/dev/fb0, sorry. I've been making that mistake all afternoon.

No...no Windows.

From what I've been able to gather, /dev/fb0 doesn't exist unless you pass vga as a boot parameter. But rhgb (the normal Red Hat Graphical Boot)somehow gets around this.

rhgb wouldn't be so bad if it would just kick-in sooner.

Thanks

So its a framebuffer problem. Have you compiled yourself or been using a package? I suppose you're using a package. Since you want to use this professionally I suggest compiling your own kernel with bootsplash support.

Thats a little effort but afterwards you'll have silent boot with even your logo on screen if you want (and I guess your boss will like that )

I think you can do this. I say this because we have various LiveCDs which show a bootsplash graphic or logo, and you press F2 or somesuch toggle to see all the bootup text rushing by. You can also add to startup scripts to launch straight into a application that presents the machine operator interface without any visible preamble. I feel sure this must be possible because that is what the use of small SBC (single board computers) and embedded Linux applications in industrial control is all about. Google for "embedded Linux" and you will find loads of ready-made Linux hardware that does have a video monitor connector.

Other questions arise. There is a difference between window manager and a GUI made more complicated by a desktops like KDE which combine both roles. How you can make your application control the X-server video to order, without first having a conventional desktop load up, is what we need to know.

I suggest you have a look at the scripts on a Knoppix, or Mepis install CD. There may be a way to redirect the standard output to null, or maybe even deny any framebuffer or video mode option in the bootloader script. I do not have the skill, but I feel sure there are geeky experts here who do.

Well, I'm back on bootsplash again. I've recompiled the kernel, but I think I'm getting hung-up when I try to attach the graphic to the initrd file. It corrupts the initrd so the system panics.

I'm thinking it's because the initrd on Fedora is compressed?

I understand the ramdisk is needed since no filesystem is yet loaded, but I was hoping to avoid the ramdisk completely to speed loading...well, maybe you can't have everything

I'm just skipping the desktop and loading the application with xinit.

What are you using to attach the images to the initrd?

Per the bootsplash instructions, this form:
/sbin/splash -s -f /etc/bootsplash/themes/yourtheme/config/bootsplash-1024x768.cfg >> /boot/initrd.splash

Ok, what do you mean it corrupts the initrd? How do you know? Are you attaching them to a separate initrd as your post suggests, (/boot/initrd.splash) or appending them to an existing initrd with something necessary for boot?

I'm appending them to the existing initrd. However, when I do that and try to boot, the machine panics.

I'm guessing the initrd is compressed, and I need to find a modified mkinitrd to include the image?

The initrd setup seems to be standard operating procedure for Fedora Core. For booting purposes, I really don't need one, and I have been able to cut it out to speed things up (it requires some voodoo to the /dev directory, though). So, maybe I should that and use the initrd as created by splash?

Well, I'm stuck then. Maybe you should try what you said, if you can get away with not needing an initrd, except for splash purposes, then I don't see why it shouldn't work.

Good Luck

This is driving me nuts. I don't know why this is so hard.

I started with a clean system and compiled the latest kernel with the bootsplash patch. That seems OK.

However, when I try to use bootsplash, I get something about not being able to find an appropriate signature when looking for the bootsplash files.

I think if I could just incorporate the bootsplash files with fedora's version of the mkinitrd command, I might get somewhere, but I can't seem to figure out how to do that.

ARGGGH!!!!

last time i used windows tehre was plenty of boot garbage anyway....

though that was win 98