GRUB question

[Valdis.Kletnieks at vt.edu]

On Mon, 28 Jan 2013 06:10:36 +0800, horseriver said:
> On Mon, Jan 28, 2013 at 12:05:35PM +0530, Mandeep Sandhu wrote:
> > On Mon, Jan 28, 2013 at 2:07 AM, horseriver <horserivers at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > hi:)
> > >
> > >   Is /boot/initrd.img a root filesystem? what is the filetype of it?
> >
> > Yes, it's a rootfs with minimal stuff needed for booting a workable
> > system. why does this matter. doing 'file /boot/initrd.img....' on my
> > system shows its a gzip compressed file.
> >
> > >
> > >   Can I put initrd.img in a floppy to boot system ?
> >
> > I think you can. Provided you have the floppy driver compiled into your kernel.

And assuming the initrd fits on a floppy (which is actually unlikely - even
without any kernel modules on it, the initrd to get LVM launched comes in
at around 8M.  A default Fedora initramfs is closer to 20M.  Good luck fitting
that on a floppy :)

Of course, an initrd on floppy is kind of silly, because you still need to
find someplace else to fit the actual kernel - which hasn't fit on a floppy
for quite some time.

>   Thanks!
>
>   Does this /boot/initrd.img file come out when building kernel ?
>   how to build it?

Your system should have either 'mkinitrd' or 'dracut' to build the
initrd image. Some older systems will have 'mkinitramfs'.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 865 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://lists.kernelnewbies.org/pipermail/kernelnewbies/attachments/20130128/7ffb28af/attachment.bin