Swap Brainstorm (was Re: [Rule-list] Test of 0.6.3-small - the whole story)

[Scott Hallock]

> 
> I, too, have been thinking about this, but I'm not knowledgeable enough
> to do it. One thought, though: When does the kernel during the normal
> boot (that one that gets installed) mkswap/swapon? Maybe this method can
> be used just before starting the installer?

mkswap generally occurs around the same time you mke2fs your filesystems
during installation.  Usually it's right after you fdisk/cfdisk/Disk Druid.  
Most general init scripts do a swapon -a (or is it -A?  I can never remember) 
early in the boot process.  Installer "init scripts", on the other hand, have 
to wait to swapon until after you've partitioned your hard drive in the 
general case.  However, for a low-memory installer, it might be acceptable to 
say "If the first partition on my first hard drive says it's a Linux swap 
partition, then use it as one as soon as you can."  There's a danger of data 
loss if another OS has marked a valid data partition with the same partition 
ID that Linux uses for swap partitions, but, personally, I think the chances 
of that are very small.  Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

> Why using DOS if you can use Linux? 

Doesn't matter.  Linux, NetBSD, anything that will run on your system and
run an fdisk program that lets you set partition IDs will work.
I suggested DOS because it will boot on any old x86 system, regardless of
how little memory is available.  You don't need 32-bit preemptive multitasking
to write a few bytes to the first block of the hard drive.

Scott

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