Hi dear -boot people, as you might know, I somehow took over the win32-loader developement for some versions now. One major specificity of win32-loader is that it is really hard to get tested: it has to be run on many different Windows™ versions, potentially breaking their boot.
I fear that major bugs could have slipped in my modifications, even tough I tried hard to be conservative and successfully tested it on the machines where I could still find a Windows installed. That's why I now intend to send out a "Call for testing" to debian-devel (or even debian-devel-announce !?), for which I'd like some pieces of advice. That's my draft text: -------%<-------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: win32-loader: Call for testing on Windows™ hosts Hi all, Here is a Call For Testing for the win32-loader package, which would benefit from more testing: as it name somehow tells, it's not a package that is run from a Debian host, but from Windows: it's has not necessarily been well tested. === What's that about? === The win32-loader package builds a Windows™ executable that is installed on the i386 and amd64 installer CDs as "setup.exe". This executable installs the d-i initrd and a grub bootloader on the "boot disk" of Windows™. After reboot, the install goes on from that image and uses the material on the CD for the install. The win32-loader source package also builds a "standalone" version, that can be run directly, without being on a d-i CD. This "flavour" could be installed on a website like http://goodbye-microsoft.com (and actually is, but for Gnewsense). When run from a Windows™ host, it downloads a d-i initrd and vmlinuz, and from there, does the same thing as the CD version. === What should work === Win32-loader's job is to get the user from a running Windows™ to a d-i environment, without breaking the Windows boot. It should uninstall from Windows cleanly. There is also a possibility to launch the kfreebsd d-i version. === What is known not to work === The kfreebsd flavour cannot be selected together with the "stable" target; for obvious reasons. === What type of testing would be needed === I would really appreciate if people could try both the CD version (running setup.exe from the amd64 and i386 CDs) and the standalone version (the one shipped in the win32-loader package, available from [0]), on "any" Windows version still out there. Then $ reportbug win32-loader for any problem. Thanks in advance, cheers, OdyX [0] http://alioth.debian.org/~odyx-guest/win32-loader-standalone.exe -------%<-------------------------------------------------------------------- What do you think of it (both the idea and the content)? And to which list? Thanks in advance, cheers, OdyX -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [email protected] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [email protected] Archive: http://lists.debian.org/[email protected]
