LDP/LDP/howto/linuxdoc/LILO.sgml

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<!doctype linuxdoc system>
<article>
<title>LILO mini-HOWTO
<author>Miroslav "Misko" Skoric,
<tt/skoric at eunet dot rs/
<date>v3.39, 2010-07-18
<abstract>
<nidx>linux loader windows nt 2000 boot laptop hp</nidx>
LILO is the most used <bf/Li/nux <bf/Lo/ader for the x86 flavor of
Linux; I'll call it Lilo rather than LILO here because I don't
appreciate uppercase. This file describes some typical Lilo
installations. It's intended as a supplement to the Lilo User's
Guide. I think examples are informative even if your setup isn't much
like mine. I hope this saves you trouble. Since Lilo's own
documentation is very good, who's interested in the details is
referred to /usr/doc/lilo* (once upon a time said gentlemen like
Cameron Spitzer and Alessandro Rubini who have made early versions
of this document)
</abstract>
<p>
This version of Lilo mini-HOWTO is based on work of Cameron Spitzer
(<tt>cls@truffula.sj.ca.us</tt>) and Alessandro Rubini
(<tt>rubini@linux.it</tt>). There are also contributions from Tony Harris
(<tt>tony@nmr.mgh.harvard.edu</tt>) and Marc Tanguy
(<tt>mtanguy@ens.uvsq.fr</tt>). Well, I have used materials from
the authors mentioned - <bf>without changes</bf> - and added some pointers
related to configuring LILO for using with Windows NT and Windows 2000.
More detailed information about the activation of Windows NT/2000 from LILO
menu, you may find in wonderfull
<url url="http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Linux+WinNT.html"
name="Linux+WindowsNT"> mini-HOWTO.
<sect>Introduction
<p>
Although the documentation found in Lilo's sources (the one installed
in <tt>/usr/doc/lilo</tt>-version) is very comprehensive, most Linux
users experience some trouble in building their own
<tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt> file. This document is meant to support them
by giving the minimal information and by showing five sample
installations:
<itemize>
<item>The first example is the classical ``Linux and other'' installation.
<item>The next one shows how to install Lilo on a hard drive
connected as <tt>/dev/hdc</tt> that will boot as <tt>/dev/hda</tt>.
This is usually needed when you install a new Linux drive from
your own running system. This also tells how to boot from SCSI
disks when your BIOS is modern enough.
<item>The third example shows how to boot a Linux system whose root
partition can't be accessed by the BIOS.
<item>The next sample file is used to access huge disks, that neither the
BIOS nor DOS can access easily (this one is somehow outdated).
<item>The last example shows how to restore a damaged disk,
if the damage resulted from installing another
operating system).
</itemize>
<p>
The last three examples are by Cameron, <tt>cls@truffula.sj.ca.us</tt>,
who wrote the original document. Alessandro <tt>rubini@linux.it</tt>
doesn't run anything but Linux, so he can't check
nor update them by himself. Needless to say, any feedback is welcome.
<sect>Background Information and Standard Installation
<p>
When Lilo boots the system, it uses BIOS calls to load the Linux
kernel off the disk (IDE drive, floppy or whatever). Therefore, the
kernel must live in some place that can be accessed by the bios.
<p>
At boot time, Lilo is not able to read filesystem data, and any
pathname you put in <tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt> is resolved at
installation time (when you invoke <bf>/sbin/lilo</bf>). Installation
time is when the program builds the tables that list which sectors are
used by the files used to load the operating system. As a consequence,
all of these files must live in a partition that can be accessed by
the BIOS (the files are usually located in the <tt>/boot</tt>
directory, this means that only the root partition of your Linux
system needs to be accessed via the BIOS).
<p>
Another consequence of being BIOS-based is that you must reinstall the
loader (i.e., you must reinvoke <bf>/sbin/lilo</bf>) any time you
modify the Lilo setup. Whenever you recompile your kernel and
overwrite your old image you must reinstall Lilo.
<sect1>Where Should I Install Lilo?
<p>
The <tt/boot=/ directive in <tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt> tells Lilo where
it should place its primary boot loader. In general, you can either
specify the master boot record (<tt>/dev/hda</tt>) or the root
partition of your Linux installation (is usually is <tt>/dev/hda1</tt>
or <tt>/dev/hda2</tt>).
<p>
If you have another operating system installed in your hard drive,
you'd better install Lilo to the root partition instead of the MBR. In
this case, you must mark the partition as ``bootable'' using the ``a''
command of <bf>fdisk</bf> or the ``b'' command of <bf>cfdisk</bf>.
If you don't overwrite the master boot sector you'll find it
easier to uninstall Linux and Lilo if needed.
<p>
Of course, you always have a way to avoid some "rules" like above. Well,
you may install Lilo to the MBR even if you already have another operating
system installed there. For example, if you installed Windows NT 4.0 as the
first operating system on your machine, then NT's boot loader was placed into
the MBR so you were able to boot NT without problems. After you installed
Linux and chose to install Lilo to the MBR, Lilo rewrote NT's boot loader.
Next time you boot your machine, you won't be able to boot NT. But, that
is no problem. You should edit your <tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt> and add a new
entry for NT. Next time you re-boot your system, there will be the new
added NT entry under Lilo menu. The same thing happened when I installed
Windows 2000 instead of Windows NT.
<sect1>How Should I Configure my IDE Hard Drives?
<p>
I personally don't use LBA or LARGE settings in the BIOS (but I only
run Linux); they are horrible kludges forced on by design deficiencies
in the PC world. This requires that the kernel lives in the first 1024
cylinders, but this is not a problem as long as you partition your
hard drives and keep root small (as you should do anyways).
<p>
If your hard disk already carries another operating system, you won't
be able to modify the BIOS settings, or the old system won't work any
more. All recent Lilo distribution are able to deal with LBA and LARGE
disk settings.
<p>
Note that the <tt>"linear"</tt> keyword in <tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt> can
help in dealing with geometry problems. The keyword instructs Lilo to
use linear sector addresses instead of sector/head/cylinder tuples.
Conversion to 3D addresses is delayed to run-time, therefore making
the setup more immune to geometry problems.
<p>
If you have more than one hard disk and some of them are only used by
Linux and are not involved in the boot process, you can tell your BIOS
that they are not installed. Your system will boot more quickly and
Linux will autodetect all the disks in no time. I often switch disks
in my computers, but I never touch the BIOS configuration.
<sect1>How Can I Interact at Boot Time?
<p>
When you see the Lilo prompt, you can hit the &lt;Tab&gt; key to show
the list of possible choices. If Lilo is not configured to be
interactive, press and hold the &lt;Alt&gt; or &lt;Shift&gt; key
before the ``LILO'' message appears.
<p>
If you choose to boot a Linux kernel, you can add command-line
arguments after the name of the system you choose. The kernel accepts
many command-line arguments. All the arguments are listed in the
``BootPrompt-HOWTO'' by Paul Gortmaker, and I won't replicate it
here. A few command line arguments, however, are particularly
important and worth describing here:
<itemize>
<item><tt>root=</tt>: you can tell the Linux kernel to mount as root
a different partition than the one appearing in <tt>/lilo.conf</tt>.
For example, my system has a tiny partition hosting a minimal Linux
installation, and I've been able to boot the system after
destroying my root partition by mistake.
<item><tt>init=</tt>: version 1.3.43 and newer of the Linux kernel can
execute another command instead of <bf>/sbin/init</bf>,
as specified on the command line. If you experience bad problems
during the boot process, you can access the bare system by
specifying <tt>init=/bin/sh</tt> (when you are at the shell
prompt you most likely will need to mount your disks: try
``<bf>mount -w -n -o remount /; mount -a</bf>'',
and remember to ``<bf>umount -a</bf>'' before turning off
the computer).
