(snipped a whole lot of stuff)
>Perhaps others can throw in their bit from here.
There is actually a HOWTO on this very subject which should
be a good start .. The Linux bootdisk howto, last updated
Sept 2000.
Also worth reading stuff about bootable CDs, which use
the same mechanism (they actually have a boot floppy disk
image on the CD, I believe)
Once you know how to customise a boot disk, doing what
you want it to do shouldn't be too hard...
- Chris