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From: "Andrew L. Gould" <algould@datawok.com>
To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Date: Mon, 19 Jul 2004 15:54:39 -0500
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cc: '3BSD' <assadbsd@gmail.com>
cc: Darren Pilgrim <dmp@bitfreak.org>
cc: questions@freebsd.org
Subject: Re: How to install a custom built world+kernel to a machine with no
	OS?
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On Monday 19 July 2004 03:32 pm, Darren Pilgrim wrote:
> [Private email redirected back to list]
>
> > From: 3BSD [mailto:assadbsd@gmail.com]
> >
> > On Mon, 19 Jul 2004 04:21:09 -0700, Darren Pilgrim
> >
> > <dmp@bitfreak.org> wrote:
> > > I have a number of machines onto which I want to install a
> > > custom-built world, kernel and set of packages, all of which have
> > > been built on
>
> another
>
> > > machine.  The target machines presently have no OS on them and
> > > can only
>
> be
>
> > > booted by CD.
> >
> > How similar are those machines hardware wise? Because if they are
> > really similar, you could use an imaging utility such as norton
> > ghost to replicate one install on any number of machines, provided
> > their hardware is similar, but if you use a Generic kernel, I'd
> > imagine you don't even need the machines to be that similar at all.
>
> That doesn't solve the problem, though.  I would still need to
> install the OS onto at least one machine.

So are you saying that the custom world and kernel are not the system in 
use on the computer on which they exist?

Assuming you've already edited the configuration files 
(/etc/rc.conf, /etc/fstab, etc):

1. Could you take the harddrives out of the destination computers, mount 
them on the source computer, and copy the system onto the hard drives?

2. Couldn't you use a live cdrom distribution (Freesbie, Knoppix, BBC 
Linux, etc) to boot the machine, setup networking, mount the hard drive 
and transfer (ftp, nfs, rsync, etc) the custom system to the new 
computer?

Andrew Gould