OK, I've got OpenBIOS built on an x86 system but it's also running other things at the moment so it's going to be a few hours before I can make more progress. In the interim I wonder if I could ask some more questions.
i) I can only boot the test system reliably from LILO (as distinct from GRUB) which doesn't have the equivalent of GRUB's "module" command. Is there a way of "piggybacking" openbios-x86.dict onto openbios.multiboot, or are there steps I can apply to openbios-builtin.elf to make it bootable?
ii) Since in this role I'm not storing the dictionary in Flash presumably any changes imply a complete rebuild. Does this also apply to the setenv/printenv settings, or can they- for example- be stored in a file? I guess a variant of this question applies if booting from CD.
iii) While I'm enthusiastic and have a small amount of experience of OpenPROM on Sun systems my Forth is extremely rusty. Where can I find more documentation on OpenBIOS facilities (as distinct from a Forth primer of which there are plenty around)?
Many years ago there was a debugger called Quaid Analyzer which could boot from floppy and set traps on BIOS entry points. I'm looking forward to finding out how much comparable functionality I can get out of OpenBIOS.