The boot-floppies package contains all of the
source code and documentation for the installation floppies.
The Rescue Floppy has an Ext2 filesystem (or a FAT filesystem,
depending on your architecture), and you should be able to access it
from anything else that can mount Ext2 or FAT disks. The Linux kernel
is in the file linux. The file root.bin is
a gzip-compressed disk image of a 1.4MB Minix or Ext2 filesystem,
and will be loaded into the RAM disk and used as the root filesystem.
If you find it necessary to replace the kernel on the Rescue Floppy, you must configure your new kernel with these features linked in, not in loadable modules:
Copy your new kernel to the file linux on the
Rescue Floppy, and then run the shell script rdev.sh
that you'll find on the floppy.
You'll also want to replace the modules.tgz file on the
Drivers Floppy. This file simply contains a
gzip-compressed tar file of
/lib/modules/kernel-ver; make it from the root
filesystem so that all leading directories are in the tar file as
well.
The base floppies contain a 512-byte header followed by a portion of a
gzip-compressed tar archive. If you strip off the headers and
then concatenate the contents of the base floppies, the result should
be the compressed tar archive. The archive contains the base system
that will be installed on your hard disk. Once this archive is
installed, you must go through the ``Configure the Base System''
menu item in the installation system and other menu items to configure
the network and install the operating system kernel and modules before
the system will be usable.