Re: Apt how, why, where

[glhenni@cs.sandia.gov (Gary L. Hennigan)]

Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@datasync.com> writes:
| Hi,
| >>"E" == E L Meijer \(Eric\) <E.L.> writes:
| 
|  E> Being lazy myself, I have a feature request on behalf of all the (lazy)
|  E> loadlin users.  Would it be possible to have the newly created
|  E> kernel-image package offer the option of copying the kernel to the
|  E> place loadlin expects it in your setup?  I would figure that
|  E> kernel-package_...deb could ask if there is a standard
|  E> `loadlin-kernel-directory', and store that in its configuration files.
|  E> Of course it should rename old kernels using some intelligent renaming
|  E> scheme (vmlinuz.1, vmlinuz.2, ...).
| 
| 	Is it really that bad doing a 
|  # cp /vmlinuz /place/to/keep/images
|  ? The reason I have not done so is that some people keep the images
|  on dos partitions (which may or may not be mounted, and others keep
|  it on a floppy. 
| 
| 	There is no real standard place where loadlin users keep the
|  images; and any hardwired solution is unlikely to satisfy more than a
|  fraction of the people (who could already use /boot if they so
|  desired, anyway).
| 
| 	An interactive solution, as you suggest, is adding a bit of
|  complexity to a script that already is quite critical, and
|  complex. Also, I am under some pressure to winnow interactivity out
|  of the scripts, in preparation of attempting a install process where
|  questions are asked before an install, not during one, so one may
|  answer a set of questions, and walk away; and sore the answers to
|  automatically feed another machine in a farm of machines.
| 
| 	So, unless there is compelling arguments in favour, I am
|  disinclined to further increase the complexity of the postinstall
|  script (since a simple cp command provides the workaround).
| 
| 	Comments?

I agree with Manoj, no need to make it any more complex than it is. 

I can offer my own solution. I made /boot a small VFAT partition that
is mounted both under Linux and under Win98. So, whenever I install a
kernel_image*.deb package It gets put in there by default and if/when
I need to boot Linux from Win98 it's there the next time I go into
Win98. Not totally automatic if it's a new kernel version, but close
enough.

Of course I think I've used loadlin exactly once so it's not much of
an issue for me to begin with.

Gary