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Date:      Wed, 31 May 1995 01:07:05 -0700
From:      "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@freefall.cdrom.com>
To:        Warner Losh <imp@village.org>
Cc:        "House of Debuggin'" <wpaul@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu>, hackers@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Boot disks insane? 
Message-ID:  <1365.801907625@freefall.cdrom.com>
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Wed, 31 May 95 00:30:43 MDT." <199505310630.AAA00237@rover.village.org> 

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> Yes.  But in the past there have been two disks, one much larger than
> the other....  and usually you booted the smaller one (gzipped) and
> the larger one had all the useful files you needed.

I'll doc this better for 2.0.5R - I promise.. :-)

> Anyway, I encountered a large number of problems with installing this
> release.  I tried to do the FTP release thing (from a local host) and
> found that I got an unspecified error -1 no matter what host I pointed
> it at.  Maybe I did something wrong, but it sure was frustrating to
> discover this.  I don't think that ncftp is on boot.flp.  I couldn't
> find it when I used that useful shell on the forth screen.

Strange!  I have done numerous ftp installs, over everything from
PCMCIA ethernet cards to PPP to SLIP!  Are you sure your DNS stuff
is set up properly?  Netmask?  Did you try a URL by IP address?
(e.g. ftp://192.222.333.444/pub/FreeBSD/2.0.5-ALPHA/).

I'd like to debug this, if you'd be so kind..  I'm relying on this
kind of feedback to make 2.0.5R work!

> Also, there should be some way to mount old file systems so that you
> can just ftp the files from ftp.freebsd.org to your local hard disk
> (say overnight when you know the load is low) and thenn do the
> install.  As it was, I had to unpack them by hand to get a somewhat
> bootable system.

UFS installation should do the job..

> Then I tried to continue with things like configure and the like, but
> they didn't have any effect, so I've been cranking things by hand.

Feh?  I'd be interested in details.  Again, I certainly have tested
most of that to destruction and am surprised to hear that it's
giving you so much trouble!

> It would be nice if there was some way to say "There's my 2.0R disks,
> figure out all these silly questions from that system, do the right
> thing with the new system, and be about your business," but I
> understand that is a 2.1R project.

I'm glad you understand that.. :-) :-)

> The new install is cool and fairly nice, but the disk disk partition
> and disk label tools need some feedback as to what happens when you
> hit <ESC>.  It would be nice if it remembered mount points accross
> reboots, but that is minor...

I can't remember the mountpoints since they're not stored anywhere!
:-( I could parse fstab if I found it, but after the slice changes it
would almost certainly be wrong. anyway.

> Oh, is it "safe" to use old, unconverted file systems with the
> 2.0.5-ALPHA *AND* the 2.0R kernel at the same time (meaning that
> sometimes the 2.0R kernel is reading/writing them, and at other times
> the 2.0.5-ALPHA kernel is reading/writing them).

Should be no problem, modulo the slice code bitching at you.

> All in all, this is a much improved install system, despite my
> complaints about it.  It will likely need some polish around the edges
> before it is ready for 2.0.5R (Sorry Jordan).

No offense taken - that's why I'm doing this ALPHA!  I'm totally open
to any specific suggestions you or anyone else might have and, as Poul
will tell you, am generally quick to implement anything I think is a
good idea.  This install is by no means frozen in stone yet!  If you
(and I mean the generic "you", not just Warner) have suggestions for
changes to the code or the docs (or, even better, patches for any of
the above :-) I'm _very_ interested in hearing from you!

I may have come on a little strong with Julian, and I really don't
mean to be snappy about feedback.  I am tired and there's a vertebra
twisted in my neck that is causing me considerable pain (%@&%*!!
chiropractor is closed on Tuesdays! :-( ) so I may be a little on
edge, but I'm still very interested in feedback.  Some of it may be
utterly impractical, and when it is I'll simply say so, but I still
want to hear it!

					Jordan



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