This package allows you to create a Debian installation system on
floppy disk or other media, for bootstrapping Debian onto a new
system. Most users will simply download the disk images to do this, so
the boot-floppies package will generally only be used by advanced
Debian maintainers.

Steps:

- You'll need certain parts of the Debian archive in order to build
  this package.  If you don't already have a local mirror or NFS
  access to one, a good first step is to mirror the base directory of
  the FTP.  From there, look through
  scripts/rootdisk/EXTRACT_LIST_{all,<my-architecture>}
  and scripts/basedisk/PACKAGES_{all,<my-architecture>} for other
  packages you will need.

- You'll need to be running a kernel with loop support, you'll
  also need (modules are fine) minix and msdos filesystem support

- `cd /usr/src/boot-floppies'

- adapt the variables in Makefile to your local environment; you can
  put your custom variables in a file Makefile.config if you like,
  which will be included if it exists from Makefile after the variables
  are defined.

- `mkdir updates', and put in updates/ any *.deb package files
  that cannot be found on your Debian FTP mirror, or links to them;
  note that you do not necessarily have to install those packages
  on your system as the scripts extract the files they need from
  the *.deb package files

- run 'make check'
  This checks your local settings and makes sure you have all the 
  necessary packages.

- run `make release' (as root)
  This compiles the programs that are specially designed for the
  installation disks, extracts programs from the Debian FTP mirror and
  builds all the disks.
