etherboot/netboot problems with Linux kernel 2.4.7

[James Pearson <james-p@moving-picture.com>]

I've been using etherboot/netboot to boot diskless Linux machines using
various kernels (2.2.5 -> 2.4.2) using bootp. I recently wanted to use a
2.4.7 kernel - so I set things up in exactly the same way as I've done
many times before, but when the kernel boots it stops with the error:

Root-NFS: No NFS server available, giving up.

Having searched around on the Net, I've found out that the ipconfig code
for bootp/dhcp has changed in kernels greater than about 2.4.4, meaning
that you have to use "ip=bootp" or similar as a kernel boot command line
option to enable the kernel to get what it needs via bootp (in this
case). In fact, just using "ip=" seems to work as well.

Personally, I think it's rather strange that you have to give this
argument even if you've already configured the kernel to get IP
addresses via bootp/dhcp ...

There was a discussion on linux-kernel mail list about this available
via:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&safe=off&th=d8413f907bcda8d7&seekm=linux.kernel.15103.18845.562418.245774%40pizda.ninka.net#link10

which includes a patch from  H.J. Lu that I'm using to work round this
"problem"

James Pearson
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