Using initrd to install and maintain lan clients.

[Mike Coburn <mcoburn@gasboy.com>]

My mknbi-linux invocation looks like:
mknbi-linux -x -a ramdisk_size=16384  -d /dev/hda1 -r ramImage.gz -k
zImage -o /tftpboot/bootImage

The audit trail of this invocation looks like:
Kernel image file name  = zImage
Output file name        = /tftpboot/bootImage
Ramdisk image file name = ramImage.gz
Kernel command line     =  "auto rw root=/dev/hda1 nfsroot=kernel
nfsaddrs=kernel ramdisk_size=16384"

The ramImage.gz is a Red Hat rescue disk which I modified and to insert
a /linuxrc to prep my local disk and load software on it
using rsync.

This all works fine and so I made the roms and I find that it does not
work like I wanted:

If the machine is not connected to the network the rom loader never
gives up so that the bios can load from hard disk.  Have I done
something real stupid in using this 3c905b.lzrom stuff?  Should I be
putting more stuff into the rom?  Or is this all there is?

I can make-do by continueing to use the floppy but I don't really want
that.  All systems on the net should first check with the server and
insure that their local OS is in sync.  The systems are sometimes
carried home.

Advice please....  I've spent a lot of time on this thing and I hope
there is a reasonably painless solution.


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