Re: How do I boot over network

mike burrell (mikpos@home.com)
Sat, 2 Oct 1999 15:14:49 -0600

kernel@kvack.org (kernel@kvack.org) said:
> On Sat, 2 Oct 1999, Wakko Warner wrote:
> > I have an intel etherexpress 10/100 in a diskless machine. It gets it's ip
> > address and tftp's the kernel image. Once it transfers control to the
> > image, I get 8000 scrolling down the screen and the floppy drive is
> > constantly on.
>
> A standard kernel image assumes that its boot sector was loaded off of a
> floppy, and attempts to load the remainder of the kernel. I patched the
> setup code to work when netbooted, but I lost the source. :( However, if
> you want a copy of the bootsector, I can send you one (and maybe
> disassemble/recreate the source).

it sounds like what you want to do is change the root device. use rdev to
change that (as is described in nfsroot.txt). the kernel, though, doesn't
load the remainder of the kernel; it tries to mount the root device. this
doesn't explain the 8000 (ahem) error messages, though. when a kernel can't
mount the root device you usually get something like this (i'm doing this
from memory, excuse the wrong wording):

VFS: No such device 02:00
Kernel panic.

after which, you will find no more error messages.

for the original poster: what exactly is displayed on screen (i.e. how far
does it get?). is it immediately after it uncompresses the image, or what?
and what is the exact wording of the error message?

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