Date: Sun, 8 Jan 1995 04:17:27 -0800 From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@time.cdrom.com> To: hackers@freefall.cdrom.com Subject: A very large clarification. Message-ID: <199501081217.EAA01550@time.cdrom.com>
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I must first apologise for being far too general in my rebuttal to Bill Paul's posting. I just had a long conversation with David (and, earlier, Nate) that made me realize just how ambiguous I must have been. This posting is my attempt to rectify that error. First thing: What I think of when I hear the word "install" has evidently gone far astray of everyone else's. I wasn't actually talking about the same "install" that Bill or Garrett were. No, when I say "install" I suppose that I am really talking about *configuration management*. My end of the installation always comes in at the higher level "bininst", don't forget, and I rely on Poul-Henning to provide the low level stuff. That is to say that the fdisk/disklabel stuff will probably be still done much in the old way, and as Poul-Henning dictates. If anything, I'd expect sysinstall to get more wizard knobs on it (not less), and just because the stuff *I'm* interested in is the fancy _customization_ stuff that you can enter at any time after the bare-bones install ** doesn't mean that I am suggesting that the bare-bones install use X **!!. I am sorry if I gave that impression! I was talking out-loud about what I had in mind for the *customization* phase of "installation". I intend to work only at the very trailing edge of the installation, with stuff you do after you've landed safely and want to start making things look more personalized (if you _want_ to). Poul can worry about the low-end stuff, since it's more his forte'. I wouldn't dream of making the fixit floppy be X based! :-) Two: I agree that the shell must return. I suppose that a 3 floppy set (and 1 floppy cd set) should be accepted as inevitable? I think the 2 floppy boot was a neat trick, but just a bit too cramped! :( Three: I do NOT plan to do any of this X stuff for 2.1. Again, I am thinking long term. 6 months to a year ahead. A properly done configuration management system will take me MONTHS to do! There's no way I was ever talking about doing it for 2.1. Impossible! This is a long term goal, and one I'll do because I enjoy doing it. Four: My reference to 2GB boot disks was mostly faceteous, and I wasn't even trying to say that I expected all of our *boot media* to come in 2GB form. I was simply rebutting Bill's implied (at least to me) statement that "all this stuff was just impossible to get on your system - far too big!". I don't think I need to go for 12 floppy installations, but if one could bring up the system *fully* on 3 floppies, then I see no reason why I might not ALSO offer a 8 floppy (est) "configuration pack" that let you do all kinds of neat stuff with your system using X Inside's X server and some cute tools written in Tk. I'm not asking the hackers to use it, I'm just wanting to do this because I think it's useful and it's the kind of stuff *I* like to do! :-) Hell, it's not even an original idea! Adam Richter seems to be doing very well with it. Jordan
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