Bill Vermillion(bi...@bilver.wjv.com)@Tue, Feb 27, 2001 at 10:19:11AM -0500:

yeah afaik there is a separate partition/slice/whatsoever that holds the boot files.

i know some people will ignite their flamethrowers now but <asbestos suit> i like the idea behind /dev/ipldevice on ibm aix. its just container for some very simple structure that holds the files needed to boot as far as devices and other drivers are loaded to get into the next stage and kinda kldload(8) the other drivers and stuff before commencing the real rc stuff. this means -- in the simplest implementation -- having a partition, lets say /dev/da0e with approx. 10 mb size and symlinking it to /dev/bootdevice. then some administration model like linux' lilo has to be run where the image of the boot file system gets assembled somehow. dirty hack: having a directory /bootstage where all the files (loader, rcfiles, kernel, modules) are copied in and cd /bootstage && find .|cpio -o /dev/bootdevice now the loader has to grok cpio or tar format. </asbestos suit>

very stable and convenient way. to be suitable for production use there has to be some kind of selection mechanism for the old setup but that's not a big point in discussion i guess.

cheers, /k

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