It got me thinking that if we slowly started a project to create SCSI Device Copies of freshly installed UNIX or LINUX systems on 68k Macs it would be a cinch to help people install it.

First, the project would get folks to setup Stock machines with no extra parts etc., so that it would match a basic configuration. Then after the system is setup and ready, then the hard disk would be taken to another machine running Toast 3 and it would do a direct scsi copy to a toast image.

We would then have to figure out how to write that direct scsi copy to a hard disk. (The idea being a person downloads it, and iether copies the image or a CD of it directly back to a SCSI disk which is then placed in thetarget Mac and booted.)

Any ideas on this? This could potentially make installing *NIX on a 68k a whole tonne easier!

Doesn't the linux Kernel compile its self for the exact machine it was installed on?
If so… that could be kinda a big hurdle…

For example, Linux would be installed with no extra options, standard RAM and a specific HD size.

No peripherals could be installed like extra non-standard mice or ethernet cards beyond what the machine has onboard.

unless I dont quite understand what you are talking about…

BTW, I believe that we've had a cool ol' unix install one CD does it all discussion before, and it got quite far, but at that time, none of us knew too much about UNIX, and many of us knew even less about making a distribution on CD.

So for a public project, it would be a violation of Apple's license and Apple would stomp the project if Apple's binaries were included. Binaries for 7.5.3 are provided for personal use, not for redistribution, one reason why many of the old user groups are no longer allowed to offer Mac OS System Software for download because Apple sent them letters demanding thus. It would be no different with this project.

I think I might draft a letter or something for that tonight...

I still haven't drafted that thing to APple, (probably an eMail)...

eMail me cory5412@ureach.com, and remind me to. I bet we'd be able to make it happen.

It would take a lot of work, hacking and so called "illegal" reverse engineering to make Linux boot straight from the disk without Mac OS. But in any case, a HFS partition is required because the ToolBox has no other options. (Unless someone were to patch the ROMS and burn thier own modified chips, which is interesting but perhaps risky considering tyhe technical know-how that's required, not to mention the old ROMS have to be removed and new ones re-soldered.)

As regards user groups, to this date most usergroups I have been to don't have mac OS for download.

Read http://mac512.com/ssdl.htm Cory...Apple sent letters asking them to stop offering files for downloads. And they are a registered User Group.

As for asking Apple, I'm sure it's worth a shot. Worst is they say no. :)

And I just took 45 seconds to confirm what I already knew about bootable CDs for the Mac: They have a partition map at the front with a driver partition. That is more than enough leeway to persuade the system to load a kernel from an ISO9660 filesystem instead of the System file from an HFS filesystem.

Yes, it would be a lot of work. But quite a bit of the work has already been done.

Oh well, if you guys won't go for it, I'll float the technically simpler idea of doing it for NetBSD instead of Linux to the NetBSD team in a couple months...

Because I HAVE read on apple's site, that if you tell them what you're offering, and get permission, it is legal, and they will let you.

NetBSD is not very picky about the machine, which is to say that you can move an installation from an SE/30 to a Q950 without a hiccup. (Though you may have to change a couple of settings in the booter if the SCSI ID of the drive has changed.) Linux should be the same.

Making a bit-for-bit copy from within Unix is dead simple: use dd. Just ensure that the source partition(s) are mounted read only and the destination is on another drive. You may also want to zero the drive (again, use dd) prior to installing the system since that would give you better compression for the drive image -- so several configurations can be shipped on one CD. So how would you restore the image without having Unix first: use SunTar. IIRC, it will write to raw devices from within Mac OS, it is small enough to fit on a floppy, and it doesn't require any special extensions. (Anybody know how to replace the Finder with SunTar so that we can fit everything onto a single bootable floppy?)

The Mac OS bit is easy to deal with: create a bootable system then strip out anything owned by Apple. The user would simply reinstall Mac OS after writing the image to disk. This isn't a problem since a basic System Folder would include the System file, Finder, the booter (in the Startup Items folder), and the booter preferences files -- we would only have to remove two files. Granted, to do it properly we would need to use a utility which wipes the data too.

The real issue is the hard drive: it will be a different size on each machine. Now suntar won't care if the image being written is smaller than the drive. Will Mac OS care under similar circumstances? If it doesn't, we have a bootable machine. I doubt that Unix would care either, so we would have a working machine with some lost disk space. Is that disk space recoverable? Perhaps it would be under Unix, but I doubt that you could use it under Mac OS. Under ideal circumstances, we would have to decide how large the drive image should be to suit the needs of most people.

Finally, it wouldn't be worth doing this for a basic installation -- that is easy enough to do on your own. If it isn't easy enough to do on your own, then it is because the instructions are poorly written. If the instructions are poorly written, then I would suggest changing the instructions rather than creating pre-installed CDs.

quote:

---

*all* of MacOS, and the boot rom inside the computer, are owned by Apple.

---

The System file, (which you'd still need, even if you replaced the finder), for example, is "owned by apple"

a way around this, is to make someone download the discs from apple on their own, and then make our own disc available, that has our 'installer' and the non-apple utilities.

Method 1:
download the 7.5.x installer set from apple, and install a minimal system onto a 40mb partition, or seperate hard drive.

Download our "BSDInstalloMattic" disc, and run the program on your computer.

Enjoy NetBSD
End Method 1.

What you want to do, is possible, even if apple won't let you distribute a modified version of their OS.

Another thing you could try, is distributing a disc with just a system file, and a program you made on your own (a compiled HyperCard stack, for example)

68k Macintosh Liberation Army Forums

© 2001-2003 68kMLA