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Xref: sserve comp.os.linux.misc:654 comp.os.386bsd.misc:767 Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!munnari.oz.au!metro!sequoia!ultima!kralizec.zeta.org.au!kralizec.zeta.org.au!not-for-mail From: bde@kralizec.zeta.org.au (Bruce Evans) Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.386bsd.misc Subject: Re: Why would I want LINUX? Date: 25 Aug 1993 14:27:17 +1000 Organization: Kralizec Dialup Unix Sydney: +61-2-837-1183 V.32bis Lines: 45 Message-ID: <25epn5INNren@kralizec.zeta.org.au> References: <24rbb5$t51@hrd769.brooks.af.mil> <24vd7h$frk@horus.mch.sni.de> <258gu6INNlef@bonnie.tcd-dresden.de> <1993Aug23.074749.18957@colorado.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: kralizec.zeta.org.au In <1993Aug23.074749.18957@colorado.edu> drew@kinglear.cs.colorado.edu (Drew Eckhardt) writes: >When my system comes up, my master boot record (winiboot) asks me >which partition I want to boot. If I don't choose something >(with one keypress) within the timeout period, Linux is automatically >booted.. If I press some key for a different OS, it gets booted instead. Same here. Except 386BSD is booted after the timeout instead of Linux :-). >While this isn't the default installation (with LILO), winiboot is >available as part of the shoelace package, available in source >and binary form. There are some copyright problems with shoelace, but they mostly don't affect winiboot. I think LILO was written partly as an overreaction to the copyright problems. >As far as the LILO bootblock being different from BSD's - it >was developed under a different set of design constraints. Size >is more limited than with BSD because we don't have things sub >partitioned with an area for the disklabel / bootblock set aside. This is the main reason why a BSD-style bootblock won't work for Linux. Linux originally had only the minix fs, which allows only 1K for the boot program where 386BSD's requires 8K. I't might be good to put multiboot stuff in the 386BSD boot block. The code is trivial except for mode-switching stuff which the the "BIOS" 386BSD boot blocks already handle. Joerg Wunsch writes: >>(Another problem of Linux is, they occupy a full dozz partition for swap >instead of sub-partitioning their primary one.) The 386BSD subpartioning leaves a lot to be desired. It should at least handle the standard 4 partitions. Then there are extended partitions. I think DOS allows at most 26 partitions per drive (up to 25 of them in extended partitions), and Linux is normally wired for at most 8 partitions per drive, but I once supported 32 partitions per drive in the Minix driver. The 386BSD approach is best except for the small number of subpartition and lack of support for foreign partitions. Foreign partitions need to be supported if only to avoid writing to them. -- Bruce Evans bde@kralizec.zeta.org.au