Installing Minix 2.0 on an XT with one 360K drive

modified: 31 May 2004

While checking links on my site I found that this reference no longer
works: Installing Minix 2.0 on an XT with one 360K drive.  (Johan
Lindqvist, lindq@etech.chalmers.se)

The link was: http://www.etek.chalmers.se/~lindq/misc/minix.html, but I
get a "Not Found" message for this page as well as the parent page
~lindq.  An attempt to send e-mail to the author also failed.

In the course of searching for the author's name I came upon a short
thread in the Minix-L archives.  Since this topic may still be of
interest I decided to reproduce the thread here:

Results of search for "Johan Lindqvist":

Item #	Date	Time	Recs	 	Subject
016074	96/08/12	22:20	30		USR.XX with small disks.
016075	96/08/13	11:07	45		Re: USR.XX with small disks.
016089	96/08/17	17:33	52		Re: USR.XX with small disks.
016108	96/08/20	21:40	53		Re: USR.XX with small disks.

[016074]
Date:         Mon, 12 Aug 1996 22:20:53 GMT
Reply-To:     Johan Lindqvist <lindq@ETEK.CHALMERS.SE>
Sender:       Minix operating system <MINIX-L@LISTSERV.NODAK.EDU>
From:         Johan Lindqvist <lindq@ETEK.CHALMERS.SE>
Organization: Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden
Subject:      USR.XX with small disks.
Comments: To: info-minix@louie.udel.edu

I've been trying to find some use for my old 8088, and what would be
better than to run Minix on it?

I get the binaries needed using a UNIX acct and then move the files to
the XT by disks.  However, the only disk I have access to for the 8088
is an old 5.25" drive, which only handles 360 kB.  No, problem, you
say, just use the TINY distribution.  My problem is the USR.XX images.
They're all 720 kB.  How do I handle them?  The usage(8) page assumes
you have a drive that handles at least 720-disks, and doesn't really
cover TINY installations.

Anyone with experience on the TINY distribtion that are familiar with
the problem?  Did I get it all wrong?

If you do reply, please email me a copy as well.  (No, I _do_ read this
group.  People who post notes in groups they don't read, asking for
email answers to FAQ:s annoy me.  However, my newsfeed seems a little
strange, and I wouldn't want to miss an answer.)

______________________________________________________________________________ 
 Johan Lindqvist |Due to lack of interest, tomorrow 
Gothenburg Mail: |has been cancelled. 
Sweden lindq@etek.chalmers.se | 

[016075 ]
Date:         Tue, 13 Aug 1996 11:07:45 GMT
Reply-To:     Will Rose <cwr@CTS.COM>
Sender:       Minix operating system <MINIX-L@LISTSERV.NODAK.EDU>
From:         Will Rose <cwr@CTS.COM>
Organization: CTS Network Services (CTSNET), San Diego, CA
Subject:      Re: USR.XX with small disks.
Comments: To: info-minix@louie.udel.edu

Johan Lindqvist (lindq@etek.chalmers.se) wrote: 
: I've been trying to find some use for my old 8088, and what would be better 
: than to run Minix on it?

: I get the binaries needed using a UNIX acct and then move the files to the 
: XT by disks. However, the only disk I have access to for the 8088 is an old 
: 5.25" drive, which only handles 360 kB. No, problem, you say, just use the 
: TINY distribution. My problem is the USR.XX images. They're all 720 kB. 
: How do I handle them? The usage(8) page assumes you have a drive that 
: handles at least 720-disks, and doesn't really cover TINY installations.

: Anyone with experience on the TINY distribtion that are familiar with 
: the problem? Did I get it all wrong?

If you have boot, root, and usr you can bring up a minix system, and I
think these are all available in 360K.  Once you have a minix system up
you can copy the 720K images to the minix filesystem, and unpack them
in place (given enough hard disk space).  Typically

cd /usr cat USR* | zcat | tar xvf -

Note that this is the overall sequence, and probably won't work on an
XT using pipes, due to lack of memory for processes.  You will need
lots of space for intermediate files.  Further, zcat may not work on an
8088; you may have to use decomp16 instead.

I tend to have an MSDOS partition as the first partition on the disk,
for convenience sake; if the USR files are merged and put on that
partition,

dosread a USR.ALL | decomp16 >usr.tar

may save some space on the minix side.

