car@trux.UUCP (Chris Rende) (11/28/89)
After a year of on and off hacking at xt_wini I finally had it patched to
work with my 5Mb and 10Mb hard disk. This past weekend I was able to do a
"mkfs /dev/hd0 5000; /etc/mount /dev/hd0 /user" and load all kinds of stuff
onto the hard disk.
(I used hd0 because I don't have the partitioning part of xt_wini working
yet...).
I have some questions about using a hard disk with minix:
(I have Minix 1.2 but plan to upgrade now that my HD works).
1) I supose that the correct "way" is to use hd1-hd4 instead of hd0, right?
This is probably where fdisk comes in...
2) If you only have a 5Mb hard disk to use, what's the best way to use it?
Make one big 5Mb partition? Mount it on /user? Mount it on /usr?
Make two partitions? Mount one on /user and one on /usr?
What Minix directories are best used as mount points for the hard disk?
3) I'd like to the RAM disk for as little as possible (if at all). Is it
wise to use the hard disk as the ROOT FS?
How do you move the ROOT FS from the RAM disk to the HD?
How do you get rid of or reduce the RAM disk in order to free up RAM?
4) When I get my second drive (10Mb) to work, what would be a good disk layout
for using the two drives together?
5) How can I boot from the hard drive? - I'd like to get the floppies out
of the boot process, if possible.
Any pointers about HD use with Minix would be greatly appreciated.
Observation:
I can see the head positioning mechanism moving on the HD while the disk is
operating. Minix seems to do alot of seeks back to the start of the file
system, cyl 0, super block, or whatever. While doing a "cat somefile" the
head seeks to a block from somefile, returns to the start of the disk, seeks
to the next block of somefile, returns to the start of the disk, etc...
Why does the head keep returning "home"? How can this be reduced?
car.
--
Christopher A. Rende Central Cartage (Nixdorf/Pyramid/SysVR2/BSD4.3)
uunet!edsews!rphroy!trux!car Multics,DTSS,Unix,Shortwave,Scanners,StarTrek
trux!car@uunet.uu.net Minix,PC/XT,Mac+,TRS-80 Model I,1802 ELF
"I don't ever remember forgetting anything." - Chris RendeTAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) (11/29/89)
In article <312@trux.UUCP>, car@trux.UUCP (Chris Rende) says: > >After a year of on and off hacking at xt_wini I finally had it patched to >work with my 5Mb and 10Mb hard disk. This past weekend I was able to do a >"mkfs /dev/hd0 5000; /etc/mount /dev/hd0 /user" and load all kinds of stuff >onto the hard disk. > >(I used hd0 because I don't have the partitioning part of xt_wini working >yet...). I hope there was nothing on that disk, because if there was, you trashed it. > >I have some questions about using a hard disk with minix: >(I have Minix 1.2 but plan to upgrade now that my HD works). > >1) I supose that the correct "way" is to use hd1-hd4 instead of hd0, right? > This is probably where fdisk comes in... > My God!! You don't even know what FDISK is for, and you went and did that ANYWAY??! To answer your question, yes. Fdisk partitions you hard disk for you. Re- partitioning your hard disk has the same effect as reformmatting it. The data is all there, but you can't get at it. You have to reformat it first. /dev/hd0 under Minix is the entire first hard disk, *** IT IS NOT THE FIRST PARTITION. /dev/hd1 is the first partition, /dev/hd2 is the second, /dev/hd3 is the third. /dev/hd4 is the entire second hard disk, etc. Try to remember, re-partitioning your hard disk means you lose what is on it. I learned this the hard way. >2) If you only have a 5Mb hard disk to use, what's the best way to use it? > Make one big 5Mb partition? Mount it on /user? Mount it on /usr? > Make two partitions? Mount one on /user and one on /usr? > > What Minix directories are best used as mount points for the hard disk? > This is all up to you and how you want your system configured. These are also thing you should work out BEFORE you commence this operation (I didn't, and I learned the hard way). With only five meg, you probably want the whole thing as one dir (probably /usr). The best directories to use as mount points are empty ones on the root file system (/usr, /user, or make your own). >3) I'd like to the RAM disk for as little as possible (if at all). Is it > wise to use the hard disk as the ROOT FS? > How do you move the ROOT FS from the RAM disk to the HD? > How do you get rid of or reduce the RAM disk in order to free up RAM? > I would advise leaving the root FS on the RAM disk. You probably don't need much more RAM than you have. Minix only takes just what it needs plus a couple of K. >4) When I get my second drive (10Mb) to work, what would be a good disk layout > for using the two drives together? > I have a hard time beleiving that you aren't using either hard drive, and if you are using them, DON'T repartition EITHER of them until you back them up! Once you get them both working, I would suggest you mount them just as you would your floppies, and make two spare dirs on your root directory for flopp- ies. The root directory will have to stay on the ramdisk so you have something to mount you hdisks to (You cant mount them on themselves). >5) How can I boot from the hard drive? - I'd like to get the floppies out > of the boot process, if possible. > WHY BOTHER?? Minix is just a small Unix system, and at present cannot be made to match Xenix or any other Unix sytem. It's just an alternate op sys. It wouldn't be worth the hassle. And besides, if you are running DOS and you do configure Minix for boot off hdisk, you will have to boot DOS off floppy. The Moral: You can't have your cake and eat it too. >Any pointers about HD use with Minix would be greatly appreciated. > >Observation: >I can see the head positioning mechanism moving on the HD while the disk is >operating. Minix seems to do alot of seeks back to the start of the file >system, cyl 0, super block, or whatever. While doing a "cat somefile" the >head seeks to a block from somefile, returns to the start of the disk, seeks >to the next block of somefile, returns to the start of the disk, etc... >Why does the head keep returning "home"? How can this be reduced? > Minix isn't doing that. The hard disk is doing that so it knows where to look for the next block of somefile. It's perfectly normal, and I can't see why you would want to reduce it anyway. >car. >-- >Christopher A. Rende Central Cartage (Nixdorf/Pyramid/SysVR2/BSD4.3) ------- | Thom Rounds _ /| | \'o.O' | INTERNET: tar@maine.caps.maine.edu =(___)= | BITNET: TAR@MAINE U | UUCP path: psuvax!psuvm!maine!tar Ack! Phht! | | Disclaimer: NONE
ghelmer@DSUVAX.uucp (Guy Helmer) (11/29/89)
