<sect1>

    <heading>How do I install a splash screen and where do I find them?

    </heading>

    <p>Just prior to the release of FreeBSD 3.1, a new feature was

      added to allow the display of "splash" screens during

      the boot messages. The splash screens currently must be a 256

      color bitmap (<tt>*.BMP</tt>) or ZSoft PCX

      (<tt>*.PCX</tt>) file.  In addition, they must have a

      resolution of 320x200 or less to work on standard VGA adapters.

      If you compile VESA support into your kernel, then you can use

      larger bitmaps up to 1024x768. Note that VESA support requires

      the <tt>VM86</tt> kernel option to be compiled into the

      kernel.  The actual VESA support can either be compiled directly

      into the kernel with the <tt>VESA</tt> kernel config option

      or by loading the VESA kld module during bootup.</p>

    <p>To use a splash screen, you need to modify the startup files

      that control the boot process for FreeBSD.  The files for this

      changed prior to the release of FreeBSD 3.2, so there are now

      two ways of loading a splash screen:

    <itemize>

      <item>FreeBSD 3.1

       <p>The first step is to find a bitmap version of your splash

         screen.  Release 3.1 only supports Windows bitmap splash

         screens.  Once you've found your splash screen of choice

         copy it to <tt>/boot/splash.bmp</tt>.  Next, you need to

         have a <tt>/boot/loader.rc</tt> file that contains the

         following lines:

       <verb>

           load kernel

           load -t splash_image_data /boot/splash.bmp

           load splash_bmp

           autoboot

       </verb>

      </item>

      <item>FreeBSD 3.2+

       <p>In addition to adding support for PCX splash screens,

         FreeBSD 3.2 includes a nicer way of configuring the boot

         process.  If you wish, you can use the method listed above

         for FreeBSD 3.1.  If you do and you want to use PCX, replace

         <tt>splash_bmp</tt> with <tt>splash_pcx</tt>.  If,

         on the other hand, you want to use the newer boot

         configuration, you need to create a

         <tt>/boot/loader.rc</tt> file that contains the

         following lines:

       <verb>

           include /boot/loader.4th

           start

       </verb>

       <p>and a <tt>/boot/loader.conf</tt> that contains the

         following:

       <verb>

           splash_bmp_load="YES"

           bitmap_load="YES"

       </verb>

       <p>This assumes you are using <tt>/boot/splash.bmp</tt>

         for your splash screen.  If you'd rather use a PCX file,

         copy it to <tt>/boot/splash.pcx</tt>, create a

         <tt>/boot/loader.rc</tt> as instructed above, and

         create a <tt>/boot/loader.conf</tt> that contains:

       <verb>

           splash_pcx_load="YES"

           bitmap_load="YES"

           bitmap_name="/boot/splash.pcx"

       </verb>

      </item>

    </itemize>

    <p>Now all you need is a splash screen.  For that you can surf

      on over to the gallery at <htmlurl

      url="http://www.cslab.vt.edu/~jobaldwi/splash/"

      name="http://www.cslab.vt.edu/~jobaldwi/splash/">.</p>

  </sect1>