Hi guys, (sorry about the long mail...)
> During the discussion of version 1.2, this was my interpretation of > how this should be handled and what was implemented when the > user installed FreeDOS in normal mode. Having a failed install (by > not booting into FreeDOS) was unacceptable behavior. Therefore, > the installer would normally backup and then over-write the boot... Well, as mentioned several times in the 1.2 discussion, losing all your data is even more unacceptable, so there should be a choice ;-) On dedicated harddisks or virtual computer images, which optionally could be auto-detected by the installer, it is of course nice to do automatic "rude" installs which makes sure that DOS boots afterwards. But the user should have the choice between "rude" install, "no" install at all (simply use "live" DOS as booted from USB stick) and as 3rd choice "manual" install, where the user has to do the partitioning and formatting by hand before running the installer which limits itself to install DOS to any user-chosen directory, even asking whether SYS should be run and whether config/autoexec should be overwritten or just prepared under another name :-) > code during installation. This action can be overridden if advanced > mode is used during the install. There were many pros and cons > to this being the default action. > > The installer will not destroy partitions... As long as the installer makes it clear that you have a CHOICE, as long as that choice is not what happens by default when you just press Y or enter, this is already quite reasonable :-) As you see, people ARE scared that the install can delete data. > * The installer checks if there is a drive C: visible to FreeDOS. > If does not find one, and that drive is blank it will use fdisk to > automatically partition the drive in "smart" mode. Otherwise, if > there are partitions existing on the drive, or it cannot figure > out what should be partitioned, or if it is in “dumb" mode. It > will launch fdisk and let the user deal with it. How does it decide about the "blank" aspect? > * Installer checks if drive C: can be read by FreeDOS. If not, > it will format it. It should NOT do that by default if you ask me. It should rather say something like "There is a C: but it does not work for DOS. If you just made the partition for DOS, you can press F now to let me format C: Otherwise, please leave the installer and take care to make C: accessible for DOS, in any way that seems good." (the above example deliberately uses "F" instead of "Y" to make sure that people have to think before they just press "agree") > * The installer transfers the system files and overwrites the > boot code. That, too, might want to ask the user first... > Advanced mode, provides these capabilities: > * never auto-partition > * option of long-slow formatting. > * installing to drives other than C: (configured as C: for booting) > * not transferring the system boot files > * not over-writting the boot code. > * lots of other stuff. That is nice but I wonder if it is necessary in that style: Advanced mode could also let the user do the partition and format step and offer the easier-to-implement second half of the install only: Install to user-selectable directory, then invite user to optionally add SYS files / boot sector. I am aware that this is a rather controversial topic :-) For easy improvement, maybe the installer could initially say something like "if this is a dedicated DOS PC, maybe virtual, select easy install now. If you have other data on the PC, please select advanced manual installation..." The rest of the installer can probably stay as it is :-) > The FreeDOS 1.2 Preview releases contain several boot images. > sudo dd if=FILENAME.IMG of=/dev/USBDEVICE That is okay for Linux users, but those probably would use GPARTED for the partition and format step anyway ;-) Many Windows users might prefer something simpler, like DOSBOX. Also because of the nice "old sound card" simulations :-) Or of course some tool or howto for making it REALLY easy to make a bootable USB stick which can be used without the need to install DOS to any harddisk? Cheers, Eric ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ What NetFlow Analyzer can do for you? Monitors network bandwidth and traffic patterns at an interface-level. Reveals which users, apps, and protocols are consuming the most bandwidth. Provides multi-vendor support for NetFlow, J-Flow, sFlow and other flows. Make informed decisions using capacity planning reports. http://sdm.link/zohomanageengine _______________________________________________ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