<item>A number: by specifying a number on the kernel command line, you
instruct <em>init</em> to enter a specific run-level (the
default is usually 3 or 2, according to the distribution you chose).
Refer to the <em>init</em> documentation, to <tt>/etc/inittab</tt>
and to <tt>/etc/rc*.d</tt> to probe further.
</itemize>
<sect1>How Can I Uninstall Lilo?
<p>
When Lilo overwrites a boot sector, it saves a backup copy in
<tt>/boot/boot.</tt><em/xxyy/, where <em/xxyy/ are the major and minor
numbers of the device, in hex. You can see the major and minor numbers
of your disk or partition by running ``<bf>ls -l
/dev/<em>/device</em></bf>''. For example, the first sector of
<tt>/dev/hda</tt> (major 3, minor 0) will be saved in
<tt>/boot/boot.0300</tt>, installing Lilo on <tt>/dev/fd0</tt> creates
<tt>/boot/boot.0200</tt> and installing on <tt>/dev/sdb3</tt> (major
8, minor 19) creates <tt>/boot/boot.0813</tt>. Note that Lilo won't
create the file if there is already one so you don't need to care about
the backup copy whenever you reinstall Lilo (for example, after
recompiling your kernel). The backup copies found in <tt>/boot/</tt>
are always the snapshot of the situation before installing any Lilo.
<p>
If you ever need to uninstall Lilo (for example, in the unfortunate
case you need to uninstall Linux), you just need to restore the
original boot sector. If Lilo is installed in <tt>/dev/hda</tt>, just
do ``<bf>dd if=/boot/boot.0300 of=/dev/hda bs=446 count=1</bf>''
(I personally just do ``<bf>cat /boot/boot.0300 > /dev/hda</bf>'',
but this is not safe, as this will restore the original partition table as
well, which you might have modified in the meanwhile). This command is
much easier to run than trying ``<bf>fdisk /mbr</bf>'' from a DOS
shell: it allows you to cleanly remove Linux from a disk without ever
booting anything but Linux. After removing Lilo remember to run Linux'
<bf>fdisk</bf> to destroy any Linux partition (DOS' <bf>fdisk
</bf> is unable to remove non-dos partitions).
<p>
If you installed Lilo on your root partition (e.g., <tt>/dev/hda2</tt>),
nothing special needs to be done to uninstall Lilo. Just run Linux'
<bf>fdisk</bf> to remove Linux partitions from the partition
table. You must also mark the DOS partition as bootable.
<sect1>How to make a ram disk?
<p>
<em>Notice: If you find the next section difficult to read, you may
also look for the web page:
<tt>http://surfer.nmr.mgh.harvard.edu/partition/ramdisk.html</tt>
where you would find the "original" of this contribution ...</em>
<p>
by Tony Harris
16 Oct 2000
ram disk eenie-weenie HOWTO
<p>
If your root file system is on a device for which your kernel has no
compiled-in driver, you will need to use <tt/lilo/ to load that driver
as a module very early in the boot cycle.
There are only two easy steps:
<itemize>
<item>make a ram disk image with <bf>/mkinitrd</bf>
<item>modify <tt>lilo.conf</tt> to point to the image
</itemize>
First, I <bf>cd</bf> over to <tt>/boot</tt>:
<p>
<verb>
System.map chain.b module-info-2.2.16-3ext3
System.map-2.2.16-3 initrd-2.2.16-3.img vmlinux-2.2.16-3
System.map-2.2.16-3ext3 vmlinux-2.2.16-3ext3
vmlinuz kernel.h
boot.b map vmlinuz-2.2.16-3
bz.2.2.15.juke.Image module-info vmlinuz-2.2.16-3ext3
bzImage-2.2.14 module-info-2.2.16-3
</verb>
<p>
Here you can see that I have a 2.2.16-3 kernel and I have added a
second kernel with ext3 support (<tt/vmlinuz-2.2.16-3ext3/). There is
already a ram disk image for my first kernel (<tt/initrd-2.2.16-3.img/)
To make a new image for the second kernel, I type the following (stuff I
type is in bold):
boot# <bf>mkinitrd initrd-2.2-16-3ext3.img 2.2.16-3ext3</bf>
<tt/mkinitrd/ is a shellscript that looks at the modules needed by my
kernel, then makes an ext2 filesystem containing them.
If we look inside the image we see this is the case:
boot# <bf>cat initrd-2.2.16-3ext3.img | gunzip > /tmp/myimage</bf>
boot# <bf>file /tmp/myimage</bf>
/tmp/myimage: Linux/i386 ext2 filesystem/
<p>
You do not have to look inside your image. Only making the image and
modifying <tt>lilo.conf</tt> are necessary steps. However, discussion of
the ramdisk image is provided for pedagogic purposes.
In order to look inside, I need to mount the image as though it were
a filesystem:
boot# <bf>mount /tmp/myimage /mnt/tmp -t ext2 -o loop=/dev/loop3</bf>
boot# <bf>ls /mnt/tmp</bf>
<tt/bin dev etc lib linuxrc/
boot# <bf>find /mnt/tmp</bf>
<tt//mnt/tmp/
<tt//mnt/tmp/lib/
<tt//mnt/tmp/lib/aic7xxx.o/
<tt//mnt/tmp/bin/
<tt//mnt/tmp/bin/sh/
<tt//mnt/tmp/bin/insmod/
<tt//mnt/tmp/etc/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/console/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/null/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/ram/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/systty/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/tty1/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/tty2/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/tty3/
<tt//mnt/tmp/dev/tty4/
<tt//mnt/tmp/linuxrc/
The most important part of this ram disk image is <tt/aic7xxx.o/,
which is my scsi module.
Finally, I move on to the last step, modifying <tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt>:
Here is my entry in <tt/lilo.conf/ that corresponds to the kernel and
image I just created:
<tt/image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.2.16-3ext3/
<tt/label=linux.ext3/
<tt/initrd=/boot/initrd-2.2.16-3ext3.img/
<tt/read-only/
<tt/root=/dev/hdb3/
That's it. Run <bf>/lilo</bf> as root and reboot.
<p>
If you have problems, check out the kernel <tt/HOWTO/. There are a
couple things you need to have covered: you need your kernel modules
compiled and living in <tt>/etc/conf.modules</tt>.
<sect>The Simple Configuration
<p>
Most Lilo installations use a configuration file like the
following one:
<verb>
boot = /dev/hda # or your root partition
delay = 10 # delay, in tenth of a second (so you can interact)
vga = 0 # optional. Use "vga=1" to get 80x50
#linear # try "linear" in case of geometry problems.
image = /boot/vmlinux # your zImage file
root = /dev/hda1 # your root partition
label = Linux # or any fancy name
read-only # mount root read-only
other = /dev/hda4 # your dos partition, if any
table = /dev/hda # the current partition table
label = dos # or any non-fancy name
</verb>
<p>
You can have multiple ``image'' and ``other'' sections if you want. It's
not uncommon to have several kernel images configured in your
<em>lilo.conf</em>, at least if you keep up to date with kernel
development.
<sect1>How to Deal with Big Kernels
<p>
If you compile a ``zImage'' kernel and it is too big to fit in half a
megabyte (this is common with new 2.1 kernels), you should build a
``big zImage'' instead: ``<tt>make bzImage</tt>''. To boot a big
kernel image nothing special is needed, but you need version 18 or
newer of Lilo. If your installation is older, you should upgrade your
Lilo package.
