Hi,
On Thu, 28 Jun 2001, Steven James wrote:
> Greetings,
>
> It sounds like we're on nearly the same path. I am using the ide driver from
> TIARA also. I'm also using a special raw partition and header. On init, the MBR
> from each IDE is fetched, looking for partition type FC. The first block in such
> a partition is a structure with a magic signature, and room for 3
> kernel/initrd/commandline specs (any or all can be empty). The idea is to
> provide a simple mechanism for failsafe kernels and the ability to boot from any
> functional drive.
That is almost exactly what I have in mind. Is partition type FC still
unused ?
So you don't use the MBR itself, which is good and can remain for
whatever the user wants.
> I expect to have it all together either tomorrow or early next week (testing
> today). It has actually worked already, but without cleanup and organization,
> the multiple boot methods in my tree were threatening to become a hairball.
Please keep me informed, maybe I can test/help !
Do you use the ide_fixup from tiara ? I had a problem here with the
detection. First finding the right pci device, and then the detection,
if the IDE controller is really there, didn't work when I connected
a compact flash, so I removed these lines and it works.
How do you do it for the different IDE PCI ID's ?
Armin
> G'day,
> sjames
>
>
> Quoting Armin Schindler <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>
> > On Thu, 28 Jun 2001, Steven James wrote:
> > > Quoting Armin Schindler <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > > Are there any efforts yet to add IDE boot to linuxbios ?
> > >
> > > I'm working on that now. It's about 90% done.
> >
> > Great, so I think I can remove what I got from tiara to
> > load from IDE device at the moment.
> >
> > What excatly is your boot strategy to know the kernel
> > image location and the kernel command line ?
> >
> > Right now I used a small first partition without
> > filesystem to read raw the image which has a header
> > prepended for the sizes and the parameters.
> >
> > When do you think you will have something usable ?
> > I need the IDE load within the next 2 weeks, so if
> > your code takes longer, I will go with what I have
> > done so far.
> >
> > Armin
> >
> >
