On Tue, Jan 18, 2000 at 02:50:17PM -0800, Jonathan Stone wrote:
> But even so, and after pulling the keyboard and mouse, I cant get the
> kernel to use the serial port for console output (e.g,. to print
> boot-time autoconfiguration messages).

Serial bootblocks are needed if you want to be able to select a kernel,
or boot options (-s) via serial.

A kernel with serial console is what you need if you want kernel messages
and the 'console' device on a serial port. See kernel config options
here:

# This option allows you to force a serial console at the specified
# I/O address.   see console(4) for details.
#options        "CONSDEVNAME=\"com\"",CONADDR=0x2f8,CONSPEED=57600
#       you don't want the option below ON iff you are using the
#       serial console option of the new boot strap code.
#options        CONS_OVERRIDE   # Always use above! independent of boot info

You can have a kernel with serial console, without having bootblocks, as
long as you always boot the same kernel, and don't need to recover from
problems without a keyboard & video. Or, you can have both. And I guess
you can have bootblocks without kernel, but I can't think of a good 
reason for that :-)

-- 
David Maxwell, david@vex.net|david@maxwell.net -->
(About an Amiga rendering landscapes) It's not thinking, it's being artistic!
					      - Jamie Woods