<sect1>How to boot Windows NT from 'LILO boot:' menu
<p>
Here I will give you an order of routines you have to do if you want
to have both Linux and NT entries under Lilo menu:
<itemize>
<item>First of all, I would suggest you to install a fresh copy of
Windows NT 4.0 on your hard disk. I suppose that you already
made a backup of your important data, so the NT installation
shouldn't be a problem. During the NT installation, setup is
not going to ask you where to place NT's boot loader, so it
would be placed into the MBR (Master Boot Record) of your hard
disk. But, there is a possibility for a previous content of
the MBR to remain within the MBR (especially any previous
Lilo), so I would suggest you (before installation of NT) to
boot the computer with a DOS floppy diskette having DOS version
of FDISK. At the prompt a:\ just enter the command: fdisk /mbr
and restart the computer again (without that floppy).
<p>
<item>After you have successfully installed your NT, you will see that
it uses the whole hard disk or a specific partition of the hard
disk (depending on what you decided during the setup process).
So, it is advisable to 'shrink' the partition where NT resides
in order to make some free space on the disk. Onto that free space
you will install your Linux. After you have your NT configured
and running, you have to boot your computer using a floppy
diskette with Partition Magic utility by Power Quest. It is a
graphical tool able to see all partitions on all hard disks you
have. The best thing is that you can make some changes with your
partitions but not to destroy your existing data. One of the
available changes is to make your existing partition(s) smaller,
so to get some free space on the disk(s) for other purposes.
Although you are advised to make a backup before you make any
changes to the partitions, I usually practice to 'shrink' NT's
partition before I installed anything but NT itself (so, if
needed, a repetitive re-installation wouldn't be a problem).
Well, Partition Magic (or any other similar utility you are
familiar with) will shrink your NT's partition (either NTFS or
FAT) to a smaller measure and place it to either the beginning
or to the end of the previous measure. It means that you may
choose to have your 'shrinked' NT partition at the beginning
or at the end of your disk (I usually choose NT to be at the
beginning, so the ending part of the disk will become a 'free
space'). After the 'shrinking' is finished, you may re-boot your
NT in order to check the new situation: you may use Windows
Explorer or Disk Administrator for that.
<p>
<item>So far so good. Next step is to install your Linux. Case you
are familiar with RedHat distribution (I hope with other distros
is the same or similar), you start by putting your installation
CD in the drive and re-boot the computer). Well, when you are about
to choose what type of installation it will be (Gnome or KDE
Workstation, Custom, etc.) you may choose whatever you planned
before, but I would suggest to install a Workstation at first.
This is good because Linux setup will find automatically the
free space on the (first) hard disk, make all partitions needed
for Linux, format them properly, make majority of option by
default so you won't have much pain during the setup (later, if
you want, you may either to add missing components or re-install
Linux as Custom over the existing linux partitions). Lilo should
go to the MBR.
<p>
<item>After it looks that Linux installation is finished, you are going
to re-start the computer and there you will only see Lilo
with one Linux entry to boot (or maybe more than one Linux
entry, in case your hardware is multi-processor one). But, don't
panic! Your Windows NT is still there where you had installed it
before Linux. You should become some familiar with Linux as soon
as possible, in order to be able to find and edit your new
/etc/lilo.conf file. When you open this file for the first time,
you'll see that there is only one (or more) Linux entry. Well,
you should know the exact position (read: a partition) where
Windows NT has been installed, so you could add an appropriate
entry into /etc/lilo.conf file. After you do that, restart Lilo
and, after the next re-boot, you will have both 'linux' and 'nt'
entries under Lilo menu.
</itemize>
<sect1>How to boot Windows 2000 from 'LILO boot:' menu
<p>
Well, you may use the same procedure as described above.
I suggest you to read <url url="http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Linux+WinNT.html"
name="Linux+WindowsNT"> mini-HOWTO that also talks
about booting Windows 2000, which is installed on the same part of disk
where Windows NT was <em>before</em>. There you'll find many useful details
regarding various Linux+WinNT/2000/98 combinations.
<sect>Installing <tt/hdc/ to Boot as <tt/hda/ and Using <tt>bios=</tt>
<p>
Lilo allows to map the kernel image from one disk and instruct the
BIOS to retrieve it from another disk. For example, it's common for me
to install Linux on a disk I connect to <tt/hdc/ (master disk of
secondary controller) and boot it as a standalong system on the primary
IDE controller of another computer. I copied the installation floppy
to a tiny partition, so I can run <em>chroot</em> in a virtual
console to install <tt/hdc/ while I use the system to do something else.
<p>
The <em>lilo.conf</em> file I use to install Lilo looks like:
<verb>
# This file must be used from a system running off /dev/hdc
boot = /dev/hdc # overwrite MBR of hdc
disk = /dev/hdc # tell how hdc will look like:
bios = 0x80 # the bios will see it as first drive
delay = 0
vga = 0
image = /boot/vmlinux # this is on /dev/hdc1
root = /dev/hda1 # but at boot it will be hda1
label = Linux
read-only
</verb>
<p>
This configuration file must be read by a Lilo running <bf>off
/dev/hdc1</bf>. The Lilo maps that get written the boot sector
(<tt>/dev/hdc</tt>) must refer to the files in <tt>/boot</tt>
(currently installed as hdc); such files will be accessed under hda
when this disk will be booted as a standalone system.
<p>
I call this configuration file <tt>/mnt/etc/lilo.conf.hdc</tt>
(<tt>/mnt</tt> is where hdc is mounted during the installation. I
install Lilo by invoking ``<tt>cd /mnt; chroot . sbin/lilo -C
/etc/lilo.conf.hdc</tt>''. Refer to the manual page for
<em>chroot</em> if this looks magic.
<p>
The ``<tt>bios=</tt>'' directive in <tt>lilo.conf</tt> is used to tell
Lilo what the BIOS thinks of your devices. BIOS calls identify floppy
disks and hard drives with a number: 0x00 and 0x01 select the floppy
drives, 0x80 and the following numbers select hard disks (old BIOS-es
can only access two disks). The meaning of ``<tt>bios = 0x80</tt> in
the previous sample file is therefore ``use 0x80 in your BIOS calls
for <tt>/dev/hdc</tt>''.
<p>
This Lilo directive can be handy in other situations, for example when
your BIOS is able to boot from SCSI disks instead of IDE ones. When
both IDE and SCSI devices are there, Lilo can't tell whether 0x80 will
refer to one or the other because the user is able to choose it in the
BIOS configuration menus, and the BIOS can't be accessed while Linux
is running.
<p>
By default, Lilo assumes that IDE drives are mapped first by the BIOS,
but this can be overridden by using instructions like these in
<tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt>:
<verb>
disk = /dev/sda
bios = 0x80
</verb>
<sect>Using Lilo When the BIOS Can't See the Root Partition
<p>
I have two IDE drives, and a SCSI drive. The SCSI drive can't be seen
from BIOS. The Linux Loader, Lilo, uses BIOS calls and can only see
drives that BIOS can see. My stupid AMI BIOS will only boot from "A:"
or "C:" My root file system is on a partition on the SCSI drive.
<p>
The solution consists in storing the kernel, map file, and chain
loader in a Linux partition on the first IDE. Notice that it is not
necessary to keep your kernel on your root partition.
<p>
The second partition on my first IDE (<tt>/dev/hda2</tt>, the Linux
partition used to boot the system) is mounted on <tt>/u2</tt>. Here
is the <tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt> file I used.
