NAME
dosboot —
boot NetBSD/x86 from
DOS
SYNOPSIS
dosboot |
[-u]
[-c
command]
[-i]
[path
[-adqsv]] |
DESCRIPTION
dosboot is an MS-DOS program. It is a boot loader for
NetBSD/x86 designed to permit
NetBSD to be booted directly from MS-DOS. By default,
it boots a file with name
NETBSD in the current MS-DOS
directory.
dosboot shares common code with the standard boot
loader,
x86/boot(8).
The recognized options are:
-
-
- -c
- Execute command (see below).
-
-
- -i
- Enter interactive mode. dosboot will
present a prompt, allowing input of commands (see below).
-
-
- -u
- Boot from a UFS file system instead of an MS-DOS file
system.
-
-
- path
- Specifies the kernel file. In MS-DOS mode (default) a
normal MS-DOS filename (with or without drive specification) is accepted.
In UFS mode (after -u or after a mode
ufs command), a path in a NetBSD file system
is expected. By default, the file is looked up in partition
‘a’ of the first hard disk. Another device or partition can be
specified by prepending a block device name in terms of
NetBSD, followed by a colon (see
x86/boot(8) and
examples).
-
-
- -adqsv
- Flags passed to the kernel, see
x86/boot(8).
The commands accepted after the
-c flag or in interactive mode
are:
-
-
- boot
[device:][filename]
[-1234abcdmqsvxz]
- Boot NetBSD. See
boot in
x86/boot(8) for full
details.
-
-
- dev
[device]
- Set the default device and partition for subsequent file
system operations. Without an operand, print the current setting. This
setting doesn't apply to MS-DOS mode.
-
-
- help
- Print an overview about commands and arguments.
-
-
- ls
[path]
- Print a directory listing of path,
containing inode number, filename and file type. This command works in UFS
mode only. path can contain a device specification.
-
-
- mode
fstype
- Switch file system type; fstype
should be one of dos or
ufs.
-
-
- quit
- Leave the dosboot program and exit to
MS-DOS.
dosboot is also installed in the
release(7) hierarchy, under
installation/misc/dosboot.com.
FILES
/usr/mdec/dosboot.com
EXAMPLES
To boot a
NetBSD kernel located on MS-DOS drive D, one
would issue:
To boot from a
NetBSD floppy into single user mode, type
e.g.:
dosboot -u fd0a:netbsd -s
SEE ALSO
release(7),
x86/boot(8)
HISTORY
The
NetBSD/x86
dosboot command first
appeared in
NetBSD 1.3.
BUGS
dosboot assumes that the processor is in real mode at startup.
It does not work well in the presence of MS-DOS extenders and memory managers.
dosboot does not run directly under Windows 95.
In UFS mode, files can only be loaded from devices known to the BIOS. The device
names do not necessarily comply with the names later used by the booted
NetBSD kernel.
In MS-DOS mode, no useful boot device specification is passed to
NetBSD. It is necessary to have the root device
hardwired into the kernel configuration or to enter it manually.