HG wrote:
I presume this can be installed with floppies and network?
Probably even easier - USB-stick.
USB doesn't work for this (or on this machine). Network boot would be ok, but it's too hard for me to set up with SUSE.
You mean use etherboot off a floppy, or with bootrom or builtin PXE? Yeah, that could get a little complicated, especially if you don't like compiling your own software. It's works fine though.
I've tried it with knoppix though and it works just fine. Actually, I could see a tremendeous benefit for small business if SUSE would include a easy to setup network boot installation.
I run a small(ish) business myself, and for installations, booting off the USB-stick is all we need. It's easy and requires no CDROM. Even some (in business terms) quite ancient systems - 3-4 years old - will boot off USB. But you probably meant an installation option that would allow workstations to boot off a central server? With an NFS-mounted root filesystem? Where your workstations would boot with PXE or perhaps off a floppy or USB-stick. We have a 16-node cluster that works like that. For a few ordinary workstations, I think it is overkill, especially in a small business. The overhead in management and setup is too much, plus you'd need to keep the right sort of IT skills around.
Large businesses can take the time to use the current systems, but smaller can not.
But do you always need to be bleeding-edge in a small business? I don't. The advantage a small business has over a large is its flexibility - being a nimble ship. There is no big-brother IT-dept to dictate that all workstations must be the same colour, and run the same software. You don't need 100page roll-out plans to go around installing/upgrading SUSE whilst the secretary goes for a coffee. Interesting chat. /Per Jessen, Zürich
On Wed, 12 Apr 2006 05:21 pm, Per Jessen wrote:
HG wrote:
Network boot would be ok, but it's too hard for me to set up with SUSE.
At work I run a cluster of netbooting nodes, at home I have a little (MiniITX) server without CDrom. Setting up a complete network install system isn't hard. Your client machine's network card does PXE? Good, lets go: On the server machine you need the RPM "dhcp-server" See "man dhcpd.conf" and set up dhcpd by configuring /etc/dhcpd.conf Add these lines to /etc/dhcpd.conf server-name "10.0.0.6"; next-server 10.0.0.6; filename "pxelinux.0"; Start dhcpd. You need the RPM "atftp" (instead of tftp) Start atftpd. You need the RPM "syslinux" Copy /usr/share/syslinux/pxelinux.0 /tftpboot/ Make a directory /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg make a file /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default and put this into it: default yast label yast kernel suse10.1-vmlinuz-linux32.gz append load_ramdisk=1 initrd=suse10.1-inst32 install=nfs://10.0.0.3/install/suse10.1/ Damn word-wrap; the line beginning "install" should be part of the line beginning "append" Get the Suse CDs and set up an installation source. NFS export it. (if you use FTP or HTTP, remember to change your install= to suit.) Copy the installer kernel and initrd into the TFTP source: cp /install/suse10.1/suseboot/inst32 /tftpboot/suse10.1-inst32 cp /install/suse10.1/suseboot/linux32.gz /tftpboot/suse10.1-linux32.gz I think those are the right files, I'm guessing, it's different in 9.3. And anyway you all probably have 64 bit machines by now. MTNA (make the necessary adjustments) Plug your CD-less machine into the private network with the server you just built set the client's BIOS to PXE boot (F12 on Dells) and go for it. If you put a tail on /var/log/messages on the server machine, "tail -f /var/log/messages" then you can see it all happen. If it can't get an IP number when DHCP starts spinning the cursor, it could be cables, could be dhcpd. If it isn't being told a file to get it's dhcpd.conf If it can't get the file it's atftpd. Use "atftp -r pxelinux.0 localhost" to test your tftp server. (check permissions in /tftpboot; atftpd is strict) If it can't get the kernel, you either mistyped something in /etc/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default or misnamed it in /tftpboot Ditto the initrd file. If that doesn't give you a working YaST installer, then I guessed wrong about those inst32 files. Sorry, I'm off home now to try it myself, Happy Easter! michaelj -- Michael James michael.james@csiro.au System Administrator voice: 02 6246 5040 CSIRO Bioinformatics Facility fax: 02 6246 5166 No matter how much you pay for software, you always get less than you hoped. Unless you pay nothing, then you get more.
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Per Jessen