<verb>
# Install Lilo on the Master Boot Record
# on the first IDE.
#
boot = /dev/hda
# /sbin/lilo (the installer) copies the Lilo boot record
# from the following file to the MBR location.
install = /u2/etc/lilo/boot.b
#
# I wrote a verbose boot menu. Lilo finds it here.
message = /u2/etc/lilo/message
# The installer will build the following file. It tells
# the boot-loader where the blocks of the kernels are.
map = /u2/etc/lilo/map
compact
prompt
# Wait 10 seconds, then boot the 1.2.1 kernel by default.
timeout = 100
# The kernel is stored where BIOS can see it by doing this:
# cp -p /usr/src/linux/arch/i386/boot/zImage /u2/z1.2.1
image = /u2/z1.2.1
label = 1.2.1
# Lilo tells the kernel to mount the first SCSI partition
# as root. BIOS does not have to be able to see it.
root = /dev/sda1
# This partition will be checked and remounted by /etc/rc.d/rc.S
read-only
# I kept an old Slackware kernel lying around in case I built a
# kernel that doesn't work. I actually needed this once.
image = /u2/z1.0.9
label = 1.0.9
root = /dev/sda1
read-only
# My DR-DOS 6 partition.
other = /dev/hda1
loader=/u2/etc/lilo/chain.b
label = dos
alias = m
</verb>
<sect>How do i know the BIOS number for my SCSI disks
<p>
<em>
The contribution from Marc Tanguy (mtanguy@ens.uvsq.fr), 2001-09-27
</em>
<p>
<sect1> The theory
<p>
Actually, it exists two ways to know it :
<p>
If you have an adaptec scsi card (2940u2, 29160, 39160), you simply
use the 'diagnose' mode (using BIOS v3.10.0 recommended). It must be
activated in the scsi card BIOS menu.
Then you just have to wait and see something like :
<table loc="ht!">
<tabular ca="lcllllllll">
... | ID | LUN | Vendor | Product | Rev | Size | Sync | Bus |
<bf/HD#/ @
... | 0 | 0 | QUANTUM | ATLAS10K2 | DDD6 | 17GB | 160 | 16 |
<bf/80h/ @
... | 1 | 0 | QUANTUM | ATLAS10K2 | DDD6 | 17GB | 160 | 16 |
<bf/81h/ @
... | 2 | 0 | IBM | DDRS | DC1B | 4GB | 80 | 16 |
<bf/82h/ @
... | 3 | 0 | IBM | DNES | SAH0 | 9GB | 80 | 16 |
<bf/83h/
</tabular>
</table>
<p>
If you don't own an adaptec card, you have to
know what is the 'booting' disk (usually ID 0, but not necessary, it
can be defined in the scsi card BIOS) where LILO is going to be found
and start : this is the first disk so it has number 0x80.
Then it's very simple, the BIOS follows the IDs.
<p>
By example :
<verb>
ID 0 -> boot -> 0x80
ID 1 -> empty
ID 2 -> disk -> 0x81
ID 3 -> disk -> 0x82
</verb>
or
<verb>
ID 0 -> disk -> 0x81
ID 1 -> empty
ID 2 -> disk -> 0x82
ID 3 -> boot -> 0x80
ID 4 -> disk -> 0x83
</verb>
<p>
This part doesn't care at all of what is installed on the scsi drives.
But you should note that if you use an ID higher than the SCSI adapter it c
an
be a problem. So you should always try to set the SCSI adapter ID after the
SCSI devices IDs.
<p>
<sect1> How to swap linux and NT booting ?
<p>
OK, but NT must be the first disk to boot, so i want it in 0x80, but i
already have LILO and a full ext2 only drive on 0x80 and my NT drive is
in 0x83. How can i 'swap' linux and NT ?
This a very easy : you just have to tell BIOS that NT drive is now 0x80
and the Linux drive is 0x83.
<verb>
other=/dev/sdd1
label=nt
map-drive = 0x83
to = 0x80
map-drive = 0x80
to = 0x83
</verb>
This change will produce a warning :
<verb>
Warning: BIOS drive 0x8? may not be accessible
</verb>
but if you know what you are doing it will run without problem.
I used it on this configuration which has a Red Hat Linux 7.1 and a Windows
2000 Pro :
<verb>
Name Flags Part Type FS Type [Label] Size (MB)
Disk Drive: /dev/sda - 0x80
sda1 Boot Primary Linux ext2 [/boot] 24.68
sda2 Primary Linux Swap 139.83
sda3 Primary Linux ext2 [/usr] 3150.29
sda4 Primary Linux ext2 [/home] 15044.04
Disk Drive: /dev/sdb - 0x81
sdb1 Primary Linux Swap 139.83
sdb2 Primary Linux ext2 [/] 3150.29
sdb3 Primary Linux ext2 [/opt] 1052.84
sdb4 Primary Linux ext2 [/public] 14015.88
Disk Drive: /dev/sdc - 0x82
sdc1 Primary Linux ext2 [/var] 1052.84
sdc2 Primary Linux ext2 [/tmp] 106.93
sdc3 Primary Linux ext2 [/cache] 1052.84
sdc4 Primary Linux ext2 [/chroot] 2352.44
Disk Drive: /dev/sdd - 0x83
sdd1 Boot Primary NTFS [WINDOWS_2000] 9162.97
</verb>
<p>
My full /etc/lilo.conf :
<verb>
boot=/dev/sda
map=/boot/map
install=/boot/boot.b
prompt
default=Linux
read-only
compact
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label=Linux
root=/dev/sdb2
other=/dev/sdd1
label=Windows
map-drive = 0x83
to = 0x80
map-drive = 0x80
to = 0x83
</verb>
<p>
<sect1> Miscellaneous
<p>
I just plugged a new scsi drive, and now LILO refuse to boot, what's
going on ?
When you plug a disk, you must be careful with the IDs. If you add a drive
between two already plugged disks the BIOS numbers are changed :
<verb>
Before ----> After
scsi id - - BIOS id scsi id - - BIOS id
ID 0 - disk - 0x80 ID 0 - disk - 0x80
ID 1 - empty ID 1 - new disk - 0x81
ID 2 - disk - 0x81 ID 2 - disk - 0x82 !!
</verb>
If you change the BIOS ids, you have to re-evaluate them.
<sect>Accessing Huge Disks When the BIOS Can't
<p>
<em>Notice: 1GB is "Huge"? Well, once upon a time...</em>
<p>
The system in my office has a 1GB IDE drive. The BIOS can only see
the first 504 MB of the IDE. (Where MB means 2**10 bytes, not 10**6
bytes.) So I have MS-DOS on a 350 MB partition <tt>/dev/hda1</tt> and
my Linux root on a 120 MB partition <tt>/dev/hda2</tt>.
<p>
<em>Hauke Laging (hauke@laging.de) and Bob Hall (bhall@hallfire.org)
have noticed a small mistake above, so they've suggested a MB to be
2**20 bytes rather than 2**10 bytes. Thanks for correction. In
addition, Hauke would like to learn more about what he called,
"character codes on LILO startup, when LILO dies with LI, LI-, LIL-
or whatever". I'd appreciate a contribution related to this issue or
a valid web link to that.</em>
<p>
Here it is (a contribution by Zohar Stolar, zohar@numericable.fr):
<bf>B. LILO boot error codes</bf>
<p>
<url url="http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Bootdisk-HOWTO/a1483.html"
name="http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Bootdisk-HOWTO/a1483.html">
Thanks for link.
<p>
MS-DOS was unable to install itself correctly when the drive was
fresh. Novell DOS 7 had the same problem. Luckily for me, "Options
by IBM" forgot to put the "OnTrack" diskette in the box with the
drive. The drive was supposed to come with a product called "OnTrack
Disk Manager." If you only have MSDOS, I guess you have to use it.
<p>
So I made a partition table with Linux' fdisk. MSDOS-6.2 refused to
install itself in <tt>/dev/hda1</tt>. It said something like ``this
release of MS-DOS is for new installations. Your computer already has
MS-DOS so you need to get an upgrade release from your dealer.''
Actually, the disk was brand new.
<p>
What a crock! So I ran Linux' fdisk again and deleted partition 1
from the table. This satisfied MS-DOS 6.2 which proceeded to create
the exact same partition 1 I had just deleted and installed itself.
