Installing kernel's for local boot

[Carl J. Van Arsdall]

Thomas Lange wrote:
>>>>>> On Mon, 09 Oct 2006 15:14:35 -0700, "Carl J. Van Arsdall" <cvanarsdall at mvista.com> said:
>>>>>>             
>
>     > I've been playing with getting FAI setup for a couple weeks now.  I've 
> Which version are you using? Things have changed with FAI 3.0.
>   
I have 3.0, i've been doing my best to figure it all out with the old 
documentation and piecing together what looks different.  I'm getting there


>     > custom kernels.  The thing is, the howto is pretty dated.  It comments 
>     > putting files in files/packages which was deprecated in 2.54 from what I 
>  FAI Guide version 2.5.4, 20 april 2006 for FAI package version 2.10.1
> .
>   
Yea, you are right, I had thought that the guide had the same version as 
fai.  Sorry about the confusion


> .
>   `files/packages/'
>           THE USE OF THIS DIRECTORY IS NOW OBSOLETE.
>
>
> Maybe you are using an older version of the fai guide. But you are
> right we have to update the fai guide.
>   
Well, I was also using a howto that I found via the howtos from the fai 
wiki.  I was desperate for information so I went there, the link to it is:

http://faiwiki.informatik.uni-koeln.de/index.php/Using_customized_kernels_with_FAI


>     > So it seems to me that kernel's are specified in two places:
>     >    1.  /etc/fai/make-fai-nfsroot.conf
>     >    2.  specify a kernel for PXE that lives /srv/tftp/fai/ (or whereever 
>     > your tftp stuff is housed I guess).
> yep.
>
>     > So, my question, the boot kernel is always going to be vmlinuz install  
>     > or whatever you point to using fai-chboot right? 
> In FAI 3.0, make-fai-nfsroot has now the option -V to specify the
> kernel name. See man make-fai-nfsroot for more info. You can also
> specify the kernel name with fai-chboot.
>
>     > From the comments in 
>     > the conf file, the kernel from make-fai-nfsroot.conf is the kernel that 
>     > will boot via nfs.
> Correct.
>
>     > I'm a bit confused as to how this works. 
> This is the normal way how diskless clients boots. Have a look at
> nfsroot.txt in the kernel sources documentation.
>
>     > Anyhow, following that stuff..  what's the best way to configure fai to 
>     > install a specific kernel for class?
> Build your own kernel using make-kpkg. This will make a Debian package
> out of this kernel. The create a local Debian package repository, add
> a line to the soures.lsit file and add the name of your kernel package
> to the class in package_config.
>   
Alright, so I'd make a local repository on my fai server, place that 
debian package inside of it, and add it to package_config.  Does this 
handle updating menu.lst and the modules for me?  (sorry if that's a 
noob question, previously I just wrote scripts to manipulate these files 
for me)




-- 

Carl J. Van Arsdall
cvanarsdall at mvista.com
Build and Release
MontaVista Software