Request to FC2 Developers: need floppy to network install

Jason L Tibbitts III tibbs at math.uh.edu
Tue May 18 22:42:31 UTC 2004


>>>>> "d" == david  <david at daku.org> writes:

d> I and others on the list have asked for help because of no floppy
d> bootstrap install capability for installing FC2.

The bottom line is that the kernel no longer fits on a floppy.  So you
absolutely have to get the kernel from somewhere else.  You've said
that USB and CD are out.  That leaves network and hard disk.

If you have an existing Red Hat/Fedora installation, you can just
stick the initrd and vmlinuz from the FC2 isolinux directory in /boot,
edit grub.conf and reboot:

title Reinstall
        root (hd0,0)
        kernel /vmlinuz-fc2 ramdisk_size=9216
        initrd /initrd-fc2

No existing installation?  You could do a minimal install of an older
version.  Or install grub onto a floppy and use the network install
functionality.  Yes, you must have a TFTP server elsewhere on the
network.  It's not hard to install and configure.  Assuming you have
another Fedora machine, just install the tftp-server package,
"chkconfig tftp on", and stick your initrd and vmlinuz in /tftpboot.
Then investigate the network booting section of the Grub manual;
basically it's just

ifconfig --address=X.X.X.X --server=Y.Y.Y.Y

using the address of the machine you're installing and the TFTP
server, respectively.  Then it's just

root (nd)
kernel /vmlinux-fc2 ramdisk_size=9216
initrd /initrd-fc2
boot

You may have to tweak those paths.

d> 4)  Use tftp - gosh ... I wouldn't even know where to start for
d>     that.

It's not exactly difficult.  You said you have a server to do an FTP
install, and setting up a TFTP server is way simpler than an FTP
server.

Perhaps I just wasted my time, and what you really want isn't help to
make it work but for someone to magically make floppy booting work
again.  I can't help there.

 - J<





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