fedora-list Digest, Vol 2, Issue 110

Mark A. Hoover mahoover at ispaceonline.org
Sat Apr 10 03:56:31 UTC 2004


 > From: Jeff Vian <jvian10 at charter.net>
 >
 > Until this discussion began I had no clue that a console could be
 > accessed during install by using ctr-alt-F2.  I have yet to see that
 > anywhere in the documentation for any distro.

While I'll admit I knew about the console, I never thought to take a 
look and see what all might be floating around in the boot image for the 
installer environment.


 > Although I agree that only the expert is likely to want to use fdisk,
 > I do feel it should be an easy to select choice. And if hidden (as it
 > now is,) how to use it should be readily available in the
 > documentation.

I use it often enough to make it annoying that it's not there.



 > Making the choice of what to allow/prevent the normal user to see/use
 > is reminiscent of the inflexible paths we are subject to when using
 > other OSes, and is contary to the spirit of OSS and the flexibility we
 > have available to choose our own path.  Defaults that meet the
 > standard users need should NOT remove the ability of the power
 > user/expert to choose a different configuration.  It also should not
 > make it signifigantly harder to make those choices.

Oh thank you!  This is exactly the point I've been trying to make!  I've 
noticed over the last few editions that the "custom" path on the 
installer has become less and less customizable.  The fact that I 
usually go through and manually remove half the installed packages after 
  removing a ton of them in the package selector only emphazises the point.


 > I do not use LILO because I like the ease of GRUB.  However, that too
 > has its place and should be easy to install/use when the system is
 > being set up.  Instead we have the current requirement to install grub
 > (no other choice) then replace it with lilo after the fact.

I almost wonder what the point of offering this choice is now.  Made a 
lot more sense when you could choose between Lilo and GRUB.  Personally, 
I liked the limited sanity check that you got by being forced to run 
lilo when updating lilo.conf on remote boxes.  While it was still 
possible to make mistakes, I had a lot of them caught by this as well.

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------
Have Fun, Suffer and Survive, or Get Lost in the Net!

Mark Hoover
mahoover at ispaceonline.org





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