Martin Neubauer schrieb:
If you don't boot from cd you still need to have access to the data that is
getting installed. So you can either put the cd image somewhere on the
system (this can be a problem if you want to install Plan 9 on the whole
hard disc) or download it during installation. I also couldn't quite get the
network going from the installer, but I didn't depend on that, anyway. If
you boot from cd, just say /dev/sdD0/data.
Martin, thank you very much for your helpful answer! Indeed it might be
somewhat strange to install plan 9 as a standalone system and I am sure
that this is seldom done. At least I have plan 9 on the laptop happily
now. Let me describe the problem solution for other users eventually
fighting with a similar problem.
As you pointed out in your mail, the data must be somewhere in the
installation process. That clearly is the CD that one has to mount as
/dev/sdD0/data at the installation step "mountdist". But the
Installation Manual is wrong as it is saying:
"When prompted for "distribution disk" the usual value is /dev/sdD0/data
- it is not, that never does work. The usual value must be simply "/"
for that case of installation from this mounted CD, say sdD0! But there
is another very strange problem I could not believe until I had checked
it for reproducibility a couple of times: That "/" at the prompt
"distribution disk" does not work the first time!! The first time the
familiar sequence
....................
/bin/mount: can't open srv/dos: '/srv/dos' file does not exist
cp: can't create /n/9fat/9load: '/n/9fat/9load' clone failed
cp: can't create /n/9fat/9pcf '/n/9fat/9pcf' clone failed
/n/9fat/plan9.ini: rc (bootsetup): can't open: '/n/9fat/plan9.ini'
clone failed
as described in a former mail will appear again. One has to kill the
installation, reboot and run the process a second time, then the input
"/" will be accepted and the last task "bootsetup" will come to a happy
end. (I always wiped the disk befor starting a new test to make shure
that there are no rest of a former installation that will adulterate the
result of the experiment.) I do not know what kind of moronic error I
did make this time on that point? (As I read out of the mails there are
no other users installing/using plan 9 as a stand alone system, so it
may be that such a problem does not occur with other setup combinations
with plan 9 on a separate partition with windows or linux.)
There are some more obscurities I would like to add here:
1. With all that trouble in mind I ask myself if it is not very logic to
assume that the source of the actual installation will be the source of
the distribution? One of the first messages tells me that plan9 is
booting from sdD0, so it is clear that this is known to the system. So I
ask myself if such a step of mounting an already for the installation
necessarily mounted media is not bare of elementary logic? I would
expect that that that installation step mostly might be automated. I
think only to question the user for an eventually other source of
distribution would make sense, as one may install a new source via
internet.
2. Why does the install process offer an XGA monitor as default? VESA is
save with nearly all hardware nowadays. VESA as adefault would move away
another banana skin of the installation process for non-professionals,
especially as VESA is not offered to the user so one must know that
possibility. (And it is not described in the "Installation Manual".) So
I think VESA should be default with an offer of XGA as an option.
3. The task "formatventi" and the task "copydist" will not be prompted
as described in the "Installation Manual" but run automatically and that
is a good idea. But the point is that the description is wrong and
confusing. (In the case of "formatventi" certainly that will only happen
if you chose fossli+venti at the prompt "configfs" and copydist will
certainly only run if the process described above was successful.)
I am not familiar enough with plan 9 to change that installation
processes and do not even know where that boot-script is. But I am bored
with all that tawdry/clicky Systems and I am interested in the internals
of plan 9. Is there any detailed description to compile plan 9 from
source? I think that is a good starting point to understand a system to
do some useful.
Thanks and regards
Bernhard
