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[new] good news! It works with Feisty Alternate and Server CDs.
This is a work in progress. It is also a mix of Basic Internet Install and Local Net Install that are similar to just installing from the CD, and Hands Off Install that uses a preseed file to automate the whole thing.
Basic: Hands-On Interactive Network Desktop Install
The following high-level instructions allow you to PXE boot and install Ubuntu just as if you had a CD in the drive.
- Install an NFS server and a TFTP server on a system on your network. (See more info about TFTP setup below.)
- Download the ISO you want to boot over your network.
- Mount the ISO and copy all the files to the NFS server, and export the directory.
- Copy the contents of install/netboot from the CD into the tftpboot directory on your TFTP server.
- Copy vmlinuz and initrd.gz from the CD (you may have to search for them, they're usually in /install or /casper) into the tftpboot directory; rename them to be something unique if you will have more than one version in the directory.
Edit pxelinux.cfg/default to point one of the LABEL entries to your kernel and initrd, with the following options to tell casper to mount / via NFS -- your entry should look a lot like these three lines:
LABEL edubuntu kernel vmlinuz-edubuntu-iso append vga=normal initrd=initrd-edubuntu-iso boot=casper netboot=nfs nfsroot=10.20.1.2:/opt/ltsp/edudesktop-iso --
nfsroot points to your NFS server and the path to the directory where you copied all the contents of the CD.Set the following options in dhcpd.conf on your DHCP server:
next-server 10.20.1.2; # this is your TFTP server filename "pxelinux.0"; # put this in verbatim
- Profit!
man casper for more information about casper, which is what makes this so easy.
Basic: Hands-On Interactive Network Server Install
sahara is the server for dhcp, tftp, and http. (Each of these can be run on a separate server if desired.) shaz is the blank box that I am installing on.
Install Trivial File Transfer Protocol server and enable it (default tftp config uses inetd)
root@sahara:/ # apt-get install tftpd-hpa root@sahara:/ # vi /etc/default/tftpd-hpa
Mount the CD (media or image) under the tftpboot dir
root@sahara:/var/lib/tftpboot/ubuntu/feisty$ mount -o loop feisty-alternate-i386.iso alternate/
If you wish, you can instead copy the contents of the CD onto the server permanently instead of leaving the ISO mounted.Setup Apache
root@sahara:~ # apt-get install apache2
Make a symlink from apache's doc Root to the CD
root@sahara:/var/www # ln -s /var/lib/tftpboot/ubuntu/
Or copy the /ubuntu directory from the CD into here.Install dhcp server.
root@sahara:~ # apt-get install dhcp3-server
Set the dhcp server to tell the clients what to boot. I added a default host name, you don't need it but it comes in handy for other things.
root@sahara:~ # cat /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf subnet 192.168.1.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 { range 192.168.1.10 192.168.1.254; } # put your DNS IP's here: option domain-name-servers 192.168.1.7, 68.87.66.196 ; filename="ubuntu/feisty/alternate/install/netboot/pxelinux.0"; root@sahara:~ # /etc/init.d/dhcp3-server restart Stopping DHCP server: dhcpd3. Starting DHCP server: dhcpd3.- Boot up the client box, config the bios to net boot and you should get the Ubuntu screen and Boot: prompt. Yippee!
The above steps should give you an interactive setup, very similar to if you had booted from the CD.
Advanced: Hands-Off, Preseeded Network Server Install
The above is for an interactive install, just as if you booted from CD. The following addresses preseeding, which enables a Hands Off Install where all the questions have been answered and fed to the installer. In addition, the following does not pull anything from the Internet.
A handfull of preseed options need to be passed via kernel options. The kernel only supports 255 chars, so things are cramped. To accomodate this, I dumped some of the paths and made symlinks. That gave me just enough space for now. Note that the path/name of the kernel gets appended, so even trimming that helped.
{{{root@sahara:/var/lib/tftpboot # ln -s ubuntu-installer/i386/initrd.gz root@sahara:/var/lib/tftpboot # ln -s ubuntu-installer/i386/linux}}}
/var/lib/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default
# pxelinux.cfg/default
# display u0buntu-installer/i386/boot-screens/syslinux.txt
default menu
prompt 1
timeout 150
ontimeout boothd
label menu
# makes a menu out of this file, allows editing the options on the client
kernel menu.c32
label boothd
# boot from the first HD
# (this is what happens if nothing is pressed for 15 seconds)
localboot 0
label ubuntu-feisty-normal
# ubuntu instaler
kernel ubuntu-feisty/linux
append vga=normal initrd=ubuntu-feisty/initrd.gz ramdisk_size=14984 root=/dev/rd/0 rw --
label ubuntu-feisty-hands-off
# ubuntu instaler
# The 'kernel' and 'initrd' paths must identify files under tftpboot.
# For example, on my system I have /var/lib/tftpboot/ubuntu-feisty/linux and /var/lib/tftpboot/ubuntu-feisty/initrd.gz.
kernel ubuntu-feisty/linux
append initrd=ubuntu-feisty/initrd.gz ramdisk_size=14984 root=/dev/rd/0 rw preseed/locale=en_US kbd-chooser/method=us netcfg/wireless_wep= netcfg/choose_interface=eth0 netcfg/get_hostname= preseed/url=http://192.168.1.7/preseed-feisty.cfg vga=6 --netcfg/get_hostname= Is blank so that it will pick up the host-name supplied by the DHCP server.