In article <312@trux.UUCP>, car@trux.UUCP (Chris Rende) writes: > ... > Observation: > I can see the head positioning mechanism moving on the HD while the disk is > operating. Minix seems to do alot of seeks back to the start of the file > system, cyl 0, super block, or whatever. While doing a "cat somefile" the > head seeks to a block from somefile, returns to the start of the disk, seeks > to the next block of somefile, returns to the start of the disk, etc... > Why does the head keep returning "home"? How can this be reduced? Strange behavior. "cat" shouldn't be updating the superblock (should it?), so MINIX shouldn't be going back there. MINIX should have the inode in-core, from what I see in the source code, so it shouldn't be messing with the inodes. Either your file is really fragmented across the disk, your file is bigger than 9 blocks (requiring single or double indirect access to get zone numbers for the file), or MINIX is doing something I can't figure out yet. > Christopher A. Rende Central Cartage (Nixdorf/Pyramid/SysVR2/BSD4.3) > uunet!edsews!rphroy!trux!car Multics,DTSS,Unix,Shortwave,Scanners,StarTrek > trux!car@uunet.uu.net Minix,PC/XT,Mac+,TRS-80 Model I,1802 ELF -- Guy Helmer ghelmer@dsuvax.uucp Dakota State University Computing Services helmer@sdnet.bitnet
cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) (11/30/89)
From article <89332.220027TAR@MAINE.BITNET>, by TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds): : WHY BOTHER?? Minix is just a small Unix system, and at present cannot be : made to match Xenix or any other Unix sytem. It's just an alternate op sys. : It wouldn't be worth the hassle. And besides, if you are running DOS and you : do configure Minix for boot off hdisk, you will have to boot DOS off floppy. : The Moral: You can't have your cake and eat it too. Wrong. You can have your cake and eat it too :-). ShoeLace will be posted soon. It will allow you to select which partition to boot. It will allow you to boot Minix from hard disk. Earl -- Earl Chew, Dept of Computer Science, Monash University, Australia 3168 ARPA: cechew%bruce.cs.monash.oz.au@uunet.uu.net ACS : cechew@bruce.oz ----------------------------------------------------------------------
paula@bcsaic.UUCP (Paul Allen) (12/01/89)
In article <89332.220027TAR@MAINE.BITNET> TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) writes: >In article <312@trux.UUCP>, car@trux.UUCP (Chris Rende) says: >> [He's having trouble partitioning his hard disk under 1.2 and finally >> ended up putting a file system on /dev/hd0.] > My God!! You don't even know what FDISK is for, and you went and did that >ANYWAY??! Aw, heck! I don't think a flame was called for. Chris just needs to know how to get the 1.2 fdisk to work. I didn't have a machine with a hard disk until I got 1.3, so I'm not sure what Chris' problem is. >>2) If you only have a 5Mb hard disk to use, what's the best way to use it? >> [...] > This is all up to you and how you want your system configured. These are >also thing you should work out BEFORE you commence this operation (I didn't, >and I learned the hard way). With only five meg, you probably want the whole >thing as one dir (probably /usr). The best directories to use as mount points >are empty ones on the root file system (/usr, /user, or make your own). Good advice. With 1.3, I load my ramdisk from hd3 and mount hd4 on /user. I've got enough memory that I can afford to put /usr on the ramdisk. >>3) I'd like to the RAM disk for as little as possible (if at all). Is it >> wise to use the hard disk as the ROOT FS? >> How do you move the ROOT FS from the RAM disk to the HD? >> How do you get rid of or reduce the RAM disk in order to free up RAM? >> > I would advise leaving the root FS on the RAM disk. You probably don't need >much more RAM than you have. Minix only takes just what it needs plus a couple >of K. I think there were people running with root on the hard disk back in the 1.2 days, but that's been a long time ago. If you really want to do it, I can look through my archives and try to find the patches. With Bruce Evans' protected mode version of 1.3, the startup menu lets you choose where to put the root file system. You reduce the ramdisk by making a new root filesystem diskette with a smaller size. Use one of the sample .proto files as a model. (I think they're in the tools directory.) The size of the file system is one of the first things in the prototype file. You'll want to move some stuff out of the root partition onto the hard disk. I'd move most of /bin and all of /lib into /usr/bin and /usr/lib, and then make /usr the mount point for the hard disk. See the man page for mkfs for details. Make sure you don't reduce the root to the point that there's no space for /tmp files! >>4) When I get my second drive (10Mb) to work, what would be a good disk layout >> for using the two drives together? >> > I have a hard time beleiving that you aren't using either hard drive, and >if you are using them, DON'T repartition EITHER of them until you back them up! Oh give the guy a break! Jeez! > Once you get them both working, I would suggest you mount them just as you >would your floppies, and make two spare dirs on your root directory for flopp- >ies. OK so far... > The root directory will have to stay on the ramdisk so you have something >to mount you hdisks to (You cant mount them on themselves). Huh? I experimented with root on hd3 and /user on hd4 and had no trouble with the fact that /user's mount point was on hd3. >>5) How can I boot from the hard drive? - I'd like to get the floppies out >> of the boot process, if possible. >> > WHY BOTHER?? Minix is just a small Unix system, and at present cannot be >made to match Xenix or any other Unix sytem. It's just an alternate op sys. >It wouldn't be worth the hassle. So Minix is just a toy right now. What does that have to do with wanting more convienience in the booting process? > And besides, if you are running DOS and you >do configure Minix for boot off hdisk, you will have to boot DOS off floppy. > The Moral: You can't have your cake and eat it too. Wrong. There's no reason you shouldn't be able to boot both DOS and Minix off the hard disk. The BIOS just boots the partition that's marked active. To switch to DOS from Minix, all you have to do is change the active partition and reboot. I know there are a few Minix hackers out there who are doing this. I don't think everybody has agreed on what the Minix system ID byte is going to be, though. >>Any pointers about HD use with Minix would be greatly appreciated. >> >>Observation: >>I can see the head positioning mechanism moving on the HD while the disk is >>operating. Minix seems to do alot of seeks back to the start of the file >>system, cyl 0, super block, or whatever. While doing a "cat somefile" the >>head seeks to a block from somefile, returns to the start of the disk, seeks >>to the next block of somefile, returns to the start of the disk, etc... >>Why does the head keep returning "home"? How can this be reduced? >> > Minix isn't doing that. The hard disk is doing that so it knows where to >look for the next block of somefile. It's perfectly normal, and I can't see why >you would want to reduce it anyway. Sorry, more mis-information. The disk doesn't do anything that the kernel doesn't tell it to do. I can't see the positioning mechanism on my hard disk like Chris can, but I have noticed that my floppy seems to be doing a lot more seeking to track zero than it ought to. I've been meaning to have a look at fs to see why there's so much seeking going on. Too much other fun stuff to look at! >>Christopher A. Rende >Thom Rounds Paul Allen -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Paul L. Allen | pallen@atc.boeing.com Boeing Advanced Technology Center | ...!uw-beaver!bcsaic!pallen
TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) (12/01/89)
In article <1723@bruce.OZ>, cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) says: > >From article <89332.220027TAR@MAINE.BITNET>, by TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds): >: WHY BOTHER?? Minix is just a small Unix system, and at present cannot be >: made to match Xenix or any other Unix sytem. It's just an alternate op sys. >: It wouldn't be worth the hassle. And besides, if you are running DOS and you >: do configure Minix for boot off hdisk, you will have to boot DOS off floppy. >: The Moral: You can't have your cake and eat it too. > >Wrong. You can have your cake and eat it too :-). ShoeLace will be posted >soon. It will allow you to select which partition to boot. It will allow you to >boot Minix from hard disk. > You don't NEED shoelace to do that. Any fdisk (Minix or MS-DOS) will allow you to select the active partition. The point is, you would have a very funny setup if you booted off the hard disk. Minix needs to load the ramdisk, and having THAT on hdisk would just mean duplicate roots. Plus, the bootblock is NOT compatible with Minix data (i.e., it MUST be on a seperate disk). Having a teeny-tiny partition on your hdisk for the bootblok is rather silly, don't you think? The Moral: No, you cannot have your cake and eat it too, even if the cake is called ShoeLace. ------- | Thom Rounds _ /| | \'o.O' | INTERNET: tar@maine.caps.maine.edu =(___)= | BITNET: TAR@MAINE U | UUCP path: psuvax!psuvm!maine!tar Ack! Phht! | | Disclaimer: NONE
pa1285@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (David L. Brown) (12/02/89)
In article <17535@bcsaic.UUCP> paula@bcsaic.UUCP (Paul Allen) writes: >Aw, heck! I don't think a flame was called for. >I think there were people running with root on the hard disk back in >the 1.2 days, but that's been a long time ago. If you really want >to do it, I can look through my archives and try to find the patches. >With Bruce Evans' protected mode version of 1.3, the startup menu >lets you choose where to put the root file system. Allright, isn't one of the purposes of distrubuting source for Minix is so that users may change it. Different users have different preferences about everything. Since computer users have limited resources, compromises must be made concerning memory, and disk space. Ideally a system would have infinite ram, and infinite hard disk space, and an infinitely fast processor. I personally would rather have the system act a little slower, and free up the ram taken by the ram disk. Minix, fortunately, allowed me to do this. My current configuration has the root file system on hd2. I have two other file systems on hd3 and hd4. This configuration works fine. I am not booting off of hard disk, because I haven't put the effort into doing so. There have been plenty of postings on this and I would be willing to help make it work if someone wants to know how. By the way, I am running v1.3, on an XT clone with 45 meg of hard disk, 15 of which I have currently dedicated to Minix (this part keeps growing). ------------------------------------------------------------ ----------dbrown@ucsd.edu----------------------------------- -------------------------David L. Brown--------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------ Disclaimer: The above statements are my opinion, and are unrelated to my educational instutition. They are not important.
cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) (12/02/89)
From article <89334.224050TAR@MAINE.BITNET>, by TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds): > You don't NEED shoelace to do that. Any fdisk (Minix or MS-DOS) will allow > you to select the active partition. The point is, you would have a very funny > setup if you booted off the hard disk. Minix needs to load the ramdisk, and > having THAT on hdisk would just mean duplicate roots. Plus, the bootblock is > NOT compatible with Minix data (i.e., it MUST be on a seperate disk). Having > a teeny-tiny partition on your hdisk for the bootblok is rather silly, don't > you think? No, you're missing the my point. Booting off the hard disk is *not* a funny setup. Requiring a floppy to boot off the hard disk *is* a funny setup. Just count how many commercial machines require you to put a floppy in to boot off the hard disk! Selecting active partitions is not what's at issue here. I agree, any fdisk will allow you to select *active* partitions. But all that does is set a bit in the partition table. It has little to do with booting Minix off the hard disk. Yes, Minix needs to load the ram disk. Yes, that does mean that you need an image of the ram disk on secondary memory. Having it on a hard disk is just as good as having the image on floppy disk --- mind you, the hard disk version loads much faster. I can't see what you're objecting to. You already have a duplicate image of the root file system (on floppy). Some people even keep their ram disk image in /dev/hd3. Yes, the bootblock is incompatible with Minix data. Yes, teeny-tiny partitions are silly. The solution is to throw bootblock away. AST has allocated one block for bootstraps at the beginning of all Minix file systems (check the book). BootLace fits in there. It will read in ShoeLace which will load Minix from the file system. No special boot disk is necessary. You can keep the Minix kernel image as a normal file anywhere on the hard disk partition (eg /etc/system/minix). Or, you can keep the a.out files for the kernel (eg /etc/system/kernel, /etc/system/mm, /etc/system/fs and /etc/system/init) and ShoeLace will build the Minix at boot time. This also means that you can construct a single stand-alone boot floppy instead of the current two (one kernel image and one root file image). WiniBoot resides in the partition table sector (cylinder 0, head 0, sector 1) and will prompt you for the partition that you wish to boot. In this way you can boot dos or Minix on separate partitions. > The Moral: No, you cannot have your cake and eat it too, > even if the cake is called ShoeLace. I *can* have my cake and eat it too. In fact, I'm eating it now and having been feasting for quite some time now. Earl -- Earl Chew, Dept of Computer Science, Monash University, Australia 3168 ARPA: cechew%bruce.cs.monash.oz.au@uunet.uu.net ACS : cechew@bruce.oz ----------------------------------------------------------------------
