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Date:      Tue, 15 Jan 2002 09:58:18 -0800 (PST)
From:      John Baldwin <jhb@FreeBSD.org>
To:        "Richard S. Conto" <rsc@merit.edu>
Cc:        stable@FreeBSD.ORG, Gregory Bond <gnb@itga.com.au>, Brooks Davis <brooks@one-eyed-alien.net>
Subject:   Re: New cdboot ISO available
Message-ID:  <XFMail.020115095818.jhb@FreeBSD.org>
In-Reply-To: <20020115160141.6FC3A5DDA0@segue.merit.edu>

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On 15-Jan-02 Richard S. Conto wrote:
> 
>> originally from: Brooks Davis <brooks@one-eyed-alien.net>
>> subject: Re: New cdboot ISO available
>> date: Mon, 14 Jan 2002 15:47:12 -0800
>> --------
> ...
>>On Tue, Jan 15, 2002 at 10:20:21AM +1100, Gregory Bond wrote:
>>> > Yes, but then who do you target the ISO at?  I'm trying to judge how
>>> > widely
>>> > used the older machines are and if we should still use boot.flp on the
>>> > ISO's
>>> > to accomodate them.
>>>
>>> It depends on the nature and ubiquity of the "newer devices" that
>>> get dropped off kern.flp. If we get to the stage where even a small
>>> fraction of new systems aren't supported by kern.flp installs (because
>>> they come with RAID cards etc that are not on kern.flp) then it will
>>> be time to change. It's much easier for middling-old systems to boot
>>> using kern.flp than it is for someone (to pick a hypothetical example)
>>> with only a RAID controller not supported by kern.flp to hand-craft
>>> a floppy boot image, or do a double install (once to supported IDE
>>> drive, once to unsupported-by-kern.flp RAID device). Unless we want
>>> to get into the game of having a mix-n-match selection of kern.flp
>>> images! (This might be doable if we have 2 kern.flp images - one for
>>> "older systems" from 386-P2, one for "newer systems" from P3/Duron on,
>>> to pick a somewhat arbitary convention that should at least be fairly
>>> easy to explain to newbies.)
>>
>>IMO, we crossed this line a while back when the first 10/100 Ethernet
>>driver was removed from kern.flp.  That's not as bad as a RAID
>>controler, but it's pretty lame that we don't support any random
>>ethernet NIC out of the box.
>>
>>-- Brooks
> 
> Since there are two bootable CDs in the 4-cd set, why not have the first
> use the "new" method, and the second use the old? My understanding is that
> the 2nd disk was intended as a "repair" disk anyway. Would having limited
> support for various devices impact that functionality? Most device drivers
> could be dynamically loaded, the MSDOS file system doesn't need to be in the
> kernel on a recovery disk, usb support for scanners, MP3 players, etc.
> doesn't
> need to be there, and so on.

I think the 2nd CD still has to use boot.flp for now as I don't stick the
mfsroot.gz on disc2.  However, disc2 is actually a better candidate for cdboot
to be honest. :)

-- 

John Baldwin <jhb@FreeBSD.org>  <><  http://www.FreeBSD.org/~jhb/
"Power Users Use the Power to Serve!"  -  http://www.FreeBSD.org/

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