Re: mu TECH Hum, not so easy...

From: Michele Andreoli (m.andreoli@tin.it)
Date: Wed Oct 17 2001 - 08:50:50 CEST


On Wed, Oct 17, 2001 at 12:07:09AM +0000, Guillaume Cornet nicely wrote:
>
> I ran muLinux once more with the floppy disks, and I created a 4096k
> ramdisk. I put all in it, except /usr, /tmp, /proc (of course).
>
> Then I picked some additionnal binaries in /usr, to get at 97%... I
> took ftp and ftpget.
>
> Then
>
> # umount /dev/ram15
> # dd if=/dev/ram15 | gzip -v9 | ftpget -h host \
> -u myself \
> -p mypassword \
> -d remotedir/ \
> -f initrd.fs.gz \
> -i
>
> I am quite proud of that line, and it worked! It replaces a local
> hard disk!

Guillaume, you are a very imaginative guy. I will rename you
"Guillaume d'Orange". The idea of improve the
InstallationDisk (that's 1440k, and starts with loadlin) is a good one,
and I like to support you in this idea. But ftpget is not the only
requirement. You need of network commands (ifconfig, route), ethernet,
pppd, or I'm wrong?

Anyway, why you reversed the pipes in your example?
I thing you meant:

        # ftpget -h host .... | gzip -d > /dev/ram15
        # mount /dev/ram15 /usr

> I am conscious that my questions do not concern exactly muLinux,
> since I want to create my own system, suitable for a poor guy without
> any disk space. So if you are bored with all that, feel free not to
> answer.

True; doesn't concern exactly, but can be intented as improvement of
the installation disk. It is only matter to add some new boot script,
a new derivation from the script /setup/rc/linuxrc

The easy way to do that is to add an entry in the section called
"MAIN switch", like:

===============================
elif [ "$ftp" ] ; then
        mount /dev/fd0 /a
        sh /a/init/ftpget.sh
        exit 0
fi
===============================

Now if you add the keyword "ftp" on the boot command line, the system
mount the floppy and execute the script init/ftpget.sh.

In this script you can setup the network and download the images from
the ethernet.
With this solution, you can modify the file ftpget.sh (in the floppy)
without rebuild the root.gz image.
Why to not download the addons directly from the Sunsite.auc.dk server?

# ftpget .... XYZ.tgz > /dev/ram15
# setup -f XYZ from=/dev/ram15

In theory, you can download a complete root image and mount it as
/, using "losetup". Please, read this part in the linuxrc: this is how
the LOOP installation works. But this requires and hard-disk access.

Michele

-- 
I keep trying to locate a meeting of Quantum Physicists. But everytime
they set a meeting time, the location changes. And vice versa -- Anonymous
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