TRIUMF Grid PXE Boot Server

Installation of a pxeboot service

References: local documentation: /usr/share/doc/syslinux-VERSION; local documentation: man tftp; online documentation: Online reference [hp.com]

The tftp RPM must be installed, configured and enabled in /etc/hosts.allow. Note that xinetd must be running, since it starts tftp on demand:
# service tftp start
# grep tftp /etc/hosts.allow
in.tftpd : 192.168.1.0/255.255.255.0
The syslinux RPM must also be installed. It provides the pxeboot image that you must copy to the /tftpboot directory:
# cp -p /usr/lib/syslinux/pxelinux.0 /tftpboot/
Note that pxeboot will look in /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/ for it's boot environment.
The linux distribution installation boot image and the corresponding initrd image must be installed in the /tftpboot area. This example assumes SL 303:
# mkdir /tftpboot/303
# cp -p /ks/mirror/303/i386/images/SL/pxeboot/vmlinuz /tftpboot/303/
# cp -p /ks/mirror/303/i386/images/SL/pxeboot/initrd.img /tftpboot/303/
Finally a ansconda installation configuration file must be created for this distribution. Different configuration files may be created; for example, append ksdevice=eth1 to force kickstart over eth1
This example is a generic kickstart for SL 303. If more than one ethernet interface exists it will interactively ask which interface should be used for kickstart to proceed:
# cat syslinux-303.cfg
```
default kslinux
prompt 1
timeout 10
display boot.msg
F1 boot.msg
F5 rescue.msg

label kslinux
  kernel 303/vmlinuz-boot-303
  append load_ramdisk=1 ip=dhcp \
    initrd=303/initrd.img network ks=nfs:192.168.1.250:/ks/kscfg/303-i386.cfg
label expert
  kernel 303/vmlinuz-orig
  append expert initrd=303/initrd.img
```

Setting up a client for installation via pxeboot

create a symlink at lcfg:/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/ to the desired configuration. Node IP addresses must be converted to hexidecimal in the symlink name. See the readme.txt file in that directory for a list hexidecimal names. Example
# ln -s syslinux-303.cfg C0A80163