Posted-Date: Thu, 15 Nov 2001 01:09:53 GMT
Date: Thu, 15 Nov 2001 01:09:53 +0000 (GMT)
From: Riley Williams <rhw@MemAlpha.cx>
Reply-To: Riley Williams <rhw@MemAlpha.cx>
To: CaT <cat@zip.com.au>
cc: Pascal Schmidt <pleasure.and.pain@web.de>, H Peter Anvin <hpa@zytor.com>,
        Linux Kernel <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: fdutils.
In-Reply-To: <20011115115113.E650@zip.com.au>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.21.0111150059090.3058-100000@Consulate.UFP.CX>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org

Hi CaT.

>> We're trying to include both.

> Not really. You're trying to find excuses for adding limitations.

Show me where? The person I originally replied to was implying that we
should ignore people with more than one CD drive, and in reply I said
that such was not acceptable.

My situation lets me fall into BOTH camps of this argument:

 1. At home, I have both a DVD drive and a CD-RW in my main computer,
    and the other computers are all connected to it over a network.

 2. For me, "At work" means in my customer's premises, and I often
    find myself having to sort out scrambled Linux systems on just
    about any hardware combination you care to name.

In the latter category, I've gone all the way from demangling a 386sx/25
with 6M of RAM running Red Hat 4.2 and supposedly set up as a network
print server to demangling a quad P4 with 1G of RAM basically running
Red Hat 7.0 and acting as a stand-alone CAD workstation.

> (lots of snipping of the points below)

>>  1. Insist that those using the rescue CD have two CD drives.
>>  2. Prohibit access to the CD drive for anything other than the
>>     rescue CD.
>>  3. Copy the contents of the CD into a ramdisk, then run from
>>     the ramdisk.
>>  4. Provide a "Virtual CD Drive" on single CD drive systems
>> 
>> Have I missed anything?

>   5. Let's not put in artificial limitations on what people can
>      and can't do with their hardware.

Precicely my point in making the original post.

> Let them use floppy disks if they want to. Let them use CDs if they
> want to. Let them use 2+ CDs if they want to. Let them use DVDs if
> they want to. Let them use Zip disks, LS-120 disks etc if they want
> to so long as they are supportable.

> If we can support it, we should.

Precicely.

> After all, the main reason *I* use linux is that it lets me do what
> I want to. And I want to use floppy disks for my rescue needs. If
> and when I need more I'll move on but the floppy disk is a common
> denominator across millions of PCs. Far more then any other
> removable storage system I'd say (of course I have no figures to
> back that up - just common sense).

My main reason for using Linux is simply that it's stable on just about
any hardware I throw it at, but the points you make aren't far behind.

Best wishes from Riley.

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