flash drive? The >> > > smallest chips that we use now are 4 M Bytes and about $12.00, cheaper >> > > than a floppy drive! >> > >> > Lots of "embedded" stuff involves an ordinary PC bolted to the inside >> > of a big wooden box or similar. >> >> But I think lots _more_ embedded stuff will be: higher reliability >> / wider ambient temperature range / smaller size / and lower cost than can >> be achieved with a floppy for boot device... > >You're of course right. The truly embedded solution would be to use an SBC >with DiskOnChip and no moving parts. But that's much more expensive... > >> I guess it depends on what the imagined target for PicoBSD is. > >OTOH, there are many people who want to use their spare, old PCs as a >turnkey networking device. For them, ability to boot the system from such >inferior (but standard) device as floppy is very important. So is for me - >and as long as this is possible (without twisting our brains in knots :-) >I'd like to keep the size of picobsd below 1.44MB. Aye, isn't there a mechanism that allows us to boot from one disk and then work on the second one? Caching everything we need from disk #1 into memory and then load the actual UI from the second disk. This solution is based on the fact that we might end up with a kickass picoBSD that beats IOS and SpiderSoftware's router software, but requires two disks for all the stuff *dreaming now* =) Another advantage this set-up might have is that the config files are safe on disk #2 and might be easily upgraded by the new software on disk#1 should it become available. >Of course, this is also a matter of how flexible is the building >procedure, so that you could easily change the size parameters if you have >enough space on the target media. I'd say it's pretty easy even with >current building process. It can be improved, of course... patches are >welcome :-) Well, one thing me could add (didn't see it in the current version) is a sort of script that takes advantage of the local HD (if it is there) and prepares a native FreeBSD slice to be used by the system... As always, reactions please =) Jeroen Ruigrok van der Werven / Asmodai ICQ-UIN: 1564317 .:. Ninth Circle Enterprises Network/Security Specialist /==|| FreeBSD and picoBSD, the Power to Serve ||==\ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGPfreeware 6.0 for non-commercial use iQA/AwUBNhqIbYY752GnxADpEQL0/wCgsUOdtJhezHCNkmhkXVa4BmReE0sAn04x Vd01Uf0BQ3RdK6plRnWddkQA =1fHr -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-small" in the body of the message