Subject: Re: installing debian with initrd

From: [email-masked] (Bruce Perens)
Date: Fri, 6 Sep 96 15:34 PDT

> Is there a compressed filesystem in a file somewhere (I already have
> a kernel) where I can just do:
> 
>         loadlin kernel initrd=image.gz root=/dev/ramdisk
> 
> and start installing?

I am working on this for Debian 1.2 . Currently, you have to go through
the 5-floppy thing as detailed in my installation document on our WWW
site and also via FTP as
ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/stable/disks-i386/current/install.html .

I am planning to make 3 initrd files. Which one you use depends on how
much RAM you have. The smallest one boots to a miniroot, and you have
to feed in a floppy to get the device driver modules. This is
suitable for 4MB systems. The next larger one contains the miniroot
and all of the modules, and you have to feed in floppies for the base
system. This is suitable for 8MB system. The largest contains the entire
base system, and is suitable for 16MB systems. These should run directly
off of a CD or DOS partition, and will make floppy-less install possible
for most people.

	Thanks

	Bruce

---

From: "Marty Leisner" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 6 Sep 1996 16:56:02 PDT

>off of a CD or DOS partition, and will make floppy-less install possible

What I thought...I frown on making floppies anymore (I'd much
rather transfer images through ethernet...

Right...I'm looking at machines with >= 16 mbytes RAM...I've used
yard to make ram boot disks of 4 megabytes...(with bash and nvi
on there).  I then mount the slackware (I've used slackware)
install disk (as another ram image somewhere) and get it to work..
through brute force!!

Maybe I'm looking for instructions of what programs I have to
have installed in what places...I'm perfectly comfortable building
them myself...

You want to some help?  I'm going to install a system this weekend,
so I might give debian a while (I've been using ELF for a year, and
the only ELF system I knew of last year was slackware).

I floppyless install off CDROM is the way to go...

Are all the floppies independent file systems?  Can I mount them 
as loopback file systems?

marty