From owner-freebsd-hackers Fri Oct 27 14:40:21 2000 Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from siri.nordier.com (c3-dbn-77.dial-up.net [196.33.200.77]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 736EE37B479; Fri, 27 Oct 2000 14:40:10 -0700 (PDT) Received: (from rnordier@localhost) by siri.nordier.com (8.9.3/8.6.12) id XAA32861; Fri, 27 Oct 2000 23:39:55 +0200 (SAST) From: Robert Nordier Message-Id: <200010272139.XAA32861@siri.nordier.com> Subject: Re: Really odd "BTX halted" problem booting FreeBSD on VALinux To: fclift@verio.net (Fred Clift) Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2000 23:39:54 +0200 (SAST) Cc: fclift@verio.net (Fred Clift), dillon@earth.backplane.com (Matt Dillon), tlambert@primenet.com (Terry Lambert), freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG (freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG), hackers@FreeBSD.ORG In-Reply-To: from "Fred Clift" at Oct 27, 2000 03:44:01 PM X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL3] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Fred Clift wrote: > > > > > > Why not edit the partition table after boot1 gets installed? > > > > Because you can never make it valid. By keeping it the same set of > > illegal values, at least the system can recognise it. > > > What do you mean it can't be made valid? fdisk -u and a few keystrokes > later and I have a valid partition table... Whats wrong with it? Really, > if I'm being dense, sorry -- perhaps I just dont under stand yet -- please > be patient with me :) If the PC partition (slice) includes boot1, it is invalid. A slice should can't include its own MBR. If the BSD partition excludes boot1, it is invalid. A partition can't exclude its own boot blocks. Just because fdisk is happy, doesn't mean it's valid. Just because it works (for you), doesn't mean it's valid, either. :) > > > > A final point: > > > > o Don't use dangerously dedicated mode. > > I'd love to but the tools for automated installs in non-dedicated mode > dont really exist in a supported way. One of the things that was pointed > out in the thread is that disklabel doesn't work inside an fdisk slice. Disklabel really needs to be rewritten. > I could use expect to manipulate sysinstall? So, for now, I use > dangerously dedicated installs with a hacked fake partition table to work > around the broken bioses I use. I just might start using program posted > in this thread that lets you do labels right in lieu of anything else, or > perhaps I'll fix disklabel to work right as was suggeseted elsewhere. Don't sysinstall work in a script mode? I've never used it, but I thought it did. -- Robert Nordier rnordier@nordier.com rnordier@FreeBSD.org To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message