Handbook 19.7 Diskless Operation: bug in configuring swap text

[Rob]

Ceri Davies wrote:
> On Sun, Feb 08, 2004 at 09:00:34PM +0900, Rob wrote:
> 
>>Hi,
>>
>>Section "19.7.1.6 Configuring Swap", on diskless operation, has a mistake,
>>that drove me almost crazy. It says there:
>>
>>----------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>/etc/bootptab would use the following syntax instead:
>>
>>T128="192.168.4.4:/netswapvolume/netswap":T129=64000
>>
>>----------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>The T129 here is totally wrong, because this T129 is a syntax error and 
>>stops bootpd from working properly!
>>
>>So the second line above should be replaced by:
>>
>>T128="192.168.4.4:/netswapvolume/netswap":T129=0000fa00
> 
> Rob, would an equivalent be:
> 
> 	T128="192.168.4.4:/netswapvolume/netswap":T129="64000"
> 
> I think that would be clearer for most users.


No, that doesn't work, unfortunately.

Using the quoted decimal number, the kernel initially boots, but panics as
soon as it tries configuring the swap space. The message is something like:

[...]
bootp panic: expected 4 bytes for swaplen not 6 bytes
rebooting....

Using unquoted hex numbers solvs this problem.

So it is really important to correct and mention this in the handbook, otherwise
it'll drive people crazy. It took me a very long time to find the solution.

Rob.