Re: SEUL: Observatons

[Luka@pop3.aracnet.com (Peter) <luka@mit.edu>]

winston@atlantic.net wrote:
>> > Will SEUL start from DOS or LINUX
>>
>> I would like to see it start from Freedos.  That would require more
>> programming, though.
>>
>
>I see that I may have mistyped my intentions here.  When I said DOS I
>wasn't thinking of any particular DOS (DOS/OS7/OS2) but what I was
>getting at do we start from a familiar setting (which in most cases will
>be some version of a disk operating system that comes with the users
>computer) or does SEUL work from a virtual disk drive (Slackware
>installation).

if the question is linux-boot vs. a preliminary install based on the
current os, then i have to say the answer is clearly the former.
we do _not_ want to support an install based on n different platforms
that the user may be starting from, which does nothing if that platform
isn't precisely one of the ones we've built an installer for.
supporting any variety of software cross-platform is hellish.
installer software such as we're developing will be even more machine-
dependent than most, and trying to go this way can easily make seul
completely intractable.  otoh, developing free tools that will run
under other os's to do any useful things is good undertaking, and seul
will stand to benefit from it, but seul installation must be in no
way dependent on them.

the benefit of using freedos, assuming that we can rely on its
stability (i have not actually used it), is that it is small.
we put it on a floppy, along with a lot of programs for kicking
off the installation, and it is not too hard to fit it all.
you put in the disk, and it runs the installer.  just like a linux
boot[+root] floppy, but smaller and thus (hopefully) easier for
us to put together.

>As an aside, what is freedos?  Are you perhaps talking about opendos
>from Caldera?? But then again there is the problem of first having to
>install a new (generic) dos to work with which, at least to my mind
>would take the simple out of SEUL.

i believe the intent was to just use a freedos boot floppy (as described
above), not to do a full freedos install on the system before
purging it to install linux...
(correct me if i'm wrong)


also, re: newsgroups, lists
ok - a newsgroup would probably be a bad idea.
some breaking of this list into more directed ones should happen
soon, though...
is anyone thinking about how to do this? (if so, i will shut up)


-peter luka
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