evans@ditsyda.oz (Bruce Evans) (12/03/89)
In article <89332.220027TAR@MAINE.BITNET> TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) writes: >In article <312@trux.UUCP>, car@trux.UUCP (Chris Rende) says: >> >>(I used hd0 because I don't have the partitioning part of xt_wini working >>yet...). > > I hope there was nothing on that disk, because if there was, you trashed >it. Sounds like the disk wasn't even working before. > To answer your question, yes. Fdisk partitions you hard disk for you. Re- >partitioning your hard disk has the same effect as reformmatting it. The data >is all there, but you can't get at it. You have to reformat it first. /dev/hd0 With luck, restoring the partition table (just 1 sector on the disk) will recover the data. The best way to learn this stuff is to start with an *empty* hard disk and move partitions around on it like little files. The partition table is .001% as complicated as a file system. >/dev/hd4 is the entire second hard disk, etc. Try to remember, re-partitioning >your hard disk means you lose what is on it. I learned this the hard way. No, /dev/hd4 is partition 4 on the first disk and /dev/hd5 is the entire second disk. In theory you can delete and move around some partitions without affecting the others. >>2) If you only have a 5Mb hard disk to use, what's the best way to use it? Make a 5M partition and mount it on /usr (or "mount" it on / in v1.5). Partitions always fill up so you want them big. Too big makes them too hard to back up. >>3) I'd like to the RAM disk for as little as possible (if at all). Is it >> wise to use the hard disk as the ROOT FS? It is far more convenient, but a little slower. >>4) When I get my second drive (10Mb) to work, what would be a good disk layout >> for using the two drives together? 5M for binaries mounted on / (hope that drive is fastest) and 10M for source on /usr. >>I can see the head positioning mechanism moving on the HD while the disk is >>operating. Minix seems to do alot of seeks back to the start of the file >>system, cyl 0, super block, or whatever. While doing a "cat somefile" the I would not expect "cat" to a terminal to cause so many seeks. Operations involving more than 1 file often thrash the disk cache (it's too small). The file may be scattered all over the disk. These things often cut disk throughput by a factor of 10 (beyond another factor of 2 to 9 for rotational latency). -- Bruce Evans evans@ditsyda.oz.au
TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) (12/04/89)
In article <17535@bcsaic.UUCP>, paula@bcsaic.UUCP (Paul Allen) says: > >In article <89332.220027TAR@MAINE.BITNET> TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) : >writes >>In article <312@trux.UUCP>, car@trux.UUCP (Chris Rende) says: >>> [He's having trouble partitioning his hard disk under 1.2 and finally >>> ended up putting a file system on /dev/hd0.] >> My God!! You don't even know what FDISK is for, and you went and did that >>ANYWAY??! > >Aw, heck! I don't think a flame was called for. Chris just needs to >know how to get the 1.2 fdisk to work. I didn't have a machine with >a hard disk until I got 1.3, so I'm not sure what Chris' problem is. > Listen, friend, you didn't read what he said and niether did anyone else thanks to you censoring of what was said. It wasn't a flame. What he did was attempt a task without knowing alot of what had to be done. I run 1.2 w/hdisk. I didn't touch anything and just ran it the way it was. It works just fine. I also stopped and read some docs first, which is a good idea before you do any- thing at all. Another IMPORTANT thing to remember: /dev/hd0 is the whole disk, regardless of wether or not it is partitioned. IT IS NOT the first partition! Please under stand what it is you are saying before you say it!!!! >>>2) If you only have a 5Mb hard disk to use, what's the best way to use it? >>> [...] >> This is all up to you and how you want your system configured. These are >>also thing you should work out BEFORE you commence this operation (I didn't, >>and I learned the hard way). With only five meg, you probably want the whole >>thing as one dir (probably /usr). The best directories to use as mount points >>are empty ones on the root file system (/usr, /user, or make your own). > >Good advice. With 1.3, I load my ramdisk from hd3 and mount hd4 on >/user. I've got enough memory that I can afford to put /usr on the >ramdisk. > >>>3) I'd like to the RAM disk for as little as possible (if at all). Is it >>> wise to use the hard disk as the ROOT FS? >>> How do you move the ROOT FS from the RAM disk to the HD? >>> How do you get rid of or reduce the RAM disk in order to free up RAM? >>> >> I would advise leaving the root FS on the RAM disk. You probably don't d >nee >>much more RAM than you have. Minix only takes just what it needs plus a >couple >>of K. > >I think there were people running with root on the hard disk back in >the 1.2 days, but that's been a long time ago. If you really want >to do it, I can look through my archives and try to find the patches. >With Bruce Evans' protected mode version of 1.3, the startup menu >lets you choose where to put the root file system. > >You reduce the ramdisk by making a new root filesystem diskette with >a smaller size. Use one of the sample .proto files as a model. (I >think they're in the tools directory.) The size of the file system ^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^ There isn't one in 1.2 >is one of the first things in the prototype file. You'll want to >move some stuff out of the root partition onto the hard disk. I'd >move most of /bin and all of /lib into /usr/bin and /usr/lib, and >then make /usr the mount point for the hard disk. See the man page There isn't any in 1.2 -----> ^^^ ^^^^ >for mkfs for details. Make sure you don't reduce the root to the >point that there's no space for /tmp files! > I never said it wasn't possible, I just said that it wasn't advisable. >>>4) When I get my second drive (10Mb) to work, what would be a good disk t >layou >>> for using the two drives together? >>> >> I have a hard time beleiving that you aren't using either hard drive, and >>if you are using them, DON'T repartition EITHER of them until you back them ! >up > >Oh give the guy a break! Jeez! Oh, give ME a break, huh? Are you trying to tell me that that is bad advice , or what?? It was advice he asked for, and that's what I gave him. He didn't follow the above step the first time from what