On Mon, Sep 08, 2003 at 10:07:33PM -0500, Peter Seebach wrote:
> In message <20030909021710.GA22642@snew.com>, Chuck Yerkes writes:
> >Quoting Peter Seebach (seebs@plethora.net):
> >> In message <20030908233518.B59F07B43@berkshire.research.att.com>, "Steven M. B
> >ellovin" writes:
> >...
> >> The boot.default stuff, well, it's a fair bit of work, but MAN is it useful.
> >> For those who have never seen it:
> >>       * The boot loader loads a file called /etc/boot.default
> >>       * It can also take commands entered by hand
> >>       * Commands may pass parameters to the rest of the boot loader or
> >>         the kernel
> 
> >Is this similar to openbsd's /etc/boot.conf?
> 
> >I've come to like that to boot over a serial port, all I have
> >to do is change /etc/boot.conf, not boot with special boot blocks
> >or anything fancy and huge.
> 
> Yes, very much like - it gets used for the same sorts of things.
> 
> I had a test system with
> 	-echo "About to switch to serial console..."
> 	-pause 5
> 	-console com 3f8 38400
> which allowed me to interrupt it (and keep the VGA console) if I had
> problems.
> 
> Very nice not to have to boot with special boot blocks.

Especially given that the installboot manpage (at least on i386) is flat out
wrong right now - if you install bootxx_ffsv1 with /usr/sbin/installboot,
your system Will Not Boot. I have an old 80386 here that I recently wanted
to switch to serial console, and tried to installboot the new bootblocks (I
found that there are no biosboot_com<whatever> bootblocks in -current
anymore, apparently) and the system came up saying something about not being
able to run BASIC, in a gross 40x25 font on the monitor. I used
/usr/mdec/installboot on biosboot_com0.sym (glad I kept it around!) and it
worked as expected. I know this is a digression from the current thread
(hence the changed topic), but has this happened to anyone else?

What is the proper method for making an i386 machine boot serial console
now? (without reverting to bootblocks that, from all i can tell, are no
longer built)

-Sean

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