hello,

what has a bootloader to do??? What name has the file to have???

JOACHIM NEU

EDIT: Ah sorry, I haven't seen the other threat.

BOOT.BIN is a 512 byte file that sits in the first sector of a floppy drive.
(Hard drive has a boot loader, but I'll stick with floppy stuff here)
Boot.bin is handed control of the computer after BIO does it's initial post
hardware checks/setup & memory installations for some interrupts n stuff.
You never see the file boot.bin for it has no name unless you save it to a file. It just sits at the beginning of the boot disk.

http://bitdog.home.att.net/temp/bootread.zip

has a reader and writer for floppy A:
so format a floppy disk in DOS
FORMAT /U /S A:
format drive A: Unconditionally and install the Systems files.
Makes a bootable disk. Then run BOOTREAD.COM and the file
boot.bin appears in your directory.
It's the boot loader that loads the kernel.bin which is the opperateing system
you know as command.com ?
(I'm probably wrong about all this, but it's a start for you anyway.)
You can run boot.bin through a debugger or disassembler to figgure out
what it does. There are many code examples available on the internet.
Once you write your own boot.bin & kernel.bin
you can use BOOTWRIT.COM to write it to the beginning of floppy A:
then copy in kernel.bin and boot to it. Your new
HelloWurld-OS is a contender..........

Any way, my HowdyWurld-OS first saw the light of day last week
so now I'm an expert....

Gud luk...
Bitdog

Yo!

Here's a useful loader: http://board.flatassembler.net/topic.php?t=941.

Compile:

Install: Use Bitdog's bootwrit.com program or debug.exe.

Heh, yah you are pretty much all wrong. The boot sector is simply the first sector on any bootable device. What it does and how it does it is up to the developers, but usually it enables protected mode and loads the rest of the OS somehow. Here's a good example of one:
http://board.flatassembler.net/topic.php?t=25