I read, and neglecting to backup your hard disk before frigging around with it AT ALL is bad business!! Trust me I know from experience!! > >> Once you get them both working, I would suggest you mount them just as >you >>would your floppies, and make two spare dirs on your root directory for >flopp- >>ies. > >OK so far... > >> The root directory will have to stay on the ramdisk so you have >something >>to mount you hdisks to (You cant mount them on themselves). > >Huh? I experimented with root on hd3 and /user on hd4 and had no >trouble with the fact that /user's mount point was on hd3. > READ!!!! READ!!!! HE'S ONLY GOT 5 MEG!!! Going at that rate, he'd have partitions less than 1 meg!! That is very silly, don't you think? >>>5) How can I boot from the hard drive? - I'd like to get the floppies out >>> of the boot process, if possible. >>> >> WHY BOTHER?? Minix is just a small Unix system, and at present cannot be >>made to match Xenix or any other Unix sytem. It's just an alternate op sys. >>It wouldn't be worth the hassle. > >So Minix is just a toy right now. What does that have to do with >wanting more convienience in the booting process? Keep reading before you throw stones at me. Give me a minute to explain, ok guy ?? > >> And besides, if you are running DOS and you >>do configure Minix for boot off hdisk, you will have to boot DOS off floppy. >> The Moral: You can't have your cake and eat it too. > >Wrong. There's no reason you shouldn't be able to boot both DOS and >Minix off the hard disk. The BIOS just boots the partition that's >marked active. To switch to DOS from Minix, all you have to do is >change the active partition and reboot. I know there are a few Minix >hackers out there who are doing this. I don't think everybody has >agreed on what the Minix system ID byte is going to be, though. > Do you know what you are saying?? If you change the partition table AT ALL, BIOS will puke on you if the hard disk hasn't been re-suited to match it. This means re-formatting or re-mkfsing. THAT, pal, ISN'T worth the hassle. And besides, I explained myself, and you once again REMOVED my explaination. So I'll say it again. **THE BOOT BLOCK DATA IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH MINIX FILE SYSTEM DATA**!! It would require a seperate partiton!! And if you want to con- serve disk space, you'd have to make it damn small!! Smaller than the average fdisk will allow!!! Will you please not say anything until you know what you are talking about! And please don't remove the important pieces of what I say making me look like a babbling asshole!! >>>Any pointers about HD use with Minix would be greatly appreciated. >>> >>>Observation: >>>I can see the head positioning mechanism moving on the HD while the disk is >>>operating. Minix seems to do alot of seeks back to the start of the file >>>system, cyl 0, super block, or whatever. While doing a "cat somefile" the >>>head seeks to a block from somefile, returns to the start of the disk, seeks >>>to the next block of somefile, returns to the start of the disk, etc... >>>Why does the head keep returning "home"? How can this be reduced? >>> >> Minix isn't doing that. The hard disk is doing that so it knows where to >>look for the next block of somefile. It's perfectly normal, and I can't see y >wh >>you would want to reduce it anyway. > >Sorry, more mis-information. The disk doesn't do anything that the kernel >doesn't tell it to do. I can't see the positioning mechanism on my hard >disk like Chris can, but I have noticed that my floppy seems to be doing >a lot more seeking to track zero than it ought to. I've been meaning to >have a look at fs to see why there's so much seeking going on. Too much >other fun stuff to look at! > Have you ever heard of fragmenting?? THAT is why it goes back to track 0 for the pointer to the next block. And, BTW, the disk does ALOT that the kernel doesn't tell it to. Try reading up on these thing BEFORE you tell me how wrong I am. >>>Christopher A. Rende >>Thom Rounds > >Paul Allen Thom Rounds ------- | Thom Rounds _ /| | \'o.O' | INTERNET: tar@maine.caps.maine.edu =(___)= | BITNET: TAR@MAINE U | UUCP path: psuvax!psuvm!maine!tar Ack! Phht! | | Disclaimer: NONE
TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) (12/04/89)
In article <1727@bruce.OZ>, Earl Chew <cechew@BRUCE.OZ> says: > >From article <89334.224050TAR@MAINE.BITNET>, by TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom >Rounds): >> You don't NEED shoelace to do that. Any fdisk (Minix or MS-DOS) will w >allo >> you to select the active partition. The point is, you would have a very >funny >> setup if you booted off the hard disk. Minix needs to load the ramdisk, and >> having THAT on hdisk would just mean duplicate roots. Plus, the bootblock is >> NOT compatible with Minix data (i.e., it MUST be on a seperate disk). Having >> a teeny-tiny partition on your hdisk for the bootblok is rather silly, don't >> you think? > >No, you're missing the my point. Booting off the hard disk is *not* a funny >setup. Requiring a floppy to boot off the hard disk *is* a funny setup. Just >count how many commercial machines require you to put a floppy in to boot off >the hard disk! > MINIX IS NOT a commercial grade operating system!! That is a very lame argument, not to mention a cop-out. >Selecting active partitions is not what's at issue here. I agree, any fdisk >will allow you to select *active* partitions. But all that does is set a bit >in the partition table. It has little to do with booting Minix off the hard >disk. > It has everything to do with it. You can't put the bootblock with the root directory. They are incompatible. >Yes, Minix needs to load the ram disk. Yes, that does mean that you need an >image of the ram disk on secondary memory. Having it on a hard disk is just as >good as having the image on floppy disk --- mind you, the hard disk version >loads much faster. I can't see what you're objecting to. You already have a >duplicate image of the root file system (on floppy). Some people even keep >their ram disk image in /dev/hd3. > Why not keep it on floppy? The floppy is something you can replace with something else! Putting root on the hdisk means less space for other stuff, and that IS very, very ridiculous. >Yes, the bootblock is incompatible with Minix data. Yes, teeny-tiny partitions >are silly. The solution is to throw bootblock away. > >AST has allocated one block for bootstraps at the beginning of all Minix >file systems (check the book). BootLace fits in there. It will read in >ShoeLace >which will load Minix from the file system. No special boot disk is necessary. >You can keep the Minix kernel image as a normal file anywhere on the hard disk >partition (eg /etc/system/minix). Or, you can keep the a.out files for the >kernel (eg /etc/system/kernel, /etc/system/mm, /etc/system/fs