boot/root floppies in modern times?

boot/root floppies in modern times?

[Chris Meadors]

As a few people on l-k know, I run my own custom Linux install on my
machines.  I followed the same route as a few others, started out with a
Slackware install (version 3.4 was the last I installed) and gradually
recompiled everything as new versions came out, mutated verious scripts,
eventually I had a system that did not have one file in common with the
orginal.

I've even come up with a crude install process that lets me take my base
installation and copy onto a new machine using NFS.

Coming from the Slackware world I made myself a set of boot and root
floppies.  The boot one gets a custom kernel tailored for the machine that
I'm going to install on, the root is pretty generic, with just enough
tools to partition, format, mount, and copy.

Also following in Slackware's footsteps, I use a compressed ramdisk on my
root floppy.  This has worked just fine until today.

I got a new Thinkpad, it doesn't have an internal floppy drive.  Instead
it has a USB floppy.  It can boot from the floppy just fine, I can get my
custom boot disk's kernel loaded.  But when it comes to loading the root
image I run into trouble.

I've made a lot of headway today, but it has taken me 4 hours to get this
far and it is almost dinner time, so I figured I'd post here before I beat
my head too much more.

Obviously (but not to me initally) the USB floppy isn't a real floppy
controlled by a floppy controller, but it is a USB mass storage device.
Got the kernel seeing that much, finds a SCSI0 and has the floppy
attatched to it.  Because it doesn't have a partition table, I'm assuming
the kernel is going to want me to mount /dev/sda.  But I'm not certain,
cause I've never used a laptop running Linux let alone messed with a USB
floppy, so I'm feeling around rather blindly trying to pass the right
root= to the kernel in an attempt to get something mounted.

But then I run into more trouble, cause the normal parameters for mounting
a gziped root image from a floppy don't work with SCSI devices.  For one
it won't wait for me to flop disks.  I have fast fingers so that isn't a
problem, I can change disks while the kernel is booting.  But I have a
feeling I'm barking up the wrong tree here.

I've seen the initrd option in the kernel config along with the other RAM
disk stuff.  I have a feeling that is the path I'm going to need to go
down, but I've never delt with it before (I know Linus is gung-ho about
initrd from posts I've seen by him here).  So I figure I'd better learn
about it sooner or later.

So anyway, this isn't super kernel releated, but I figured it was enough
that a post here wouldn't hurt too much (just this one has gone on longer
than I initially intended).  I'm just looking for any pointers or ideas,
to what has become an interesting problem to me.

Thanks a lot,
Chris
-- 
Two penguins were walking on an iceberg.  The first penguin said to the
second, "you look like you are wearing a tuxedo."  The second penguin
said, "I might be..."                         --David Lynch, Twin Peaks

Re: boot/root floppies in modern times?

[Alan Cox]

> Obviously (but not to me initally) the USB floppy isn't a real floppy
> controlled by a floppy controller, but it is a USB mass storage device.

Correct.

> I've seen the initrd option in the kernel config along with the other RAM
> disk stuff.  I have a feeling that is the path I'm going to need to go
> down, but I've never delt with it before (I know Linus is gung-ho about
> initrd from posts I've seen by him here).  So I figure I'd better learn
> about it sooner or later.

initrd is basically a ramdisk image loaded by the bios before control
is transferred from the loader to the kernel. Thus you can have a floppy
with a file system, lilo and a kernel on it (if you squeeze).

Then you can set it up so that

The boot loads the initd
It runs the needed USB drivers
It  mounts the /dev/sda disk and copies it to /dev/ram1 ramdisk
It transfers control

Re: boot/root floppies in modern times?

[Ookhoi]

Hi Chris,

> I got a new Thinkpad, it doesn't have an internal floppy drive.  Instead
> it has a USB floppy.  It can boot from the floppy just fine, I can get my
> custom boot disk's kernel loaded.  But when it comes to loading the root
> image I run into trouble.

