discuss: Thread: [Proposal] PXE Server HOWTO

Mistik1 is going to have a webcam in the LTSP booth so we should all be 
able to see a bit of it.  If you want I will post the url here when it 
is known.

I can't make this one either.


Keith Strachan wrote:

> Personally, I'd love to attend, but I'm in Australia.   Any possibility of
> feedback from what is seen by those who manage to go there???
> 
>


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On Sun, Jan 27, 2002 at 01:20:55AM +0100, Jason Bechtel wrote:
> On Sat, 26 Jan 2002 13:52:47 -0700
>  Charles Curley ####@####.#### wrote:
> > On Sat, Jan 26, 2002 at 07:25:32PM +0100, Jason Bechtel
> > wrote:
> > > <http://etherboot.sourceforge.net>
> > > <http://www.ltsp.org>
> > 
> > Cool! One could use this to boot a full Linux disty,
> > which is what the authors intend.
> 
> The authors of PXE?

Sorry, no, I meant the LTSP folks. And I was incorrect. They are after
the diskless workstation, as you point out below.

You could, you know. Boot the kernel, mount everything over NFS,
including /home, and let any user log in to any diskless workstation.
The user would have a full up Linux disty available at Ethernet
speeds. You might have to keep a local RAM disk for some stuff, and
having /tmp in local RAM would be possible. You would have no hard
drive locally and universal access to one's account. This is much
better than NT domains.



> 
> The LTSP project works using PXE+Etherboot (or just
> Etherboot) to load a Linux kernel over the network, not a
> full distro.  The code in the network card's EEPROM (or on a
> floppy) contacts a DHCP server (or a bootp server) to obtain
> its network information (based on its MAC address).  Then
> the DHCP/bootp response contains the location of the kernel
> to download (tftp server name + path), which is then
> downloaded and booted.

Believe me, I'm familiar with bootp. :-) The bootp server provides an
executable; it does not have to be a kernel. It could be a second
stage bootstrap, manufacturing test code, manufacturing OS
installation code, or anything else you can compile or assemble for
the target.

> 
> If PXE was involved at all, it has now served its purpose
> and is out of the picture.  Now, once you boot this
> specially prepared kernel, it again contacts DHCP/bootp for
> its network information (at least it used to need to do
> this; LTSP 3.0 may avoid this, not sure).

I don't think it should avoid it because the bootp server may assign
a temporary address/netmask/gateway/hostname, and the downloaded
executable may "know" its permanent assignments.

> Now the kernel mounts its root filesystem over NFS (see the NFS-Root
> mini-HOWTO, recently reclaimed) and continues to boot, according to
> data stored on the NFS server...  Finally, init is executed as the
> first process and again according to the inittab file on the server,
> it either starts a telnet session in console mode or it launches X
> and establishes a XDMCP connection to the applications server.

In other words, once bootp has delivered its executable it's a normal
Unix boot process - assuming it was a Unix kernel bootp delivered.


> 
> Sorry for the speech, but I think that LTSP really is
> amazing.  The implications for TCO and ongoing maintenance
> costs are staggering.  Microsoft should be quaking in their
> boots!

Quite right.


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