[Unattended] DOS & console ports

[Ben W. <una...@cr...>]

Hi all,

Just got Unattended working two days ago... it was a struggle, partly =
because the docs didn't cover essential parts of the setup but mostly =
because I didn't download everything properly and then the version =
changed.  Anyway, it was quite satisfying when I got it working 5 =
minutes before the end of my last day at my job ;-)  Nice system, =
Patrick & Co=20

Because we were using it to install windows on an HP BL10e blade server =
I spent a long time trying to do a "headless" install, with no monitor, =
keyboard, floppy or cdrom (!).  The problem that has really slowed me =
down is the fact that once it  boots into MS-DOS, the server stops =
outputting display to the console port. =20

Eventually I spent hours in the datacentre coaxing the machine through =
formatting questions over and over etc, and then copying the resulting =
[_meta] answers back to the site directory's unattended.txt.  As it =
stands, between "Starting MS-DOS" and the first reboot into windows =
installer we have to run blind.  Ten minutes or so of assuming the build =
has started and waiting to copy files...  Not ideal, especially if the =
script balks.

Q: Is there a way to make the bootdisk image do I/O to the console port =
so we can be truly unattended? =20
Q: How do you do line continuation in an .INI file? (It took me _ages_ =
to fix hard returns on linewraps)

Ben

PS.  I have some documentation to finish off, which I'd be happy to =
contribute to the project if it's wanted.
--
http://www.crouchingbadger.com