Re: [Etherboot-developers] Q: Multiple drivers.

[Vasil V. <vas...@sy...>]

On Tue, 4 Dec 2001, Ken Yap wrote:

> >1) Is it reasonable for etherboot to support multiple cards,
> >   and possible multiple cards with different drivers at
> >   one time.
>
> Yes, this is a reasonable thing. In the past when the code was in a ROM,
> it would have violated the principle of least surprise for the code on
> one NIC's ROM to boot another NIC, but Etherboot has extended its
> tentacles into the BIOS and other places now. One thing that would be
> nice, if possible, is for the single driver version to by selection or
> by default boot only the physical NIC it lives in. That way controlling
> the interface is a matter of choosing the right NIC to put the ROM in.
>
> The interface to the drivers is rather poor, it only takes the first NIC
> it finds. Ideally it should enumerate all the NICs it can boot and
> choose a good default or give the user a choice (one of multiple NICs of
> the same or different models).

If I can give my 2p based on discussions with Peter Lister.
If you are booting '0 or '00 of machines you don't want a user's choice.
Instead it will be nice to have etherboot send DHCP requests on all NICs it
can and chooses a NIC from the ones it receives response on. Some of the NICs
may not be connected or connected to different networks. User's interaction is
OK as long as it can be automatic as well.

Vasil