On Nov 26, 11:40 am, RegB <2regburg...@earthlink.net> wrote: > There is a practical issue with having to edit the menu.lst > file from within windows. > It is at least IMPLIED that the user should do this before > re-booting and of course it would be NICE to do it while > the instructions are still displayed.
It is important to distinguish between different cases here: The message that "menu.lst "has to be edited by hand was specific to your case because you had grub preinstalled. This is not the standard case I had in mind for the exe installer. The whole idea is that the exe installer can install without to touch the windows mbr and without the need for repartitioning. Standard case with the original windows mbr ( no grub installed): a windows boot entry is created which links to grub4dos (file grldr.mbr) and this uses the default menu.lst which is title Sage Live 511-46 find --set-root --ignore-floppies /Sage-Live-511-46/initrd.gz kernel /Sage-Live-511-46/vmlinuz psubdir="Sage-Live-511-46" initrd /Sage-Live-511-46/initrd.gz to boot up the linux system: NO touching of mbr, NO touching of the hard disk partitions. So this is what I call a minmum invasive install of the system (automated etc) > The puzzle of course is how to find and edit menu.lst > while still in the Windows environment. > One could argue that anyone with a grub loader should > know Linux/Unix well enough to do that outside of the Windows > environment, but I am reading an implicit goal to be > inclusive of the Windows and "less than expert" Linux user > community. > IOW; We're not all expert Unix hackers out here (-: Ok, your case was that you had already grub installed on your system: Lets assume if one has grub installed there is already an existing linux somewhere on the computer. In that case it is "better" to install the sage live into the linux partition, because of the better filesystem etc. (file access is faster and safer). Of course you can also install into the NTFS partition. The problem is that the conventional grub with the menu.lst is located on a linux partition, so you cant see if you are working in linux. So you have to reboot to linux and find the file (often it is located in the /boot directory). I agree with you that it would better to have also a menu guided install system for that case (existing grub). I also agree that there should be documentation about this available. I already prepared some prototype pages. Please look at: http://boxen.math.washington.edu/home/emil/doc/html/en/home.htm It is pretty basic at this stage, and there is lot of space for improvements. I am not used to write technical howtos and english is not my native tongue so I am glad for any help fr suggestions to improve this documentation. > > I suggest some detailed instructions in the readme.txt, > including a line to say "Print this before shutting down windows". > A short "How To" in the readme on creating a bootable > USB memory stick would also be useful in helping the first > time user achieve a working set-up. > I know you can't make it the total manual about anything > and everything, but I think these items are "needed". > > Best, > > \R > I am even willing to create a fairly complete tutorial and walkthrough for some typical cases. But I would need feedback and help, and it would need some time to get it fairly right ... Maybe you can have a look at the pages I mentioned, if you have any suggestions, or even want to contribute some text, please let me know (pm me or dicuss it here) My main point at this time is to test the situation, where the users machine is a pure windows machine. I think the exe file which installs the sage system is an innovative approach. But of course this has to gain broader support and testing and some improvement, else it will stay in a niche as 'curiosity'. kind regards emil -- To post to this group, send an email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to sage-devel+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel URL: http://www.sagemath.org