MS-DOS 6.2 wrote its Master Boot Record on the drive, but it couldn't
boot.
<p>
Luckily I had a Slackware kernel on floppy (made by the Slackware
installation program "setup"), so I booted Linux and wrote Lilo over
MS-DOS' broken MBR. This works. Here is the <tt>/etc/lilo.conf</tt>
file I used:
<verb>
boot = /dev/hda
map = /lilo-map
delay = 100
ramdisk = 0 # Turns off ramdisk in Slackware kernel
timeout = 100
prompt
disk = /dev/hda # BIOS only sees first 500 MB.
bios = 0x80 # specifies the first IDE.
sectors = 63 # get the numbers from your drive's docs.
heads = 16
cylinders = 2100
image = /vmlinuz
append = "hd=2100,16,63"
root = /dev/hda2
label = linux
read-only
vga = extended
other = /dev/hda1
label = msdos
table = /dev/hda
loader = /boot/chain.b
</verb>
<p>
After I installed these systems, I verified that the partition
containing the zImage, boot.b, map, chain.b, and message files can use
an msdos file system, as long as it is not "stackered" or
"doublespaced." So I could have made the DOS partition on
<tt>/dev/hda1</tt> 500 MB.
<p>
I have also learned that "OnTrack" would have written a partition
table starting a few dozen bytes into the drive, instead of at the
beginning, and it is possible to hack the Linux IDE driver to work
around this problem. But installing would have been impossible with
the precompiled Slackware kernel. Eventually, IBM sent me an
"OnTrack" diskette. I called OnTrack's technical support. They told
me Linux is broken because Linux doesn't use BIOS. I gave their
diskette away.
<sect>Booting from a Rescue Floppy
<p>
Next, I installed Windows-95 on my office system. It blew away my nice
Lilo MBR, but it left my Linux partitions alone. Kernels take a long
time to load from floppy, so I made a floppy with a working Lilo setup
on it, which could boot my kernel from the IDE.
I made the lilo floppy like so:
<verb>
fdformat /dev/fd0H1440 # lay tracks on virgin diskette
mkfs -t minix /dev/fd0 1440 # make file system of type minix
mount /dev/fd0 /mnt # mount in the standard tmp mount point
cp -p /boot/chain.b /mnt # copy the chain loader over
lilo -C /etc/lilo.flop # install Lilo and the map on the diskette.
umount /mnt
</verb>
<p>
Notice that the diskette <bf>must be mounted when you run the
installer</bf> so that Lilo can write its map file properly.
<p>
This file is /etc/lilo.flop. It's almost the same as the last one:
<verb>
# Makes a floppy that can boot kernels from HD.
boot = /dev/fd0
map = /mnt/lilo-map
delay = 100
ramdisk = 0
timeout = 100
prompt
disk = /dev/hda # 1 GB IDE, BIOS only sees first 500 MB.
bios=0x80
sectors = 63
heads = 16
cylinders = 2100
image = /vmlinuz
append = "hd=2100,16,63"
root = /dev/hda2
label = linux
read-only
vga = extended
other = /dev/hda1
label = msdos
table = /dev/hda
loader = /mnt/chain.b
</verb>
<p>
Finally, I needed MS-DOS 6.2 on my office system, but I didn't
want to touch the first drive. I added a SCSI controller and
drive, made an msdos file system on it with Linux' mkdosfs, and
Windows-95 sees it as "D:". But of course MSDOS will not boot
off of D:. This is not a problem when you have Lilo. I added
the following to the <tt>lilo.conf</tt> in Example 2.
<verb>
other = /dev/sda1
label = d6.2
table = /dev/sda
loader = /boot/any_d.b
</verb>
With this modification MSDOS-6.2 runs, and it thinks it is on C: and
Windows-95 is on D:.
<sect>LILO after the installation of Mandrake Linux 9.1 on HP products
<p>
2003-11-19
<p>
<sect1>Description of the products used in this experiment
<p>
<em>Notice: Folks, that part is <bf>NOT</bf> a commercial for HP
production of any means! In fact, a series of HP computers I have been using
has delivered failures in power supply units, problems with hard disks etc.
On the other side, laptop's batteries get exhausted earlier than expected.
Other than these issues, HP machines are fine.</em>
<p>
<bf>HP Omnibook 6000</bf>
A laptop computer Omnibook 6000 is equipped with a 'bootable' DVD
drive and recently, at an ICT conference, I bought a bootable DVD-ROM
with Mandrake Linux 9.1 installation. After booting the laptop with
that bootable DVD, it gets directly to the Linux installation menu.
<p>
<bf>HP Vectra VL420 (used as a server)</bf>
In opposite, an HP Vectra VL420 doesn't have a DVD drive (it only
has a CD drive), so the direct installation from that particular
installation DVD is not possible. But, an option of making
a bootable floppy disk for starting the installation procedure
<em>is</em> possible. In fact, several boot images are available
for those users who don't have (bootable or not) DVD drive. One
of the images is a 'network' one. That means, in a local area network
there has to be either a NFS, FTP or HTTP server from which the
installation will take place.
<p>
<bf>HP Vectra VL420 (used as a workstation)</bf>
Another VL420 desktop system I also use, has a spare HDD from a
previous Windows 2000 server installation (actually, that IDE disk was moved
from the other computer where it was a primary one and here it is the second
one disk for backup data). The nice things is that it has a HTTP and FTP
servers installed (of course, usable if the system is boot from that disk).
That was good so I could use one of these servers now.
So, I made a 'network' bootable floppy and booted the first Vectra
VL420 (intended to be a Linux server) with it. After a while, it
came to a point to choose the installation method (NFS or FTP or
HTTP server). At first, I wanted to use the second 'spare' HTTP
server at the other Vectra mentioned above, but regardless of what
permission I tried to give to the 'Everyone' group of Windows users,
I always got the following answer from the Linux setup:
Error: Couldn't get file ... (or something like that)
Then I tried to use the FTP 'spare' server from the second Vectra and at
first it also asked for local and remote IP addresses. That time successfully,
it started to load a part of the remote Linux files into its memory without
any complaint. Soon after, it came to the very same position as Omnibook
6000 did: it got directly to the installation menu, asking a user to choose
a language for the installation use.
>From that point, the setup process was almost the same...
I have chosen/confirmed the following items:
- a language to use, besides English(American) as default: I added
Unicode and Serbian (both Cyrillic and Latin);
- a mouse and keyboard;
- a security level - I accepted defaults: 'Standard' for laptop and 'Higher'
for server;
The next important task was to choose one of <em>DrakX</em>
partitioning options:
- for laptop I chose the 'Use the free space on the Windows
partition', because the laptop has one IDE hard disk and I wanted
it to use a part of it for Linux (besides existing Windows 2000 Prof.
already installed). Windows' Disk Management reported:
<p>
<verb>
Disk 0 15 MB FAT (HP Diagnostics or like)
7.13 GB FAT32 (C: "HPNOTEBOOK")
20.80 GB Free space
</verb>
The two partitions (FAT & FAT32) were made during the installation
procedure using HP's supplied installation CD's.
At the first moment, Linux setup complained that my Windows partition
"was too fragmented" and required me to reboot under Windows, run
the "defrag" utility, then restart the Mandrake Linux installation.
The defragmentation process have taken cca. 1.5 hour to be completed!
When restarted the setup, it wanted to use 7.13 GB Windows partition,
instead of 20.80 GB. I chose to 'Use the free space'. Then it made partitions
for Linux: /dev/hda5 and /dev/hda7.
