From: alawrenc@sobeco.com (a.lawrence)
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux
Subject: Re: Two suggestions .. comments welcome, please!
Date: 13 Sep 92 01:47:59 GMT
Reply-To: alawrenc@sobeco.com
Distribution: comp.os.linux
Organization: Lawrence & Assc.

As a "newbie" (a little over two weeks) to Linux and a relative newcomer
to the Unix world, but also a computer profession with over 25 years
in this field, I decided to make a few comments to this post and all
others that say "Someone should do this but I don't have ....".  
Sorry if its long, but I think my comments are worth while.

In <KFOGEL.92Sep8192936@edvac.cs.oberlin.edu> kfogel@edvac.cs.oberlin.edu (Karl Fogel) writes:

>I had a couple of thoughts. I may not have any more for a while
>because those about burned me out, so here they are:

>	It would be a great help to those of use who don't have a disk
>editor for someone to upload pre-edited bootimages to the directories
>that now normally hold bootimages and/or rootimages.  We'd need four

I really don't think this is necessary or adviseable.  Having extra
boot images around:

	a) makes the first installation more complicated
	b) creates that much more information to transmit and store

What we need is a very simple image editor that will make the appropriate
changes.  Amazingly enough, when I decide to try to install Linux about
2 weeks ago, one of the first things I found in the installation files
was a program called pboot which does exactly that.  Now the documentation
is not very good (there  isn't any) and the warning about entering hex
codes in the install notes is a bit confusing, but the program works as
advertised very well.  You might consider writing some documentation for
it ( about 500 would do it, anything more is overkill), or perhaps modifing
modifying the source code so that the user replied to questions like
"Which disk (a  or b)" and "Which partition (1-10)" etc.


>nice, with a section on what exactly it entails, why it's useful, and
>some common problems encountered in doing so. This is also a project
>that I guess I'm asking someone else to do, since I don't have the 
>necessary experience -- although I'd be more than glad to help in any
>way I can. 
>	Comments? 

There is a very good document on kernel compiles in the kernel source
directory on tsx-11 ("README.kernels_srcs" in /pub/lunix/sources/system)
which has everything you want.

From my very limited experience, the people who have put this system
together, from Linus on down, have done an excellent job.  With the
tumber of people contributing to this system numbering the hundreds
the organization of the archive sites is a testmony to the hard work
of the people who maintain them.  Yes, they can be confusing and 
sometimes it is difficult to know just what to look for to meet a
certain need, but everything is there and reasonably well classified.
As a professional project manager, I have seen projects with just
10 programmers in one room where the state of affairs was much more
confusing.

For the Linux system to have advanced to the point it is at in less
than 2 years is amazing, atleast to me :-).  Just looking at it,
the features it has, and the variety of hardware and software it
supports shows how much hardwork has been put into the system
by hundreds of people.  Like everyone else, I have thoughts of
"gee, I wish they would do this" or "if someone else did that"
but with a little research and patience, I usually find that it
has already been done.  If something seems missing, I just have to
look a little harder.

I know I definately want to become part of the development of this
system and I have my own pet ideas that I beleive warrant attention.
But today I'm still at the stage of getting a complete system up and
running and don't have time to do those things, so I'll just leave
them as entries in my log to look at later.  When I'm ready, when 
the full system is running properly, and when I have a little
more experience and knowledge then I will be posting messages saying
"I think Linux needs ...., who would like to help me do it!"

 

-- 
If any given program runs correctly, it is obsolete.
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Andrew Lawrence, Informaticien Conseil           |  alawrenc@sobeco.com
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