From owner-freebsd-hackers Wed Jan 24 18:29:39 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mta5.rcsntx.swbell.net (mta5.rcsntx.swbell.net [151.164.30.29]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 35FCB37B404 for ; Wed, 24 Jan 2001 18:29:21 -0800 (PST) Received: from holly.calldei.com ([208.191.149.190]) by mta5.rcsntx.swbell.net (Sun Internet Mail Server sims.3.5.2000.01.05.12.18.p9) with ESMTP id <0G7P00E254FH2S@mta5.rcsntx.swbell.net> for freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG; Wed, 24 Jan 2001 20:04:30 -0600 (CST) Received: (from chris@localhost) by holly.calldei.com (8.11.1/8.9.3) id f0P26ds08619; Wed, 24 Jan 2001 20:06:40 -0600 (CST envelope-from chris) Date: Wed, 24 Jan 2001 20:06:18 -0600 From: Chris Costello Subject: Re: Running FreeBSD off of CDROM In-reply-to: <200101250053.QAA29043@hokkshideh.jetcafe.org>; from dave@jetcafe.org on Wed, Jan 24, 2001 at 04:53:39PM -0800 To: Dave Hayes Cc: freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Reply-To: chris@calldei.com Message-id: <20010124200618.C776@holly.calldei.com> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-disposition: inline User-Agent: Mutt/1.2.5i References: <200101250053.QAA29043@hokkshideh.jetcafe.org> Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Wednesday, January 24, 2001, Dave Hayes wrote: > I was asked recently if it was possible to run a FreeBSD server > entirely off of CDROM. Now I know that things like /var need to be > writable, and that the initial question as worded was rather naive. > However, modulo writable filesystems which can be mounted separately, > has anyone ever done something like this? I've never done it personally, but it is extremely possible. What you'd need is a writable medium, preferable a hard disk, with whatever file system you want to use on it, and a CD with a stripped-down FreeBSD installation, complete with a kernel that matches your hardware. When you boot into your CD, and after the CD is mounted as /, mount the disk as a union with the CD /. The result is that you'll have the executables on the CD, but any data being written will go to the disk. It's the same basic model the FreeBSD 'emergency CD' uses--however, the FreeBSD emergency CD mounts an MFS partition for you, instead. I wouldn't be surprised at all if this works out perfectly for you, for whatever reason you need such a setup. -- +-------------------+--------------------------------+ | Chris Costello | If at first you don't succeed, | | chris@calldei.com | you must be a programmer. | +-------------------+--------------------------------+ To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message