Will cwr@crash.cts.com

[016089]
Date:         Sat, 17 Aug 1996 17:33:46 -0500
Reply-To:     Johnson <4johnson@KEENE.NDAK.NET>
Sender:       Minix operating system <MINIX-L@LISTSERV.NODAK.EDU>
Comments:     RFC822 error: <W> TO field duplicated. Last occurrence was
              retained.
From:         Johnson <4johnson@KEENE.NDAK.NET>
Organization: Communicating for America Network Services
Subject:      Re: USR.XX with small disks.
Comments: To: info-minix@louie.udel.edu
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

Johan Lindqvist wrote: 
> 
> I've been trying to find some use for my old 8088, and what would be better 
> than to run Minix on it? 
> 
> I get the binaries needed using a UNIX acct and then move the files to the 
> XT by disks. However, the only disk I have access to for the 8088 is an old 
> 5.25" drive, which only handles 360 kB. No, problem, you say, just use the 
> TINY distribution. My problem is the USR.XX images. They're all 720 kB. 
> How do I handle them? The usage(8) page assumes you have a drive that 
> handles at least 720-disks, and doesn't really cover TINY installations. 
> 
> Anyone with experience on the TINY distribtion that are familiar with 
> the problem? Did I get it all wrong? >

I installed the TINY distrib on my 286 Laptop.  I had a 1.44meg drive,
but I know how to help, I think.

Now, using someone else's Unix machine, split each 720k USR.* disk into
2 with the dd command.  You have to do this 2 times for each USR file,
to get the 2 output files.  Then, put these all on disks, now that they
are only 360k.  You could also, now that I think about it, shorten this
to using the dd command on each USR file 2 times, going straight to
disk, assuming that the machine you're doing this on gives you physical
access to a 5.25" drive. :)

I assume you can boot with TINYROOT and load both the TINYUSR floppies
on to the HD.  This is just a simple manner of popping in TINYUSR.01
when it prompts on startup, logging in, running part to make a single
main partition and three sub-partitions, the first two should be about
720k-1440k and the other should be the rest of the main partition.  (I
used my entire 20meg HD) Then, mkfs the 3 with appropriate size info,
mount /dev/hd1c (hd2c?) on /mnt, cpdir /usr to /mnt, umount /dev/fd0,
swap to TINYUSR.02, mount /dev/fd0 /usr, cpdir /usr to /mnt, umount
/dev/fd0, umount /dev/hd1c, mount /dev/hd1c /usr, and complete manual
installation by usage.8.  Change the vol 720......  command to vol
360......., and then you should be able to install.  Good luck!  -- Ari

[016108]
Date:         Tue, 20 Aug 1996 21:40:18 GMT
Reply-To:     Marcus Herbert <rhoenie@RHOHOST.FRANKEN.DE>
Sender:       Minix operating system <MINIX-L@LISTSERV.NODAK.EDU>
From:         Marcus Herbert <rhoenie@RHOHOST.FRANKEN.DE>
Organization: SuSE aktuell
Subject:      Re: USR.XX with small disks.
Comments: To: info-minix@louie.udel.edu

Johan Lindqvist (lindq@etek.chalmers.se) wrote: 
: I get the binaries needed using a UNIX acct and then move the files to the 
: XT by disks. However, the only disk I have access to for the 8088 is an old 
: 5.25" drive, which only handles 360 kB.

I did it this way from my linux account:

1) Install TINYROOT and TINYUSR 1 and 2.  Start 'setup' and partition
your HD as usual (1.4MB root and rest is /usr) - if you are using 1.7.4
remember to copy some files from the normal 720K ROOT disk to your
system (but not the boot-kernel if you have only XT HD!).

2) After all is done start filling up your /usr tree with:

cd /usr vol 360 /dev/fd0 | zcat | tar xvfp - 
            ^^^ I did it without (!)     ^I left that too (!)

3) FOR xx:=01 to 05 DO 
     rhohost:/ # dd if=USR.xx of=/dev/fd0h360 bs=1k count=360k 
     SWAP DISKETTE *hehehehe* 
     rhohost:/ # dd if=USR.xx of=/dev/fd0h360 bs=1k skip=360k 
     SWAP DISKETTE *hehehehe* 
   END;

4) FOR xx:=01 to 03 DO 
     rhohost:/ # dd if=SYS.xx of=/dev/fd0h360 bs=1k count=360k 
     SWAP DISKETTE *hehehehe* 
     rhohost:/ # dd if=SYS.xx of=/dev/fd0h360 bs=1k skip=360k 
     SWAP DISKETTE *hehehehe* 
   END;

5) After the last disk the system didn't recognized that we were ready.
I stopped vol'ing with CTRL+INSERT (funny keyboardmapping :-).

I did the whole thing with only two diskettes.  One was filled up at
the linux system while the other was read by MINIX - but it took me
nearly 2 hours to do so :-(=(.

Good Luck!

-- TLA-ISP-users click <A HREF=mailto:rhoenie@rhoen.com>here</A> 
        Find my homepage on /\ www.franken.de \/
             As my mother said: "Don't eat *yellow* snow!"