Re: [gentoo-amd64] boot Gentoo from USB key

[Raffaele BELARDI]

On Wed, 2008-04-30 at 11:40 -0400, Jason wrote:
> 1.) a good initrd will use only statically linked executables.
> 2.) you shouldn't start any servers or background processes from initrd.
> 3.) initrd's are tied to kernels.  Every distro's initrd generator is
> re-run upon upgrading the kernel.  The modules versions won't be out of
> sync then.  Gentoo has genkernel for this purpose.
>

I have not even considered using an initrd due to lack of knowledge, but
if it could help improving the solution below I'd surely give it a try.

I'm trying to build a silent PC with Mythtv for the living room. This is
what I am doing:
1. boot the Mythtv system with no disk from USB (4Gb key should be
sufficient)
2. wake up a remote server with the Wake-On-Lan ethernet functionality.
This implies sending a particular ('Magic') packet over UDP to the
server's MAC address
3. mount the remote disks containing the movies through NFS

I'm still at step 1. For next step I was planning to put
in /etc/conf.d/local.start a call to e.g. ether-wake. Then after a delay
to let the server boot, I'd proceed to step3.

Would intird on the Mythtv box improve the above in some way, for
example by letting the system send the magic packet earlier in the boot
process?

thanks,

raf

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