and >/etc/system/init) and ShoeLace will build the Minix at boot time. > >This also means that you can construct a single stand-alone boot floppy >instead >of the current two (one kernel image and one root file image). > You lost me. Please re-iterate. >WiniBoot resides in the partition table sector (cylinder 0, head 0, sector 1) >and will prompt you for the partition that you wish to boot. In this way you >can boot dos or Minix on separate partitions. > >> The Moral: No, you cannot have your cake and eat it too, >> even if the cake is called ShoeLace. > >I *can* have my cake and eat it too. In fact, I'm eating it now and having >been >feasting for quite some time now. > It doesn't sound that way to me. >Earl Thom >-- >Earl Chew, Dept of Computer Science, Monash University, Australia 3168 >ARPA: cechew%bruce.cs.monash.oz.au@uunet.uu.net ACS : cechew@bruce.oz >---------------------------------------------------------------------- ------- | Thom Rounds _ /| | \'o.O' | INTERNET: tar@maine.caps.maine.edu =(___)= | BITNET: TAR@MAINE U | UUCP path: psuvax!psuvm!maine!tar Ack! Phht! | | Disclaimer: NONE
car@trux.UUCP (Chris Rende) (12/05/89)
In article <17535@bcsaic.UUCP>, paula@bcsaic.UUCP (Paul Allen) writes: > In article <89332.220027TAR@MAINE.BITNET> TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) writes: > >In article <312@trux.UUCP>, car@trux.UUCP (Chris Rende) says: > >> [He's having trouble partitioning his hard disk under 1.2 and finally > >> ended up putting a file system on /dev/hd0.] > > My God!! You don't even know what FDISK is for, and you went and did that > >ANYWAY??! > > Aw, heck! I don't think a flame was called for. Chris just needs to > know how to get the 1.2 fdisk to work. I didn't have a machine with > a hard disk until I got 1.3, so I'm not sure what Chris' problem is. I should probably clarify why I used /dev/hd0 to build a file system. I have a XT clone and Minix 1.2. When using DOS, I have (2) 10Mb drives and a HD controller. When I really want to use my computer (:-) I remove the HD controller and put in a second HD controller that has 1 5Mb and 1 10Mb disk hung off it. (That's 2 controllers and 4 drives). xt_wini and at_wini don't work at all with my HD controller (OMTI 5510). bios_wini seemed to need alot of stuff from Minix 1.3 which I don't have yet. I borrowed a 2nd floppy drive to work on xt_wini. I <FINALLY> got xt_wini to read sectors/blocks from the 5Mb HD by hard-coding stuff in xt_wini.c:init_params(). At that point, I did not have xt_wini.c:init_params() working enough to read the partition table. I also didn't have Minix's fdisk handy. I decided to build a file system on hd0 as if it were a floppy. Since it worked and I was tired of <the floppy shuffle> I loaded up the HD with the necessary stuff to continue my xt_wini development on the HD. Now I have attached a 10Mb drive to the system as well. Using the 5Mb drive (hd0) as a development platform I will work with fdisk (1.2), xt_wini (1.2), and the 10Mb disk in order to get xt_wini's partitioning code to work. [Thanks to all who have steered me to Minix's fdisk. ] When I have the partition stuff working on the 10Mb disk, I'll move the development platform from the 5Mb disk to the 10Mb disk. Then, I'll fdisk the 5Mb disk into a "correct" disk structure. Yes - both disks are blank. No - I don't care about DOS. > >>2) If you only have a 5Mb hard disk to use, what's the best way to use it? Thanks to all who suggested using /usr as the prime mount point. > >>3) I'd like to the RAM disk for as little as possible (if at all). This statement touched a tender spot. :-) Following the advice of a couple people I'll probably create a small partition that contains the ROOT image. This image would then be loaded as the RAM disk. It was suggested that the contents of /bin be moved to /usr/bin to reduce the size of the RAM disk. > >>Observation: > >>Minix seems to do alot of seeks back to the start of the file > >>system, cyl 0, super block, or whatever. > >>Why does the head keep returning "home"? How can this be reduced? When I attached the 10Mb disk this problem stopped! The 5Mb disk no longer seeks home after each read. Aside from attaching the 10Mb disk I removed the terminating resistor array from the 5Mb disk. Wow is it fast now! Here's another one: When I boot DOS from floppy the 10Mb disk is C: and the 5Mb disk is D:. When I boot Minix the 10Mb disk is hd5 and the 5Mb disk is hd0. Are these backwards or what? [ Yes, /dev/hd0 is 3,0 and /dev/hd5 is 3,5 ] car. -- Christopher A. Rende Central Cartage (Nixdorf/Pyramid/SysVR2/BSD4.3) uunet!edsews!rphroy!trux!car Multics,DTSS,Unix,Shortwave,Scanners,StarTrek trux!car@uunet.uu.net Minix,PC/XT,Mac+,TRS-80 Model I,1802 ELF "I don't ever remember forgetting anything." - Chris Rende
rlb@cs.odu.edu (Robert L. Bailey) (12/05/89)
In article <1727@bruce.OZ> cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) writes: >file systems (check the book). BootLace fits in there. It will read in ShoeLace >which will load Minix from the file system. No special boot disk is necessary. >You can keep the Minix kernel image as a normal file anywhere on the hard disk >partition (eg /etc/system/minix). Or, you can keep the a.out files for the >kernel (eg /etc/system/kernel, /etc/system/mm, /etc/system/fs and >/etc/system/init) and ShoeLace will build the Minix at boot time. > >This also means that you can construct a single stand-alone boot floppy instead >of the current two (one kernel image and one root file image). > >WiniBoot resides in the partition table sector (cylinder 0, head 0, sector 1) >and will prompt you for the partition that you wish to boot. In this way you >can boot dos or Minix on separate partitions. Where can I get Shoelace? I am about ready to order Minix, but, I don't want to be stuck with floppy only boots! Bob Bailey
TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds) (12/06/89)
Okay. Problem solved. Since your Minix hdisks are somewhat 'dedicated',
probably your best bet is putting the root image on your 10M disk. The reason I
say this is because you have already put stuff on your 5M disk, so you might as
well leave it the way it is. To do this, of course, you need fdisk. Creating
partitions under minix is somewhat odd and requires that you know your disk
VERY well. You've got to calculate your addresses just right, or you lose disk
space in the long run. There's also something else you should know about Minix
fdisk. When using it, always give the entire disk (hd0 or hd5) as an argument.
It's on those devices he will make partitions. If you give him something diff-
erent, say hd1 or 2, he will give you bogus output and make false partitions,
eventually making your computer a bad place to live.
As for hd0 being D: in DOS and hd5 being C:, well, you've got me. I'm
stumped.
