USB install guide should point to hd-media, not just netboot

[Ben Bucksch]

https://help.ubuntu.com/8.04/installation-guide/i386/boot-usb-files.html

Actual result:
The guide is not clear that I should use a different boot.img.gz for network-based install and ISO-based install, esp. when quickly skimming over it.

"Copying the files — the easy way
There is an all-in-one file netboot/boot.img.gz (link) which contains a..."

This does not state that you *cannot* use that together with an ISO. This is not obvious either (I assumed there's only one installer, not two mutually exclusive versions).

"Adding an ISO image
...
If you want to install over the network, without using an ISO image, you will of course skip the previous step. Moreover you will have to use the initial ramdisk from the netboot directory instead of the one from hd-media, because hd-media/initrd.gz does not have network support."

This does not contain a link.

Expected result:
Given that there are two *different* boot.img.gz for ISO install and network install, and another way of copying files manually, I suggest that there are 3 sections in the tutorial:
1. USB boot image for networked install
2. USB boot image for local install with ISO image
3. Manually creating the USB stick using the ISO image

The 1. and 2. section contain different different links to the hd-media/boot.img.gz and netboot/boot.img.gz images. Section 2 may refer to section 1, but only when making very clear to use a different image.

[js84 (js84)]

This bug still exists in the 8.10 documentation, even though it likely will be taken into account for the 9.04 documentation.

I'll gladly rewrite this and check it in, if possible.

[Ben Bucksch (benbucksch)]

js84, thanks for the response.

Can you make sure this is fixed in the 9.04 documentation at the time of 9.04 release, given that many people will try to install it at that time?
The risk here is that people are led on wrong trails and have serious problems installing from USB stick - which probably is rather common these days.

[js84 (js84)]

I'd love to once I get it working myself. After that, I'll rewrite this to be proper and generalized across installations.

(As for right now, however, I have yet to get a bootable drive working, weird considering that Debian has pretty much the same exact instructions and images and has worked for me in the past.)

[js84 (js84)]

Haha, what luck, I just had to overwrite the MBR of my USB drive to get it working.

All right, I can write/rewrite this. Should there also be a consideration of potential problems in this documentation, or is that more for the forums? Is this intended for a new audience or people with experience?

[Ben Bucksch (benbucksch)]

If it's fairly common problems (I would count your MBR problem as that), I think they should get a FAQ section at the end.

> Is this intended for a new audience or people with experience?

I think the audience should be all Ubuntu users. Using USB sticks instead of CD-ROMs will be very common for ordinary users. In fact, I personally think this document should be linked right from the download page, and should be fool-proof enough for that.