Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 01:48:57 +0200 From: Giorgos Keramidas <keramida@ceid.upatras.gr> To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: FreeBSD release ISO purpose? Message-ID: <20041107234857.GA3200@gothmog.gr> In-Reply-To: <418E82E8.4060406@gldis.ca> References: <20041107194549.GB67652@keyslapper.org> <418E82E8.4060406@gldis.ca>
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On 2004-11-07 15:17, Jeremy Faulkner <gldisater@gldis.ca> wrote:
> Louis LeBlanc wrote:
> | The install instructions simply say "insert the installation CD". I've
> | always assumed this referred to disk1. I've never needed to use disk2 in
> | the install, so what's it for? What's the bootonly disk for? What's the
> | mininst disk for? (I'm guessing it means minimum install)
> |
> | Can anyone point me to the details if they exist online?
>
> disc1 the basic install components and popular third party
> apps (x11,etc.)
This is good for most of the new users to FreeBSD, who will probably
feel more confident with the precompiled packages their release CD-ROM
includes, at least until they get reasonably acquainted with the proper
CVSup/build "magic" to upgrade their system from the sources.
> disc2 -> more packages, a live file system
Extra packages, that don't fit in the first ISO are handy for the same group
of users mentioned above. The live filesystem is a pretty good "rescue disk"
too, that includes a lot of tools. The advantages of having a live disk with
a complete, working installation of the same system installed on your hard
disk are so many I can't list them all in a single post; some of them are:
o You can easily recover most configuration errors (i.e. a simple rc.conf
typo), by booting into the rescue disk and mounting the installed system
under /mnt.
o Editors, disk editing tools, documentation, pretty much everything you
need to fix a great array of possible system errors are all there.
o No reinstallation is needed to boot into a working FreeBSD system.
> miniinst the basic install components, no third party apps
This is what I use most of the time. It cuts down a lot of the download time
and still allows me to install a minimal base-system.
Then I can add the rest of the tools I need from ports, or I can upgrade to a
newer version using the sources and a CVSup mirror I have locally (which I
periodically burn to a CD-ROM disk).
> boot the basics to boot, no install components, good for
> testing your hardware
Very handy when all you need to do is to boot into a FreeBSD system using a
well-known, working kernel. I usually keep a bootonly CD-ROM of a CURRENT
snapshot around my test systems, just in case a "smart" installer wipes out
my boot manager stuff ;-)
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