On Sat, 31 May 1997 10:27:17 -0400 
 Boris Gjenero <bgjenero@undergrad.math.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:

 > > - a boot partition selector
 > > - a boot loader
 > > - a program to configure both former components.
 > 
 > LILO isn't that bad.  Just because it isn't your traditional Unix
 > bootloader and it does multiple things doesn't mean that it's a horrible
 > mess.  I haven't ever had problems using it as my OS selector and it has
 > some neat features for x86 such as allowing you to boot from the second
 > floppy drive.

Err, given how the bootloader/configurer work, it certainly is pretty
bad.  As I recall, LILO has no standalone file system reader package.
This means that the configurator has to hard-code the actual disk block
numbers of the kernel into the bootloader.  That is a serious "ick"
in my book, and makes it totally useless as a bootloader.  (So much
for booting alternate/test kernels!)

 > compared to LILO.  I like the fact that it understands the filesystem
 > and can load any file.  I don't think that more time should be wasted on

...ah, you see my point :-)

Jason R. Thorpe                                       thorpej@nas.nasa.gov
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