User requests additional network drivers on installation floppy

[boeckmann]

From Mastodon: Superllu, the creator of DOjS asks the following:

@boeckmann not sure if you are the right one to ask.

I just tried to install SvarDOS on a i486 and the base floppy install does only contain a packet driver for an AMD PC-NET NIC.

Could you at least add an ne2000 packet driver for upcoming installation images?

[boeckmann]

Maybe we could generate an additional network driver floppy image? Would keep the installation image small while still giving the users the ability to easily get the network drivers.

As it is currently, the user has to get the driver .SVP manually and copy it onto a floppy. One step that is also annoying to me.

[mateuszviste]

The AMD PC-NET driver is a wild package (wild as in "not installed nor known by the installer"), I've added it there only so I can test SvarDOS releases more easily on VirtualBox, it's a very ugly hack that was never meant to stay.

The proper solution would be to solve #20 - installer should ask what NIC the user has, and then install the suitable packet driver, asking to insert the "network drivers" floppy... or we can assume that everyone nowadays has their PC networked, and so including some selection of network drivers on the default installation floppies is the way to go. Probably not my preferred option, though, since it would mean we could no longer boast about SvarDOS fitting on a single diskette :-P

Side note: the "network drivers" floppy should come in the same variety of formats as the SvarDOS installation disks, ie. 360K, 720K, 1200K and 1440K. Meaning that it will likely end up to be a set of disks, at least for the 360K variant..

[boeckmann]

There do not seem to be THAT many packages containing packet drivers. Maybe merging them to a single PKTDRV.SVP, splitting it for the smaller images, let the additional network installer recombine the .SVP on HD and install it. Then it can be updated by the usual PKGNET etc. If keeping the install size minimal is the ultimate goal, we could make one .SVP for every single driver and only install the one for the card the user chooses. But not sure its worth the effort.

[mateuszviste]

There do not seem to be THAT many packages containing packet drivers. Maybe merging them to a single PKTDRV.SVP, splitting it for the smaller images, let the additional network installer recombine the .SVP on HD and install it. Then it can be updated by the usual PKGNET etc.

Not many packages but lots of drivers. Crynwr alone is ca. 900K (zip-compressed). Having this merged with other drivers also means that the user has to fetch a megabyte of data just to update the 20K driver he actually needs.

If keeping the install size minimal is the ultimate goal, we could make one .SVP for every single driver and only install the one for the card the user chooses. But not sure its worth the effort.

That would be my preferred option, yes. Albeit I agree that it is more initial work. Probably we should start small, and integrate like 3-5 "most common" drivers - say, PC-NET, NE2000, RTSPKT, 3C509 and 3C905. And then build over this, depending on community feedback or our own needs.

[boeckmann]

PC-NET, NE2000, RTSPKT, 3C509 and 3C905

That plus Intel PRO100/1000 drivers should serve 90%+ of the users, I guess.

[SuperIlu]

As the original suggestion was from me:
I'm also very much in favor of the "driver disk with a feasible selection of the most common NICs" option. :)