how can I make a boot floppy disk?

[mustafa]

I just finished installing fedora 3, I didn't install a boot loader, how can I make a boot floppy disk?
I saw this note from fedora 4 installation dcumentation:
"Your computer must have GRUB or another boot loader installed in order to start, unless you 
create a separate startup disk to boot from."
But the installation finished and it didn't ask me to make one!
also, I can burn a boot image on a cd, could that help

[Joachim Backes]

On Fri, 2005-09-30 at 11:11 +0200, mustafa wrote:
> I just finished installing fedora 3, I didn't install a boot loader, how can I make a boot floppy disk?
> I saw this note from fedora 4 installation dcumentation:
> "Your computer must have GRUB or another boot loader installed in order to start, unless you 
> create a separate startup disk to boot from."
> But the installation finished and it didn't ask me to make one!
> also, I can burn a boot image on a cd, could that help

/sbin/mkbootdisk command.
>

[Timothy Murphy]

Joachim Backes wrote:
> > I just finished installing fedora 3, I didn't install a boot loader, how
> >  can I make a boot floppy disk?
> > I saw this note from fedora 4 installation dcumentation:
> > "Your computer must have GRUB or another boot loader installed in order
> > to start, unless you create a separate startup disk to boot from."
> >
> > But the installation finished and it didn't ask me to make one!
> > also, I can burn a boot image on a cd, could that help
> /sbin/mkbootdisk command.

You are unlikely to be able to fit a current kernel (plus initrd)
on a floppy.
You can get it on a CD with "mkbootdisk --iso"
(see "man mkbootdisk").

If you really want to boot from a floppy, 
see the "Smart Boot Manager" (SBM)
at http://btmgr.webframe.org/, which fits on a floppy.

[Mike McCarty]

Joachim Backes wrote:
> On Fri, 2005-09-30 at 11:11 +0200, mustafa wrote:
> > I just finished installing fedora 3, I didn't install a boot loader, how can I make a boot floppy disk?
> > I saw this note from fedora 4 installation dcumentation:
> > "Your computer must have GRUB or another boot loader installed in order to start, unless you 
> > create a separate startup disk to boot from."
> > But the installation finished and it didn't ask me to make one!
> > also, I can burn a boot image on a cd, could that help
>
> /sbin/mkbootdisk command.

Hasn't worked for a looooonng time.

Mustafa:

The message is perhaps a little ambiguous. What it means is that
you must install something to boot FC4 somewhere, it does not
boot itself. If your computer boots right now, then a boot
did get installed. Most likely GRUB is what is installed on
your hard drive.

I consider it good practice to make a boot floppy, and
keep one around. It's also good practice to keep a rescue
bootable CD around.

Anyway, try this:

http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/html_node/Creating-a-GRUB-boot-flopp...

On my FC2 machine, I get this results:

$ locate stage1
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/vstafs_stage1_5
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/xfs_stage1_5
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/e2fs_stage1_5
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/minix_stage1_5
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/ffs_stage1_5
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/fat_stage1_5
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/reiserfs_stage1_5
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/stage1
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/jfs_stage1_5
/boot/grub/xfs_stage1_5
/boot/grub/ffs_stage1_5
/boot/grub/vstafs_stage1_5
/boot/grub/minix_stage1_5
/boot/grub/stage1
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
/boot/grub/jfs_stage1_5
/boot/grub/e2fs_stage1_5
/boot/grub/fat_stage1_5
/boot/grub/reiserfs_stage1_5

[emphasis added]

$ locate stage2
/usr/share/grub/i386-redhat/stage2
/boot/grub/stage2

Either of these two will work for the stage1 and stage2
mentioned on the web page. You may need a stage1_5,
depending on what file system you are using.

Mike