Taking into account that I have offended more people than I meant to, I
would like to apologize. I came across very strong. I stated the reasons for
my doing this in more than one reply to e-mail complaints. I shouldn't have re-
sponded to a flame with a flame. I hope noone has seen my dark side.cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) (12/06/89)
From article <89337.181547TAR@MAINE.BITNET>, by TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom Rounds): >In article <1727@bruce.OZ>, Earl Chew <cechew@BRUCE.OZ> says: >> >>From article <89334.224050TAR@MAINE.BITNET>, by TAR@MAINE.BITNET (Thom >>Rounds): >>> You don't NEED shoelace to do that. Any fdisk (Minix or MS-DOS) will w >>allo >>> you to select the active partition. The point is, you would have a very >>funny >>> setup if you booted off the hard disk. Minix needs to load the ramdisk, and >>> having THAT on hdisk would just mean duplicate roots. Plus, the bootblock is >>> NOT compatible with Minix data (i.e., it MUST be on a seperate disk). Having >>> a teeny-tiny partition on your hdisk for the bootblok is rather silly, don't >>> you think? >> >>No, you're missing the my point. Booting off the hard disk is *not* a funny >>setup. Requiring a floppy to boot off the hard disk *is* a funny setup. Just >>count how many commercial machines require you to put a floppy in to boot off >>the hard disk! >> > MINIX IS NOT a commercial grade operating system!! That is a very lame >argument, not to mention a cop-out. I think that you're still missing the point. From your original article, your points are: 1. Any fdisk will allow you to select the active partition. This is true. What some people want is to have say two partitions (or more) one of which contains a Dos system + Dos file system and another containing a Minix system + Minix file system. Clearly, the file systems are incompatible. Sometimes the user might want to boot Dos and at other times Minix. Minix does not pay any attention to the *active*ness of a partition, so this attribute is not relevant. Dos may want to know about it. 2. Booting off the hard disk only occurs if you have a funny setup. What can I say? If you think so, then we'll just have to disagree. 2a. MINIX IS NOT a commercial grade operating system!! That is a very lame argument, not to mention a cop-out. I fail to see how this can make the argument *for* booting off the hard disk lame, or in what way it is a cop out. I would have thought that it would have been a cop out to leave things the way they are (ie be passive and do nothing). How can it be a cop out to enhance the system? Whether or not Minix is a commercial grade system or not is not relevant. The question is whether you want to boot off the hard disk or not. 3. Minix needs to load the ram disk and having that on hdisk would just mean duplicate roots. This is true. But having the ram disk image means that your duplicate root is on floppy instead of the hdisk. Furthermore, there are some sites, which have their roots on the hard disk itself so the argument about duplicate roots disappears. (This will be easily accomplished with 1.5.0.) Having a ram disk image requires you to put it somewhere. Putting it on hard disk seems just a good a place as floppy. Some people actually prefer it there since it loads much faster. 4. Plus, the bootblock is NOT compatible with Minix data (i.e., it MUST be on a seperate disk). I think that you're talking about the image obtained by running build, rather than bootblock.s itself. Yes, the boot floppy does not contain a valid file system. Yes, this does mean that it has to be separate. This is the reason it should be discarded. Having non-file systems makes it harder to work out exactly what is one that floppy. Is it a boot floppy? Did I accidentally corrupt it? Did I format it? Perhaps it's a Dos floppy? 5. A teeny-tiny partition on your hdisk for the bootblok is rather silly. I agree. (I think that you mean the image obtained from running build, rather than bootblock.s itself.) >>in the partition table. It has little to do with booting Minix off the hard >>disk. >> > It has everything to do with it. You can't put the bootblock with the root >directory. They are incompatible. The *active*ness of a partition has little to do with booting Minix off the hard disk. The boot floppy image not being a valid Minix file system does have a lot to do with it. > Why not keep it on floppy? The floppy is something you can replace with >something else! Putting root on the hdisk means less space for other stuff, and >that IS very, very ridiculous. 1. Slow 2. Not a file system 3. Slightly harder to maintain 4. Have to fish around for the floppy before I can boot my hard disk. 5. Minix kernel image size about 90kb out of, say, 20Mb hard disk, about 0.5%. > You lost me. Please re-iterate. All Minix file systems look like this: Block 0 1 2-x x-y +-------+-------+------+-----------+ | Boot | Super | Maps | Data Area | | Block | Block | | | +-------+-------+------+-----------+ Let's for the moment assume that this is a floppy disk. Your BIOS will, at boot time, load the code from sector 1, head 0, track 0 into memory and execute it. Your boot floppy looks like this (which you obtained by using build then cp image /dev/fd0): Sector 0 1-x +--------+--------+ | Boot | Kernel | | Sector | Image | +--------+--------+ When this is bootstrapped, the code in sector 0, bootblock.s, loads the kernel image. Returning to the file system, bootlace resides in block 0. When you boot your file system, bootlace will be loaded by the BIOS. Bootlace will load the secondary bootstrap, shoelace, which lives in the file /shoelace in the Data Area. Shoelace will then complete the bootstrap by looking for the kernel image (ie the output from the program build which, in the past, you had copied onto /dev/fd0 but now retain in a file in the Data Area). There is also provision for you to leave out the build phase when compiling your kernel. Just leave the a.out files from the link phase of cc. Shoelace can assemble your kernel from these a.out files `on the fly'. >>WiniBoot resides in the partition table sector (cylinder 0, head 0, sector 1) >>and will prompt you for the partition that you wish to boot. In this way you >>can boot dos or Minix on separate partitions. Partitioned hard disks look like this: +-----------+------+------+------+------+ | Partition | Part | Part | Part | Part | | Boot Code | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | +-----------+------+------+------+------+ Each partition is a self-contained logical disk and so may contain a Minix file system as described above. When the BIOS boots the hard disk, it reads the boot code from sector 1, head 0, cylinder 0 and executes it. Usually this is boot code that was inserted by Dos. It scans the partition table to find a suitable Dos partition and boots it. Winiboot is designed to replace this code. Instead of scanning the partition table, it allows you to choose which partition you wish to boot. The partition table itself is unmolested. Both the Dos boot and winiboot then load the code from logical sector 0 of the partition and execute the code. In this way you don't need a boot floppy. The Minix kernel image can live as normal a.out files located anywhere within the file system. This makes it easy to keep backups, inspect images, boot trial systems, etc, since the kernel now lives as normal files. This code will be posted soon. It is currently undergoing some changes to support environment strings. Arguing about whether Minix can or can't be bootstrapped off a hard disk is irrelevant at this stage. At least three sites are bootstrap Minix that way now and there appears to be a fair number of people who would like to. If you prefer to boot Minix using a boot floppy, the option to do so is still open to you. As for Minix living in one partition and Dos in another --- that's the way my system is set up. Press `1' for Dos, `2' for Minix. Earl -- Earl Chew, Dept of Computer Science, Monash University, Australia 3168 ARPA: cechew%bruce.cs.monash.oz.au@uunet.uu.net ACS : cechew@bruce.oz ----------------------------------------------------------------------
cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) (12/06/89)
From article <10641@xanth.cs.odu.edu>, by rlb@cs.odu.edu (Robert L. Bailey): > Where can I get Shoelace? I am about ready to order Minix, but, I > don't want to be stuck with floppy only boots! > > Bob Bailey Shoelace will be posted soon. I refer you to my other article for a description of how it works. I think that it will be posted either just before or just after 1.5.0 is posted. Earl -- Earl Chew, Dept of Computer Science, Monash University, Australia 3168 ARPA: cechew%bruce.cs.monash.oz.au@uunet.uu.net ACS : cechew@bruce.oz ----------------------------------------------------------------------
motti@ocsmd.ocs.com (Motti Bazar) (12/06/89)
Hi there. I don't know if anybody remembers but what this WiniBoot or something like this is said to do (reside in the boot sector and ask for the boot partition) is already done by a utility I posted to the group more then a year ago. It was called mfdisk and since then I heard from a lot of users of this thing. I posted it with full source and the modifications needed for Minix to boot fully from the hard disk. If anybody is interested, I'll post again. The partition boot utility is very usefull for any os you want to boot. Currently, I'm using it on my 33Mhz ALR to boot MeSDOS, OS/2 and Xenix and at home to boot MeSDOS and Minix. Regards ... Motti uunet!ocsmd!motti (301)428-3700 / (800)922-9204
mark@rpp386.cactus.org (Mark Lehmann) (12/07/89)
As long as this hard drive question boom exists, I like to ask about the Atari ST hard drive configurations using a Supra 20Mg HD (really uses the Miniscribe 8225 SCSI drive internally). I just got Minix yesterday. The ST documentation talks about certain drive partitions "/dev/hd?" (where ? stands for 1-3). My problem is that I do not have that type of partition information in the Supra Format Utitlity. Could someone tell me what I would need to do to give MINIX a 10Mb partition on my hard drive? At the current time, I am unfamiliar on how to dedicate a disk partition in such a way that MINIX can use it. Also, a good source told me that I will have problems getting MINIX to use my Supra drive because of sector sizes. Does anyone know of a fix for this. Thanks a lot. I hope I don't sound like a fool. I administer several UNIX systems at my work, but those systems have there own hard drive formaters that basically setup all of the disk partitions automatically (they just ask me how many blocks of space to give each "minidisk".) Mark Lehmann bigtex!rpp386.cactus.edu!mark -- +------------------------------------+-----------------------------------+ | Mark Lehmann | | | mark@rpp386.cactus.org | | | {bigtex|texbell}!rpp386!mark | |
ralph@cc.brunel.ac.uk (Ralph Mitchell) (12/08/89)
In article <1727@bruce.OZ> cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) writes: >No, you're missing the my point. Booting off the hard disk is *not* a funny >setup. Requiring a floppy to boot off the hard disk *is* a funny setup. Just >count how many commercial machines require you to put a floppy in to boot off >the hard disk! Errr, right up to the end of it's working life, our Honeywell Multics system required two tapes to boot from cold. That was just last year... Also, our two-year-old Pyramids require a boot floppy to load the console processor and controller microcode... Ralph Mitchell -- JANET: ralph@uk.ac.brunel.cc ARPA: ralph%cc.brunel.ac.uk@cwi.nl UUCP: ...ukc!cc.brunel!ralph PHONE: +44 895 74000 x2561 "There's so many different worlds, so many different Suns" - Dire Straits "Never underestimate the power of human stupidity" - Salvor Hardin, Foundation
pcf@galadriel.bt.co.uk (Pete French) (12/11/89)
[loads of bits about booting minix deleted]
ST Minix comes with a TOS program called "MINIX" that takes an image of
the boot floppy called MINIX.IMG and boots from it. Why cant someone
adapt it to work on a PC ?
I boot off hard disk into a shell, and if I want MINIX I just type "minix"
and up it comes. I am adapting it to go straight into minix at bootup and
only into TOS if the t key is pressed or something.
No hassle.
I use a 5Meg /dev/hd3 as / and a 15meg /dev/hd4 as /usr - they are of
partition type MIX and therefore cannot be got at from the desktop.
Why cant this be done on a PC ?
-Pete.
--
-Pete French. | "The rhythm's gone,
British Telecom Research Labs. | The radio's dead.
Martlesham Heath, East Anglia. | And the damage done,
All my own thoughts (of course) | Inside my head."cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) (12/12/89)
From article <538@galadriel.bt.co.uk>, by pcf@galadriel.bt.co.uk (Pete French): > ST Minix comes with a TOS program called "MINIX" that takes an image of The point is that some of us don't want to boot dos, and then subsequently type `minix'. Besides, then you'd have to have an image of the boot floppy (which is a data file as opposed to an a.out file [can't even be a .exe file]) on the dos partition when it should really be in a Minix partition (if you want it at all). > and up it comes. I am adapting it to go straight into minix at bootup and > only into TOS if the t key is pressed or something. This is the main point. Some of us would like to either boot dos or minix --- just as you would like to go straight to tos or minix at *boot time*, instead of booting [td]os then *switching* to minix since this precludes a Minix *only* (no dos at all) system on the pc. Earl -- Earl Chew, Dept of Computer Science, Monash University, Australia 3168 ARPA: cechew%bruce.cs.monash.oz.au@uunet.uu.net ACS : cechew@bruce.oz ----------------------------------------------------------------------
rwa@cs.AthabascaU.CA (Ross Alexander) (12/15/89)
In article <1727@bruce.OZ> cechew@bruce.OZ (Earl Chew) writes: >No, you're missing the my point. Booting off the hard disk is *not* a funny >setup. Requiring a floppy to boot off the hard disk *is* a funny setup. Just >count how many commercial machines require you to put a floppy in to boot off >the hard disk! Our VAX 11/780 and 11/785 machines won't boot without their console floppies. The 11/785 wants two of them. Yes, it _is_ a crock ;-) Ross