Date: Fri, 5 Nov 1999 17:03:30 -0500 (EST) From: "Crist J. Clark" <cjc@cc942873-a.ewndsr1.nj.home.com> To: roelof@nisser.com (Roelof Osinga) Cc: cjclark@home.com, freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG (FreeBSD Questions) Subject: Re: how to boot from floppy disk? Message-ID: <199911052203.RAA24600@cc942873-a.ewndsr1.nj.home.com> In-Reply-To: <38230A57.C4A9017D@nisser.com> from Roelof Osinga at "Nov 5, 1999 05:48:23 pm"
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Roelof Osinga wrote, > "Crist J. Clark" wrote: > > > > The "Winchester?" What decade did you just walk out of? > > Things just stick. Besides... hard disk? Yack. I just go with HDD. > > > ... > > > So far so good. It breaks down after the system has been loaded. At which > > > time the sysinstall Main Menu comes up. I can live with that, but what I > > > can without is the fact that it reboots the machine upon exit. > > > > Why are you using 'boot -c'? > > Like I said, things stick. Sure, still need to type in visual and there > ain't no such flag anymore; but it works, so why change. Besides, it still > gets mentioned in the docs. Even in Greg's book! So there <g>. (page 194 > of 3rd ed.) But I meant that you complain that you go to sysinstall and then can only reboot to get back out. Why go into sysinstall at all? > > Quite possible. > > > > However, the boot process changed a bit from 2.2.x to 3.x, and I am > > hesitant to tell you what is the "proper" way to do it. > > improper'll be fine, too > > > The _easiest_ (possibly not most proper) thing to do is take a copy of > > the kern.flp floppy and mount it. Put the exact command sequence you > > would enter to boot the way you want (see boot(8) to figure that out) > > in boot.conf on the floppy. > > Alas, won't work (conjecture on my part). Sure, I can change the BIOS > device ... BUT ... it won't boot from that device. Don't know why, it > just won't. (see a previous message by my hand). Which leaves ... Which previous message? Anyway, I think I guessed what you are trying to say. You can't tell your BIOS to use this device in its own menu? And if that is true, you don't think the boot(8) code could boot from it either. Probably true. > > Using the boot/loader.config (see loader(8)) might be the prefered way > > to go now-a-days. > > Indeedy. It is at that stage that, manually, I can enter the correct > params to have it boot. And be locked into the install procedure > again. Well, like I asked the fist time, why are you going into the install procedure at all? > My problem is that I don't know why that happens. Or rather, how to > prevent it. What say you? Don't use the -c option. > Dump that kernel for my GENERIC one? But > then, what is a mfsroot? It does access that diskette before > presenting the countdown prompt. I _believe_ the kern.flp is boot blocks and kernel. mfsroot.flp has stand/sysinstall and those type of utilities. You can look at... at... I can't find a kern.flp handy, if you look at loader.conf or loader.rc, you can see the code that makes it prompt for the mfsroot.flp. Take that stuff out. > I just learned that the creation of a DOS partition would solve my > problems, probably. But that means reinstalling from scratch. Not to > bad, but I'd rather boot from diskette. Ahh, a "dangerously dedicated" disk. You were warned! ;P Anyway, I actually want to be able to do this myself. I have a machine that usually functions as a src tree and ports dist server, but is also a backup. It ususally boots fine from the BIOS onto the IDE HDDs, but I am mirroring the machines it backs up on the various dangerously dedicated SCSI HDDs hanging off of it. It is an ol' 486, so I am 99.9% sure the BIOS will not like those SCSI drives. I plan on making up floppies to boot off of each backup should it need to take up the role. Then if there is a problem when I am not around, anyone can toss the disk labeled "mail backup" or "firewall backup" into the box and reboot it as that machine. I'll report my results when I find some time to get that working. -- Crist J. Clark cjclark@home.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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