Re: While of on the subject of ideas for programs.

["Hung(2) Chao(2)-Kuei(4)" <ckhung@cyut.edu.tw>]

> Also, on the subject of installing from CD-ROM, would actually copying
the
> filesystem from the CD be an option?  Or, can an image be transferred to
> the HD? Once the system has been transferred a script could be run to do
If all the old computers you get have almost identical hardware
component, something similar to your proposal have been done.
I have asked my student to carried out the following with success:
1. Suppose we want to (re)install Linux on /dev/hda1
2. Install lilo so that it defaults to /dev/hda1 but can optionally
   boot to /dev/hda2. (See 3)
3. Put /dev/hda1's compressed image file (say image.gz) on cdrom,
   say /dev/hdc.
4. Make room (say 20MB. I didn't know muLinux at that time,
   otherwise 2MB would work) on /dev/hda2 for a tiny version
   of Linux whose sole purpose is to (re)install /dev/hda1.
5. In the /dev/hda2 installation, add the following lines to
   /etc/rc.d/rc.local or somewhere:
        mount -t iso9660 /dev/hdc /mnt/cdrom
        gunzip < /mnt/cdrom/image.gz > /dev/hda1
        reboot
   so that it (re)installs /dev/hda1 and reboots to give control
   back to /dev/hda1 immediately (because the way lilo was configured).

The above setting was originally designed for the constant-crashing
Windows (/dev/hda1 being the Windows partition, and image.gz actually
a Windows image) and didn't take malicious users into account. For your
app, /dev/hda2 above can be replace with a bootable CD ROM and the image
file can be stored on the CD ROM itself. Network config tweaking surely
needs be done -- in the rc file for example.

> Just for infomational purposes, most of my donations come with 8 MB of
RAM.
> I'll also assume that most other schools get them this way too. There
has
> to be a way to slim down XWindows or some alternative GUI to work???
Pardon
I've heard of Mgr being a small alternative to X but that's all that I
know.

Chao-Kuei