- for Vectra VL420 I used 'Custom disk partitioning' because there
I had two SCSI disks, one of them running Windows 2000 Server
already installed, and the other one I wanted to use entirely for a
Linux server. BTW, I wasn't sure what the option 'Erase entire disk'
would do during its next step (erase a whole disk or a partition?),
although it also may be the proper solution too. <em>DrakX</em>
recognized the two SCSI disks as <bf>sda</bf> and <bf>sdb</bf>
and I chose <bf>sdb</bf> to install Linux. The first step was to 'Clear
all' and after that to 'Auto allocate' the space on that second disk.
Finally, after a 'Done' it appeared to make /dev/sdb1 and /dev/sdb6
Linux partitions.
<sect1>What does LILO looks like on these HP products
<p>
<bf>HP Omnibook 6000</bf>
<p>
<verb>
boot=/dev/hda
map=/boot/map
vga=normal
default="windows"
keytable=/boot/us.klt
prompt
nowarn
timeout=100
message=/boot/message
menu-scheme=wb:bw:wb:bw
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="linux"
root=/dev/hda5
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="quiet devfs=mount acpi=off"
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="failsafe"
root=/dev/hda5
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="failsafe devfs=nomount acpi=off"
read-only
other=/dev/hda2 <--- /dev/hda1 seems to be reserved for some HP diags.
label="windows"
table=/dev/hda
other=/dev/fd0
label="floppy"
unsafe
</verb>
<p>
<bf>HP Vectra VL420 (installed as a desktop client Linux system)</bf>
<p>
<verb>
boot=/dev/hda
map=/boot/map
vga=normal
default="windows"
keytable=/boot/us.klt
prompt
nowarn
timeout=100
message=/boot/message
menu-scheme=wb:bw:wb:bw
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="linux"
root=/dev/hda5
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="quiet devfs=mount acpi=off"
vga=788 <--- that line is missing at laptop with LCD screen above.
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="linux-nonfb"
root=/dev/hda5
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="devfs=mount acpi=off"
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="failsafe"
root=/dev/hda5
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="failsafe devfs=nomount acpi=off"
read-only
other=/dev/hda1 <--- /dev/hda1 seems not to be reserved for HP diags here.
label="windows" There I have Windows 2000 Professional already
table=/dev/hda installed (probably without HP's supplied CD's).
other=/dev/hdb1 <--- that is the spare disk with Windows 2000 Server.
label="windows2" Actually I had some data on it and used it as a
table=/dev/hdb second, backup disk on that desktop workstation.
map-drive=0x80 I have never tried to boot the computer from it, but
to=0x81 Mandrake's setup offered it as a boot option.
map-drive=0x81 (And that was useful as a FTP server, needed to install
to=0x80 Mandrake Linux on the other box - without DVD drive too).
other=/dev/fd0
label="floppy"
unsafe
</verb>
<p>
<bf>HP Vectra VL420 (installed as a desktop Linux system with server features)</bf>
<p>
<verb>
boot=/dev/sda <--- /dev/sda is the first SCSI disk where LILO resides (MBR).
map=/boot/map
vga=normal
default="windows"
keytable=/boot/us.klt
prompt
nowarn
timeout=100
message=/boot/message
menu-scheme=wb:bw:wb:bw
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="linux"
root=/dev/sdb1 <--- /dev/sdb1 is the second SCSI disk where Linux resides.
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="quiet devfs=mount acpi=off"
vga=788
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="linux-nonfb"
root=/dev/sdb1
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="devfs=mount acpi=off"
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz-secure
label="linux-secure" <--- something related to the Linux server security?
root=/dev/sdb1
initrd=/boot/initrd-secure.img
append="quiet devfs=mount acpi=off"
read-only
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="failsafe"
root=/dev/sdb1
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="failsafe devfs=nomount acpi=off"
read-only
other=/dev/sda1 <--- /dev/sda1 is the first partition on the first SCSI disk where Windows resides.
label="windows"
table=/dev/sda
</verb>
<p>
<sect1>Conclusions
<p>
>From the examples above, you could see that I have been using
various computer forms with also various types of hard disk.
Somewhere there is only one IDE drive, somewhere else there are
two of them, otherwise there are a couple of SCSI drives etc. Regardless
of that, I always tried to put LILO into the MBR - located on the <em>first</em>
disk. Now it looks like that Linux finally managed to solve the old
<em>1024 cyl</em> problem. In fact, LILO seems to be capable to boot
Linux regardless it is placed close to the rest of Linux partitions or not.
<p>
There are some other considerations related to the experiment above,
but they are part of the other fine document:
<url url="http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Linux+WinNT.html"
name="Linux+WindowsNT"> mini-HOWTO.
<p>
<sect>Bibliography
<p>
2010-07-18
<em>Notice: I often participate in various (inter)national ICT
conferences in Serbia and abroad, presenting technical papers and
delivering half-day and full-day tutorials, covering basic ideas
and useful mission of the amateur radio hobby and its possible
usage in engineering education. What I have been doing is to spread
- as much as possible - the knowledge about existing open source
products, including Linux and amateur radio free software. Besides
that, I have been writing various articles for a variety of scientific
and other magazines. Here you have the list of those articles and
paper topics submitted to the conferences.</em>
<p>
In case you want to re-publish or forward my volunteer paper
works to some journals or other public media around, you are
free to contact me. Some of my papers are written in Serbian
Cyrillic, some of them are in English and some of them even
combined!
<p>
<tscreen><verb>
- "U prilog I.A.C.", MI (the youth scientists' organization
newspaper), No. 69, 1990.
- "U prilog I.A.C. (2)", MI (the youth scientists' organization
newspaper), No. 70, 1990.
- "Vise od radio-amaterskog hobija", Vojska, No. 163, 1995.
- "Korak ka zvezdama", Vojska, No. 200, 1996.
- "Die Gefahr von Innen - Internet gegen Amateurfunk",
AMSAT-DL Journal, No. 4, Dez./Feb. 96/97.
- "Kakva nam organizacija (ne) treba?", Radioamater,
Feb. 1997.
- "Kakva nam organizacija (ne) treba? (2)", Radioamater,
Apr./May. 1997.
- "Sateliti umiru padajuci", Vojska, No. 235, 1997.
- "The Internet is not the Enemy", QST, Aug. 1998.
- "Novi radio-amateri za novi vek", Antena, June 2000.
- "Racunarske komunikacije putem radio-veza i
zastita pristupa", Bezbednost, No. 3, 2000.
- "Paket-radio - Racunarske komunikacije putem radio-veza",
proceedings, "Info-Teh", Vrnjacka Banja, Serbia, 2001.
- "Racunarske komunikacije putem radio-amaterskih veza",
proceedings, "YU-Info", Kopaonik, Serbia, 2002.
- "Computer Communications over radio", presentation,
"Linux FEST", Belgrade, Serbia, 2002.
- "Paket-radio - Radio-amaterske digitalne veze",
proceedings, "Kongres JISA", Herceg Novi, Montenegro, 2002.
- "Paket-radio (2) - Modemi za radio-veze",
proceedings, "Info-Teh", Vrnjacka Banja, Serbia, 2002.
- "Alternativne racunarske mreze", festival catalog,
"INFOFEST", Budva, Montenegro, 2002.
- "Alternative computer networks", proceedings, "TELFOR",
Belgrade, Serbia, 2002.
- "With rule and regulation improvements to the progress"
proceedings, "TELFOR", Belgrade, Serbia, 2002.
- "Racunarske komunikacije putem radio-amaterskih veza (2)",
proceedings, "YU-Info", Kopaonik, Serbia, 2003.
- "Racunarske komunikacije putem radio-amaterskih veza (3)",
proceedings, "YU-Info", Kopaonik, Serbia, 2003.
- "Paket-radio (3) - Programske mogucnosti na strani servera",
proceedings, "Info-Teh", Vrnjacka Banja, Serbia, 2003.
