trying to make a special FAI boot cd

Rob Lemley rclemley at booksys.com
Thu Dec 10 01:44:03 CET 2009


I am now working with FAI version 3.3.2 on Lenny.

I need a sandbox FAI server for upgrades and testing, that I can boot to
without changing with the DHCP server on the LAN.  The LAN DHCP server
assigns IP addresses and tells PXE clients where to go for the boot
files, etc.

I need to build a bootable CDROM or USB Stick that tells the client to
get the IP address from DHCP, and to get the NFSROOT and etc from the
FAI Testing server.

With the previous versions of FAI (and on Etch), I had figured out how
to use (modify) make-fai-bootfloppy to create a boot CD that would
enable the target to boot from the CD, get an IP address from the DHCP
server on the LAN, and use the NFSROOT on the FAI server.

I modified  make-fai-bootfloppy to generate an extra grub entry, like so:

title FAI-NFS-DHCP $KERNELVERSION
kernel (fd0)/$kernel root=/dev/nfs nfsroot=$SERVERIP:$NFSROOT
ip=:$SERVERIP:::::dhcp $params
$sd

Now, in FAI 3.3.2, there is no make-fai-bootfloppy, and I've messed
around with the old one but having trouble getting it to work with the
new kernels and other pieces in FAI.

I think this should be simple to do, but I'm having a little difficulty
figuring out all the pieces, mknbi, syslinux, rom-o-matic, etherboot,
gPXE, the live cd pieces, etc.   The landscape has changed quite a bit.

Does anyone know of a quick way to get an FAI boot CD that makes the
client get the IP address from DHCP and get everything else from the FAI
server (which is not configured as a PXE host in the DHCP, but IS
configured with FAI, NFS, and TFTPD)?

Thanks,
Rob



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