> The first menu (these are all text menus, BTW) > -------------- > The choices listed are: > > 1) Boot FreeDOS from CD > > Works. > > h) Boot from first harddisk (0x80) > > I fell into this because of the timeout. The next two lines on the > screen are:
These are not handled by ISOLinux. Probably PART doesn't like the way that ISOLinux tries to boot from the hard drive. > q) Skip CD-Rom boot (try next boot device) > > NO ROM BASIC > SYSTEM HALTED ISOLinux with this option just hands the boot sequence back to the BIOS; not its fault. > Even the first option (though it works) may confuse users. When > they see "1) Boot FreeDOS from CD", some users may ask, "Isn't that > what I just did?". > > Perhaps this option should read, "Continue with FreeDOS > installation". And if so, then perhaps there should be an Good idea. > alternative option called "abort FreeDOS installation and reboot" - > for those times when this CD gets booted accidentally. For those times, the timeout to boot from hard drive is there for a reason... > Or should this menu just be dropped completely? No, see above explanation. The timeout to boot from hard drive is there so that a person can leave their computer after commencing the install and not find themselves booting the CD-ROM again when they come back. > Second menu > ----------- > After I press "1" on the first menu, I briefly saw a msg that said > something about data, memdisk, loading, etc. Unfortunately, I Those messages are normal, and unimportant. Basically if you end up having the screen cleared, there was no problem at all. You don't even have to press "1", btw; you can just press enter. > second menu appeared. I hope those msgs weren't important. Not the least bit. > Another countdown menu. Hurry, hurry, hurry! I was certain that 2 min wouldn't be rushing anyone. Perhaps it should say that pressing any key (like the down arrow) will halt the timeout. > The 5 choices vs. 2 choices discrepancy has already been explained. > Moving on. > > Pressing "1" leads to the screen clearing and about 7 lines of > text appearing. But before I have time to read them all, the > screen clears again and presents me with another menu. Again, if the screen does get cleared, there wasn't a problem. > Fourth menu > ---------- > Please select the drive you want to install FreeDOS on. > > Only two choices are offered - both wrong. The choices are C: and > D:. But I want to install FreeDOS into a new partition in the 120MB > of unpartitioned space available on the drive. Apparently, I have > to do some prep work for that to happen. I should probably change it to say that if neither of the choices are correct, simply choose either one and select a partitioning option from the next menu. After rebooting, the new partition will be recognized and you can continue as usual. > Fortunately, there is an escape option. So I press Esc. I wouldn't recommend pressing Esc. Perhaps I should remove that message :-). > Escape menu Actually, just the next menu; Esc does who knows what with the destination disk choice (probably chooses C: though). > 9 choices here. I tried three of them - 3, 5, and 9 (IIRC). > > .Read instructions on how to use this CD > > Is it possible to add this option to the first menu that the user > sees after booting? Also it might be helpful to add this option to Not really, and I don't see the point of adding it to later menus (only one, which offers to return to the original menu) > Option 9, "reboot", gave me a brief flash of the screen and then > redisplayed the same menu. I tried it several times. > > I soon noticed that there was a short line of text being > displayed (ever so briefly) on the screen each time I pressed 9. > Eventually I was able to read that short line of text. The text > read "No fixed disks present". :-( Ouch! It is obvioiusly using fdisk /reboot, instead of the more ideal fdapm warmboot :-). > XFdisk > ------ > I successfully created a new ~120MB primary partition in the empty > space using XFdisk. > > After I created that partition I selected it. There I saw the > "Install Bootmanager" on XFdisk's "Options" menu. I was curious > about it. So I pressed F1 (hoping to get more info about it). > > Instead I got a dialog box entitled "File error". It read, "WARNING > / Error opening XFDISK.XFH." I found that pressing F1 for each > option listed produced the same msg. Sorry, but the help file is only available in German. If someone wants to fetch the XFdisk source code and translate it to english, be my guest. > That's all for now. HTH. Thanks for the suggestions! -- Fall is my favorite season in Los Angeles, watching the birds change color and fall from the trees. David Letterman (1947 - ) See ya ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Using Tomcat but need to do more? Need to support web services, security? Get stuff done quickly with pre-integrated technology to make your job easier Download IBM WebSphere Application Server v.1.0.1 based on Apache Geronimo http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=120709&bid=263057&dat=121642 _______________________________________________ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