I had the same problem with my vaio c1ve. Only a usb floppy drive, and
no way to let it read the second floppy disk or to make it mount root
via nfs as the nic got active after the bootp requests. 

I solved this by using one floppy with a initrd with enough tools to
download the drivers which were not in the kernel (for example usb &
scsi, or ide). You then just download the modules plus insmod on your
ramdisk and of you go. 

Hope this helps!

	Ookhoi

Re: boot/root floppies in modern times?

[Joel Jaeggli]

a number of new laptops have pci ethernet interfaces on mini-pci cards...
on both an hp omnibook 500 (3com 9xx), and a thinkpad x20 (intel) I've
done a network install of redhat 7.1 using the single bootnet floppy.

regards
joelja

 On Sun, 30 Sep 2001, Ookhoi wrote:

> Hi Chris,
>
> > I got a new Thinkpad, it doesn't have an internal floppy drive.  Instead
> > it has a USB floppy.  It can boot from the floppy just fine, I can get my
> > custom boot disk's kernel loaded.  But when it comes to loading the root
> > image I run into trouble.
>
> I had the same problem with my vaio c1ve. Only a usb floppy drive, and
> no way to let it read the second floppy disk or to make it mount root
> via nfs as the nic got active after the bootp requests.
>
> I solved this by using one floppy with a initrd with enough tools to
> download the drivers which were not in the kernel (for example usb &
> scsi, or ide). You then just download the modules plus insmod on your
> ramdisk and of you go.
>
> Hope this helps!
>
> 	Ookhoi
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Re: boot/root floppies in modern times?

[Chris Meadors]

On Sun, 30 Sep 2001, Ookhoi wrote:

> I had the same problem with my vaio c1ve. Only a usb floppy drive, and
> no way to let it read the second floppy disk or to make it mount root
> via nfs as the nic got active after the bootp requests.

Well I got the e-mail from Alan Cox, thought it was a little terse, but it
did focus me on the initrd, went and read the initrd.txt again, and found
that Alan's e-mail spoke volumes.

Like Alan suggested I squeezed and I got lilo, the kernel, and an initrd
fs containing a static busybox on 1 floppy.

> I solved this by using one floppy with a initrd with enough tools to
> download the drivers which were not in the kernel (for example usb &
> scsi, or ide). You then just download the modules plus insmod on your
> ramdisk and of you go.

So, I ended up where you did, 1 floppy with enough tools to load any other
floppy with anything else I need.

Which brings me to my next stumbling block.  The NIC that I have now (got
an internal mini-pci one coming next week) is a PC Card.  That is
something else I've never messed with.  I built the driver (3c574) into
the kernel, but from what I'm seeing that isn't enough?  I also need the
pcmcia-cs userland tools?  (I'm reading the PCMCIA-HOWTO now.)  I guess
this wouldn't seem too strange to me if I was still running 2.2 and needed
the isapnp userland stuff, but that has been included in the kernel.  So
what is the deal with PC Cards?

Well I've got more reading to do.

Thanks again,
Chris
-- 
Two penguins were walking on an iceberg.  The first penguin said to the
second, "you look like you are wearing a tuxedo."  The second penguin
said, "I might be..."                         --David Lynch, Twin Peaks

Re: boot/root floppies in modern times?

[Ookhoi]

> So, I ended up where you did, 1 floppy with enough tools to load any
> other floppy with anything else I need.

:-)

> Which brings me to my next stumbling block. The NIC that I have now
> (got an internal mini-pci one coming next week) is a PC Card. That is
> something else I've never messed with. I built the driver (3c574) into
> the kernel, but from what I'm seeing that isn't enough? I also need
> the pcmcia-cs userland tools? 

No. I have the 3CCFE575CT and with the driver 3c59x build into the
kernel or as kernel module, I don't need any pcmcia tools. Good thing
for the single floppy. :-)

	Ookhoi