[vox-tech] FSTAB Questions

[Dave Margolis]

On Tue, 17 Feb 2004, ME wrote:

> One of the amazing things with software is that it can grow beyond the
> confines and limitations that people try to impose on it. Luckily, since
> we use Linux, we do not need to "limit" ourselves to only use software as
> it was expected.

Hmmm. Your use of the word limit in quotes comes dangerously close to
being condescending, but I'll assume that's not how it was meant.

Anyway, I was asking a question, not making a statement.  I asked 'What
is?'.  I didn't make the statement 'There is no such thing...'

>
> Consider a laptop that is used at installfests to act as a server of files
> for installs, a gateway/masquerading unit, and a shell server for
> multi-user access.

I don't see why any of the above machines require dual-boot with Windows.

>
> Also, consider hybrid systems with wine being used remotely.

Depending on how your run Wine, yes, but not neccesary.

>
> Just because a person cannot see a use for something does not mean that a
> use does not exist for it. You want more examples? Read on...
>

I didn't suggest that a use didn't exist.  I just suggested the solutions
being offered got off the track of answering the original question, which
sounded to me like it was coming from a desktop user.  But I would never
suggest that a desktop can't scale into something more, or that security
shouldn't be considered because of some vague definition of how a computer
is used.

> Our uni Networking and CS labs are this way. 1 Windows install and 2
> different Linux installs. Yes, we do utilize the multi-user functions on
> these systems in our experiments.

Yeah, experiments, not real multi-user machines that also happen to
dual-boot.  Perhaps I'm muddling multi-user with REMOTE-user, but I would
suggest for unix boxes that's more often the case than not.

>
> Well, we have different machines that have specific purposes. Also, there
> are still some systems out there that require the admin to boot to windows
>
> Other cases for having a bootable windows systems:
> BIOS Upgrades for the system
> SCSI Card Firmware updates that only run from DOS or windows
> System hardware initialization for hardware that uses proprietary code to
> start the hardware working so that Linux can use it
> Being required by the  hardware vendor to run diagnostic software that
> only runs in windows before you can have parts replaced

All but the last of the examples above suggests dual-booting DOS, not
Windows, or even booting from a DOS floppy when possible.  I made myself a
DOS bootable CDROM which I find comes in handy every now and
then...

I don't know.  I just consider dual-booting something that you grow
out of as a desktop user and not really something appropriate for
production Linux boxes.  That's why I asked the question about the lab or
public access computer, which was a scenario I thought up where a dual-boot,
multi-user system made sense.

>
> (many more reasons if you think about it)

Or not so many, or perhaps you would have listed them to back up your
argument.