~sRe: System configuration utility 

To: tech-install@netbsd.org
In-Reply-To: Message-Id: <199809291942.VAA00275@snylteveps.runit.sintef.no>

> To accomplish this I used a variant of the "INSTALL_TINY" floppy
> I've mentioned earlier on port-i386, and I needed to add "swapctl"
> to the ramdisk.  When the install disk is partitioned (using
> sysinst), I did ^Z and turned on swapping on the newly created swap
> partition.  That allowed the unpacking to complete when I fg'ed
> sysinst again (the unpacking would otherwise hang).  I'm a little
> uncertain whether it's interesting to keep on supporting 4M
> installs, but at least I've now proven that it is still possible
> with the install method of today.

It looks a litle bit strange to me to suspend sysinst at point, where
it waits for input, shouldn't there be an "oficial way to get a shell
there? The Question came from my instalation of my new labtop last
weekend, using a serial line to copy the instalation set from my desktop.

Here comes the story:

  1. After figure out the cable and how to use slattach(?) and
  ifconfig(?) to get ftp(1) working (I did it the first time), I exit
  the shell to continue the installation.

  2. I start installation to partition my disk (work realy nice), I
  choce an ftp installation of the sets and the copying starts seeing
  base.tgz will take more 3 hours I leave it over night (was allready
  warned about the time it will take, form one of the NetBSD maillists).

  3. The next day atfernoon (didn't have time earlier) I continued and
  the installation went well. But the sets seems to be removed.

  4. I had to chose to copy X11 and source and leave it an other
  day or take it without that and do X11 and src later. I will have
  cosen to download all sets in step 2 (in >24 houres all sets could be
  downloaded), if I had have an idea how to get a shell after partitioning
  (Why I didn't have tryed ^Z :-).

Some Ideas for sysinst and INSTALL:

  1. Add a short how-todo in INSTALL about seting up a serial line.
  i.e.:
    1. Conect the serial cable to both computer and notice the tty
       for each.
    2. Chose an IP-addres for both computer.
    3. slattach -s <speed/38400> <tty>
    4. ifconfig sl0 <my_ip> <dest_ip>
  BTW: How I get the sl? value for ifconfig, if I attach more than
  one line.  Shouldn't say slattach that to me?

  2. Add a shell menu point to each menu, as an clear visiable escape
  point.

  3. Add some options to sysinst to do the steps separate. With no
  options it should work as it do it now.

thanks for reading this
Bernd Salbrechter