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Re: [RFC] Support for using multiple CDs during installation



On Wednesday 31 October 2007, Joey Hess wrote:
> It seems logical to me; the installer wants to find as complete as
> possible a copy of the debian archive and doesn't really need to
> continue to find other copies once one has been found. Same reason it
> doesn't ask for CDs after you've given it DVDs..

It's logical from the installer's pov, but not from a _user's_ pov.
How the hell is he supposed to guess that he will be asked about additional 
CDs later when confronted with a question about a network mirror?

If I (as a newbie) were confronted by that question I would think "OK, so 
that's it: I either use the mirror or have to do with what's included on 
this one CD; let's choose the mirror to be safe".
With my proposal the user will _know_ at the time of the mirror question how 
many CDs/DVDs he already has available which makes answering "No" to the 
mirror question a lot less scary.

And you're not answering the case where someone would want to use 2 CDs + a 
network mirror because he has a reasonable but not great Internet 
connection.
One of the main reasons I have a local mirror and happily download some 
50-100 GB each month - most of which I'll never use - is exactly to avoid 
long downloads when updating and doing installer tests, even though I have 
broadband (though not very big broadband).

> Summary of all offerings[4] of US CD vendors:
Guess (at least some) Dutch sellers are less money hungry than US ones then:
- http://www.dddi.nl/neword_en.html
- http://www.munnikes.nl/cd/cart/index.php?action=cat&cat=193&kid=b14

I agree that something like the first does is probably exceptional (and will 
probably scare real newbies :-)

I also don't see it as a problem that they don't sell netinsts: if you're 
going to use a netinst (and possibly even single full CD) you _have_ a got 
Internet connection so you'll be able to download it yourself. Promoting 
m-a with vendors _would_ be a good idea.

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