- "Paket-radio (4) - Legal rules and regulations in the amateur
computer networks", proceedings, "Info-Teh", Vrnjacka Banja,
Serbia, 2003.
- "Packet-radio (2) - With rule and regulation improvements to the progress",
proceedings, "Kongres JISA", Herceg Novi, Montenegro, 2003.
- "Alternativne racunarske mreze (2)", festival catalog,
"INFOFEST", Budva, Montenegro, 2003.
- "Alternativne racunarske komunikacije putem radio-veza",
Info M, 6-7/2003.
- "Legal Rules and Regulations in the Amateur Radio Computer Networks",
proceedings, "22nd ARRL and TAPR Digital Communications Conference",
Hartford, CT USA, 2003.
- "Favoritism", IEEE Potentials, Oct/Nov 2003
- "Alternative computer networks (2)", proceedings, "TELFOR",
Belgrade, Serbia, 2003.
- "With rule and regulation improvements to the progress (2)"
proceedings, "TELFOR", Belgrade, Serbia, 2003.
- "XI Telekomunikacioni forum - TELFOR 2003", Info M, 8/2003.
- "Aktivnosti organizacije IEEE Computer Society - YU Chapter"
Info M, 8/2003.
- "Yugoslavia IEEE Student Branch", IEEE Region 8 News,
Vol. 7 No. 1, Feb/Mar 2004
- "Radio-amaterske racunarske mreze", tutorial, "Info-Teh",
Vrnjacka Banja, Serbia, 2004.
- "Radio-amaterske racunarske mreze", tutorial, "Kongres
JISA", Herceg Novi, Montenegro, 2004.
- "The Amateur Radio as a Learning Technology in
Developing Countries", proceedings, "ICALT/TEDC 2004",
Joensuu, Finland, 2004.
- "The Amateur Radio in Engineering Education", seminar,
"IEEE-EESTEC Technical Conference 2004", Arcavacata
di Rende (Cosenza), Italy, 2004.
- "The Conference Low-Down", IEEE Potentials, Feb/Mar 2005
- "ICALT 2004, IEEE Novi Sad SB, Serbia & Montenegro",
IEEE Region 8 News, Vol. 8 No. 1, Mar 2005
- "The Conference Low-Down", IEEE Potentials, Apr/May 2005
- "The Amateur Radio Networking And Computing", proceedings,
"PSU-UNS ICEE 2005", Novi Sad, Serbia, 2005
- "Radio-amaterske racunarske mreze", tutorial, "Info-Teh",
Vrnjacka Banja, Serbia, 2005 (intro: dr D. Surla, PMF)
- "Radio-veze", round table session, "Kongres JISA", Herceg
Novi, Montenegro, 2005.
- "The New Amateur Radio University Network - AMUNET",
proceedings, "9th WSEAS CSCC Multiconference",
Vouliagmeni, Athens, Greece, 2005.
- "The perspectives of the Amateur University Network -
AMUNET", WSEAS Transactions on Communications, Vol 4,
pp 834, Sep. 2005.
- "Conferences in Serbia and Montenegro", IEEE Region 8 News,
Vol. 8 No. 3, Sep 2005.
- "The Conference Low-Down", IEEE Potentials, Dec 2005
- "Divided We Fall", The Institute, IEEE, Dec 2005
- "University Networking Through the Amateur Radio Communications",
plenary lecture, "3rd WSEAS/IASME Int. Conf. on Engineering
Education", Vouliagmeni, Athens, Greece, 2006.
- "The New Amateur Radio University Network - AMUNET (Part 2)",
proceedings, "10th WSEAS CSCC Multiconference",
Vouliagmeni, Athens, Greece, 2006.
- "University Networking Through the Amateur Radio Communications",
tutorial, "10th WSEAS CSCC Multiconference",
Vouliagmeni, Athens, Greece, 2006.
- "Education in Peril", The Institute, IEEE, Sep 2006
- "The Conference Low-Down", IEEE Potentials, Dec 2006
- "Amateur Radio in Engineering Education", tutorial, "Info-Teh",
Vrnjacka Banja, Serbia, 2007.
- "Paket-radio (5) - Programske mogucnosti na strani klijenta",
proceedings, "Info-Teh", Vrnjacka Banja, Serbia, 2007.
- "Summer Schools on the Amateur Radio Computing", proceedings,
"12th Annual Conference on Innovation & Technology in Computer
Science Education", ACM ITiCSE 2007, Dundee, Scotland, 2007.
- "Amateur Radio in Engineering Education", tutorial, "EUROCON",
Warsaw, Poland, 2007.
- "Bringing New Life in Old Computers", proceedings, "26th ARRL
and TAPR Digital Communications Conference", Hartford, CT USA,
2007.
- "The Conference Low-Down", IEEE Potentials, Sep/Oct 2007
- "My trip to Eurocon - a member's view", IEEE Region 8 News,
Vol. 10 No. 3, Dec 2007.
- "Amateur Radio in Engineering Education", tutorial, "Info-Teh",
Vrnjacka Banja, Serbia, 2008.
- "Paket-radio (6) - Privatnost podataka i zastita ucesnika u
radio-amaterskim mrezama", proceedings, "Info-Teh", Vrnjacka
Banja, Serbia, 2008.
- "Amateur Radio in Engineering Education",
tutorial, "5th WSEAS/IASME Int. Conf. on Engineering
Education", Heraklion, Crete, Greece, 2008.
- "The New Amateur Radio University Network - AMUNET (Part 3)",
proceedings, "12th WSEAS CSCC Multiconference",
Heraklion, Crete, Greece, 2008.
- "Amateur Radio Telecommunications and Networking in Education",
tutorial, "IARIA ICWMC 2008", Vouliagmeni, Athens, Greece, 2008.
- "The Conference Low-Down", IEEE Potentials, Sep/Oct 2008
- "Amateur Radio in Engineering Education", workshop,
"TELFOR", Belgrade, Serbia, 2008.
- "Amateur Radio: More than a hobby!", tutorial,
"IAENG IMECS 2009", Hong Kong, China, 2009.
- "Wasted Gear", IEEE Computer, Feb 2009
- "Amateur Radio: More than a hobby!", tutorial,
"6th WSEAS/IASME Int. Conf. on Engineering Education",
Rodos, Greece, 2009.
- "The New Amateur Radio University Network - AMUNET (Part 4)",
proceedings, "13th WSEAS CSCC Multiconference",
Rodos, Greece, 2009.
- "Amateur Radio in Education", book chapter in "Handbook of
Research on Human Performance and Instructional Technology",
ISBN: 978-1-60566-782-9, October 2009
- "Surveillance as a service", IEEE Computer, Dec 2009
- "Amateur Radio: More than a hobby!", tutorial, IEEE
"ICACT 2010", Phoenix Park, Korea, 2010.
- "Amateur Radio: More than a hobby!", tutorial, DIRF
"NDT 2010", Prague, Czech Republic, 2010.
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
Besides the published articles and presented works, I am also a member
of the following associations: IEEE Computer Society, IEEE Communications
Society, WSEAS and ACM. In addition, I work on establishing an academic
computer network that would use the amateur radio stations as the media.
Some kinds of proposed networks exist elsewhere on this planet and I
invite their administrators to contact me in order to cooperate.
<sect>Further Information
<p>
<sect1>Copyright
<p>
Copyright (c) 2000-2010 by Miroslav "Misko" Skoric, YT7MPB.
<p>
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or
any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no
Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover
Texts. A copy of the license is available from
<url url="http://www.fsf.org/licenses/fdl.html">.
<sect1>Disclaimer
<p>
Use the information in this document at your own
risk. I disavow any potential liability of this
document. Use of the concepts, examples, and/or
other content of this document is entirely at
your own risk.
