(2-in-1 reply.) Ansgar <ans...@43-1.org> (2023-05-19): > On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 20:57 +0200, Bjørn Mork wrote: > > Hmm. I find the netboot installer archives very useful for rescue > > purposes. This sometimes involves PC hardware too old for amd64. I > > PXE booted a 20+ year old laptop with no DVD/CD drive (Compaq Evo > > N410c - CD drive was part of the optional docking station) using a > > bullseye netboot.tar not long ago.
If you're concerned about the impact of no longer producing installation images for this use case, you shouldn't. Building netinst, CD, DVD, BD, etc. images happens via debian-cd, using artifacts produced by a src:debian-installer build, which are stored under installer-<ARCH>/ directories in the archive. Those wouldn't go away in this scenario. http://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/bookworm/main/installer-i386/ If you're thinking about debian-installer-<N>-netboot-i386 binaries, that would be the exact same story, since those are built by packing the contents of those directories. > You can keep using the bullseye netboot.tar for the next 20+ years to > rescue boot an ancient system, copy the data off of it, and then > responsibly dispose the system. If the system to be rescued is older than the netboot being considered, that should be possible. If it's newer, that might not be possible. See what happened when we moved from LUKS to LUKS2: an older d-i couldn't rescue a newer system because it just didn't know about the new format. Cheers, -- Cyril Brulebois (k...@debian.org) <https://debamax.com/> D-I release manager -- Release team member -- Freelance Consultant
signature.asc
Description: PGP signature
