Installation - More user friendly

[Robert Huff]

Corey Mosher writes:

>  What would actually be quite nice is to have a fancy GUI install
>  in addition to the current one.  Then at the beginning of the
>  install you can decide whether you really want to install FreeBSD
>  or look at the pretty lights in the fancy GUI version.  Option 1
>  is choose the current way, option 2 is go the GUI method.  This
>  gives people the flexible "old fashioned" way to install while at
>  the same time getting people through the install who may be less
>  experienced buy using the GUI version.

	There's an additional variable here, that I haven't seen
anybody mention.
	It is desirable to have a uniform installation process, no
matter what the media.  This means the hard-working folks in Release
Engineering only have to wrangle one set of code.
	It is also desirable to have a small installation process, so
deisrable I think this is a matter of official policy.  (Can anyone
confirm or deny this?)  As of ... somewhere late in 3.x or early in
4.x, I think ... one could run the entire essential install off one
3.5 floppy.
	Then it was two.
	Now it's three, if you need some not-so-uncommon drivers.
	Will the sky fall if we go to four?  No.  But "cost" of each
additional disk goes up.  I don't assume everyone has a 52x CDROM,
any more than I assume thay have a 3mbps cable connection.
	(I'm neither for or against a GUI installer. I just want to be
sure we're all playing with the same deck.)


				Robert Huff