All copyrights are owned by their owners, unless
specifically noted otherwise. Use of a term in
this document should not be regarded as
affecting the validity of any trademark or service
mark.
Naming of particular products or brands should not
be seen as endorsements.
You are strongly recommended to take a backup of
your system before major installation and backups
at regular intervals.
<sect1>News
<p>
In addition to the Lilo docs, there are a number
of mini-howto's that can be useful for your needs.
All of them are called ``Linux+<em/foobar-OS/'', for
some <em/foobar-OS/, they deal with coexistence of
Linux and other operating system(s). For example,
"NT OS Loader + Linux mini-HOWTO" by Bernd Reichert,
describes how to add an entry for Linux under existing
Windows NT Loader's menu. Next, you have
<url url="http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Linux+WinNT.html"
name="Linux+WindowsNT"> mini-HOWTO written by myself,
covering how to add an entry for NT
under existing Linux Lilo menu (more detailed than here).
Also, "Multiboot-with-LILO" describes how the various
Windows flavors can be made to coexist with Linux.
<em>This mini-HOWTO would be improved from time
to time. If you think that the HOWTO on your
Linux installation CD is some out-of-date, you
may check for newest release on the Internet. It
could be found within the main <url
url="http://www.tldp.org/"
name="Linux Documentation Project"> or some of its
mirrors.
</em>
<sect1>Credits
<p>
<em>This version of mini-HOWTO can thanks to:</em>
<tscreen><verb>
Cameron Spitzer (cls@truffula.sj.ca.us)
Alessandro Rubini (rubini@linux.it)
Tony Harris (tony@nmr.mgh.harvard.edu)
Marc Tanguy (mtanguy@ens.uvsq.fr)
Dragomir Kalaba, a local Linux 'guru'
</verb></tscreen>
Any comments or suggestions can be mailed to my
email address:
skoric at eunet dot rs
<sect1>HOWTO
<p>
<nidx>disk!information resources!HOWTOs</nidx>
These are intended as the primary starting points to
get the background information as well as show you how to solve
a specific problem.
Some relevant HOWTOs are <tt/Bootdisk/, <tt/Installation/, <tt/SCSI/ and <tt/UMSDOS/.
The main site for these is the
<url url="http://metalab.unc.edu/LDP/"
name="LDP archive">
at Metalab (formerly known as Sunsite).
<sect1>Mini-HOWTO
<p>
<nidx>disk!information resources!mini-HOWTOs</nidx>
These are the smaller free text relatives to the HOWTOs.
Some relevant mini-HOWTOs are
<tt/Backup-With-MSDOS/, <tt/Diskless/, <tt/LILO/, <tt/Large Disk/,
<tt/Linux+DOS+Win95+OS2/, <tt/Linux+OS2+DOS/, <tt/Linux+Win95/,
<tt/Linux+WindowsNT/, <tt/Linux+NT-Loader/, <tt/NFS-Root/,
<tt/Win95+Win+Linux/, <tt/ZIP Drive/, <tt/FBB packet-radio BBS/.
You can find these at the same place as the HOWTOs, usually in a sub directory
called <tt/mini/. Note that these are scheduled to be converted into SGML and
become proper HOWTOs in the near future.
<sect1>Local Resources
<p>
<nidx>disk!information resources!local</nidx>
In most distributions of Linux there is a document directory installed,
have a look in the
<htmlurl url="file:///usr/doc"
name="/usr/doc"> directory.
where most packages store their main documentation and README files etc.
Also you will here find the HOWTO archive (
<htmlurl url="file:///usr/doc/HOWTO"
name="/usr/doc/HOWTO">)
of ready formatted HOWTOs
and also the mini-HOWTO archive (
<url url="file:///usr/doc/HOWTO/mini"
name="/usr/doc/HOWTO/mini">)
of plain text documents.
Many of the configuration files mentioned earlier can be found in the
<htmlurl url="file:///etc"
name="/etc">
directory. In particular you will want to work with the
<htmlurl url="file:///etc/fstab"
name="/etc/fstab">
file that sets up the mounting of partitions
and possibly also
<htmlurl url="file:///etc/mdtab"
name="/etc/mdtab">
file that is used for the <tt/md/ system to set up RAID.
The kernel source in
<url url="file:///usr/src/linux"
name="/usr/src/linux">
is, of course, the ultimate documentation. In other
words, <em>use the source, Luke</em>.
It should also be pointed out that the kernel comes not only with
source code which is even commented (well, partially at least)
but also an informative
<url url="file:///usr/src/linux/Documentation"
name="documentation directory">.
If you are about to ask any questions about the kernel you should
read this first, it will save you and many others a lot of time
and possibly embarrassment.
Also have a look in your system log file (
<htmlurl url="file:///var/log/messages"
name="/var/log/messages">)
to see what is going on and in particular how the booting went if
too much scrolled off your screen. Using <tt>tail -f /var/log/messages</tt>
in a separate window or screen will give you a continuous update of what is
going on in your system.
You can also take advantage of the
<htmlurl url="file:///proc"
name="/proc">
file system that is a window into the inner workings of your system.
Use <tt/cat/ rather than <tt/more/ to view the files as they are
reported as being zero length. Reports are that <tt/less/ works well here.
<sect1>Web Pages
<p>
<nidx>disk!information resources!WWW</nidx>
<nidx>disk!information resources!web pages</nidx>
There is a huge number of informative web pages out there and by their very
nature they change quickly so don't be too surprised if these links become
quickly outdated.
A good starting point is of course the
<url url="http://www.linuxdoc.org/" name="Linux Documentation Project">
home page, or this one: <url url="http://www.tldp.org/" name="Linux
Documentation Project">, an information central for documentation, project
pages and much, much more.
Please let me know if you have any other leads that can be of interest.
<sect>Getting help
<p>
<nidx>(your index root)!assistance, obtaining</nidx>
In the end you might find yourself unable to solve your problems and need
help from someone else. The most efficient way is either to ask someone
local or in your nearest Linux user group, search the web for the nearest
one.
Another possibility is to ask on Usenet News in one of the many, many
newsgroups available. The problem is that these have such a high
volume and noise (called low signal-to-noise ratio) that your question
can easily fall through unanswered.
No matter where you ask it is important to ask well or you will not be
taken seriously. Saying just <it/my disk does not work/ is not going
to help you and instead the noise level is increased even further and if
you are lucky someone will ask you to clarify.
Instead describe your problems in some detail that
will enable people to help you. The problem could lie somewhere you did
not expect. Therefore you are advised to list up the following information
on your system:
<descrip>
<tag/Hardware/
<itemize>
<item>Processor
<item>DMA
<item>IRQ
<item>Chip set (LX, BX etc)
<item>Bus (ISA, VESA, PCI etc)
<item>Expansion cards used (Disk controllers, video, IO etc)
</itemize>
<tag/Software/
<itemize>
<item>BIOS (On motherboard and possibly SCSI host adapters)
<item>LILO, if used
<item>Linux kernel version as well as possible modifications and patches
<item>Kernel parameters, if any
<item>Software that shows the error (with version number or date)
</itemize>
<tag/Peripherals/
<itemize>
<item>Type of disk drives with manufacturer name, version and type
<item>Other relevant peripherals connected to the same busses
</itemize>
</descrip>
Remember that booting text is logged to <tt>/var/log/messages</tt> which can
answer most of the questions above. Obviously if the drives fail you might not
be able to get the log saved to disk but you can at least scroll back up the
screen using the <tt/SHIFT/ and <tt/PAGE UP/ keys. It may also be useful to
include part of this in your request for help but do not go overboard, keep
it <em/brief/ as a complete log file dumped to Usenet News is more than a
little annoying.
</article>