From owner-freebsd-hackers Fri Dec 20 19:55:43 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 89EE637B401 for ; Fri, 20 Dec 2002 19:55:42 -0800 (PST) Received: from web41205.mail.yahoo.com (web41205.mail.yahoo.com [66.218.93.38]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 32D2943ED8 for ; Fri, 20 Dec 2002 19:55:42 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from gathorpe79@yahoo.com) Message-ID: <20021221035542.62187.qmail@web41205.mail.yahoo.com> Received: from [149.99.119.27] by web41205.mail.yahoo.com via HTTP; Fri, 20 Dec 2002 22:55:42 EST Date: Fri, 20 Dec 2002 22:55:42 -0500 (EST) From: Gary Thorpe Subject: Re: Bootable FreeBSD CD To: Garance A Drosihn , Sean Hamilton , freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG --- Garance A Drosihn wrote: > At 7:12 PM -0800 12/20/02, Sean Hamilton wrote: > >Greetings, > > > >How does the kernel on the FreeBSD install CD know which device to > >mount as root? I'm assuming it hasn't got a ROOTDEVNAME config > >option, since that would make it fairly specific to certain > hardware. > > > >Mine always tries to mount fd0. > > You might want to check out > http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/freebsdtogo/ > > It might be helpful for whatever you're trying to do... > > -- > Garance Alistair Drosehn = gad@gilead.netel.rpi.edu > Senior Systems Programmer or gad@freebsd.org > Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute or drosih@rpi.edu > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message I think the quick answer is that the kernel on the install CD uses a built in image of a memory file system to mount as root. So, the default root device is a memory file system that can be guaranteed not to change (and permits you to remove the CD ROM once booting is over I think). This is probably the reason why FreeBSD needs more memory to install as conmpared to running normally (16MB for install vs. 6MB normally?). I think it is MDROOT/MFS or something similar in the kernel configuartion file. There are also man pages, but I forget the specific terms (mdroot() maybe? definately mfs(4)). ______________________________________________________________________ Post your free ad now! http://personals.yahoo.ca To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message