Bug#518808: [PATCH] d-i manual: document booting from DOS

[Frans Pop <elendil@planet.nl>]

Hi Samuel and Holger,

Sorry for not looking at this BR earlier, but somehow I don't think booting
from DOS is the highest priority we have.

I've looked at the patch from Holger (as that's the most extensive of the
two), but have some problems with it. My comments below.

Cheers,
FJP

On Saturday 19 September 2009, Holger Wansing wrote:
> I have tested booting testing/squeeze from MS-DOS and here are some
> improvements/updates to the d-i manual documentation on this.
>
> Please consider to use the patch attached here.

--- en/boot-installer/x86.xml	2009-09-18 22:29:22.000000000 +0200
+++ en/boot-installer/x86_workingcopy.xml	2009-09-18 22:19:39.000000000 +0200
[...]
 Boot into DOS (not Windows) without any drivers being loaded.  To do
 this, you have to press <keycap>F8</keycap> at exactly the right
 moment (and optionally select the <quote>safe mode command prompt only</quote>

FJP:
AFAIK current versions of Windows (including XP!) don't have a "safe
mode command prompt only" option. This is ancient history. If you want
to revive this, we need to provide updated info in how to run DOS in the
first place.

-option).  Enter the subdirectory for the flavor you chose, e.g.,
+option).  Enter the subdirectory install.386:

FJP:
"install.386" is only valid for i386, but for amd64 it should be
"install.amd". As the section is for arch="x86", we should cover both
correctly. The best way to do this is probably to define an entity in
build/entities/common.ent, something like:
<!ENTITY x86-install-dir
  "install.<phrase arch="i386">386</phrase><phrase arch="amd64">amd</phrase>">
And then use that whereever the patch now has 'install.386'.

--- en/install-methods/boot-drive-files.xml	2009-09-18 22:29:22.000000000 +0200
+++ en/install-methods/boot-drive-files_workingcopy.xml	2009-09-18 22:23:24.000000000 +0200
[...]
+Copy the following directories from a &d-i; installation CD or DVD to your
+hard drive, let's say to <filename>c:\</filename>:

FJP:
This is too vague. The directories *must* be copied to c:\, or at
least to the root dir of a hard drive because otherwise the batchfile
will not work.
But wouldn't it be much simpler to completely forget about copying files
and just say:
- mount the CD drive
- change to the CD drive
- cd to \install.{386,amd}
- run install.bat
?

Then you can forget about this whole section (and thus remove the link to
&boot-installer-intro-hd.xml; and maybe replace that with a more suitable
intro).