Re: Installation problems with Woody
Woody boot-floppies are most likely very preliminary at this point and
I wouldn't expect a seamless installation. Any comments should be sent
to the debian-testing list. (I haven't received anything from
debian-testing for quite a while, so didn't even know that the
boot-floppies had been released). I'm cc'ing debian-testing with this
reply.
I agree that the dead http.us.debian.org server is a potential problem.
I don't know if one server has been down for quite a while or if there
have been random outages. I usually just repeat my 'apt-get' command
and another server is reached. Obviously this could be a problem with
a script.
Bob
On Mon, May 07, 2001 at 10:55:54AM -0400, Carl Fink wrote:
> A server I have root on was compromised this weekend. Since we don't
> know the vulnerability that was exploited, but we do know the attack
> came via an account I set up, I decided to back up my home directory
> and reinstall my system.
>
> I had been running potato, but since I was doing a scratch install I
> chose to install woody, which in principle should be near stable
> status. I downloaded the six floppy images from debian.org (actually
> sourceforge) and began.
>
> The installer is as basic as ever, but there are problems beyond its
> expecting the user to have memorized his/her hardware and know what
> some pretty technical words mean. For one, apparently one of the
> servers sharing the name "http.us.debian.org" is down. When it comes
> time to install the base system, therefore, about every third
> download sits idle for eternity. The timeout is set to a
> ridiculously high number, something like ten minutes -- so trying to
> install the base system essentially means your system will download
> 0-2 files, then freeze for ten minutes, then return to the "Install
> Base System" screen.
>
> Shouldn't a failed attempt to download a .deb file lead to a second
> attempt, not an "I give up"?
>
> I happen to be Internet-savvy enough to figure out the problem and
> manually type the kernel.org mirror's address in place of debian.org,
> but a naive user will just think the installer doesn't work.
>
> And that isn't my big problem. The system *cannot* be made bootable,
> at all. Yes, it's a big drive, and yes, I did create a small
> partition at the beginning to be /boot. No dice. There appears to
> be only a generic "it didn't work" message that doesn't report LILO's
> specific error, meaning I have no way to figure out why it doesn't
> want to work.
>
> Okay, I'll create a boot floppy. Well, as it turns out, no I won't.
> I get the informative message that "boot floppy creation failed".
> Guys, that isn't especially helpful. No, it isn't defective
> floppies, unless all five that I tried just happen to be defective in
> such a way that DOS format can't detect it.
>
> So after a long, frustrating install process I have a system that
> cannot be used. Could there at least be an option to use LOADLIN?
> LOADLIN works really well, and I can make that little partition at
> the beginning of /dev/hda be a DOS drive.
>
> Pardon my venting.
> --
> Carl Fink carlf@dm.net
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