netcfg/choose_interface=eth0 - You may wish to specify eth1 or wlan0 for laptops if you want it to setup the wifi card, not the wired port.
Note for client-specific PXE configurations: The DHCP server can't pass it, but pretending that the MAC address of your wireless card is 12 : CD : 56 : AB : 78 : EF you can specify a custom pxelinux.cfg/01-12-dc-56-ab-78-ef (lowercase) instead. If you are using static dhcp, you can also use the IP address in hex for a per-machine or per-subnet or per-network configuration. See http://syslinux.zytor.com/pxe.php#config for more information. Basically, say you have three wireless cards where the IP in hex translated to caf12d5e, caf12d6b, caf124ea, you could specify pxelinux.cfg/caf12d and pxelinux.cfg/caf12. The first two would match to the first config file and the third would match to the second config file.
Originally found at http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/feisty/main/installer-i386/current/doc/manual/en/apcs01.html and saved to /var/www/preseed.cfg, here are the important changes:
d-i mirror/country string enter information manually d-i mirror/http/hostname string sahara # This is whatever HTTP server you have set up d-i mirror/http/directory string /ubuntu # This is the /ubuntu directory from the install CD copied (or linked) under the webroot of your HTTP server d-i mirror/suite string feisty # Name your ubuntu version here d-i mirror/http/proxy string
(See http://www.debian.org/releases/etch/example-preseed.txt for another example.)
Here is my current dhcpd.conf
ping-check = 1;
log-facility local7;
option domain-name "sahara.net";
option time-servers 192.168.1.1;
option broadcast-address 192.168.1.255;
option domain-name-servers 63.240.76.4, 204.127.198.4;
option routers 192.168.1.1;
subnet 192.168.1.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {
range 192.168.1.10 192.168.1.254;
}
# Hoary test boxes
group {
filename="pxelinux.0" ;
# You need a next-server option if TFTP and DHCPd aren't on the same system.
next-server sahara;
# 192.168.1.2 does not exist on my lan.
# I am setting it like this to make sure the box doesn't find
# a repo on the net to pull sources from.
# It would be good I can figure out how to i
# limit these setting to the install phase
# (including the 2nd part after the reboot )
option domain-name-servers 192.168.1.2 ;
option routers 192.168.1.2 ;
host dwl650p {
hardware ethernet 00:05:5d:5a:81:f0 ;
option host-name "dwl650p" ; }
# tsp2 6100 - a=wired, b=wifi
host tsp2a {
hardware ethernet 00:00:39:fa:ff:f3 ;
option host-name "tsp2a" ; }
host tsp2b {
hardware ethernet 00:02:2d:b0:c8:6c ;
option host-name "tsp2b" ; }
host tsp1 {
hardware ethernet 00:00:39:88:31:a6 ;
option host-name "tsp1" ; }
host e400 {
hardware ethernet 00:60:08:b0:62:0d ;
# fixed-address 192.168.1.181 ;
option host-name "e400" ; }
}If your box doesn't have the option to boot from lan (like one of mine) you can make a boot disk that will do that part.
http://etherboot.sourceforge.net
I am pleased to say that I was able to read, download, build, run, make the floppy in under 30 min.
"Etherboot does not (yet) offer support for PCMCIA cards." so the older laptops will have to wait.
Pile of PXE related links:
http://freshmeat.net/projects/syslinux/
http://syslinux.zytor.com/memdisk.php
http://support.3com.com/infodeli/tools/nic/mba.htm New Universal NDIS Driver for DOS
http://www.qualystem.com/en/dualboot.html
http://unattended.sourceforge.net/step-by-step.php
http://unattended.sourceforge.net/advanced.php#pxe
http://syslinux.zytor.com/archives/2003-June/002185.html
http://www.intel.com/design/network/drivers/int21143.htm
http://www.tux.org/pub/distributions/tinylinux/tomsrtbt/
http://www.winimage.com/winimage.htm
http://www.weird-solutions.com/docs/pxe_booting.pdf
http://www.weird-solutions.com/bin/util/tftp_root.zip
http://marc.herbert.free.fr/linux/win2linstall.html Install GNU/Linux without any CD, floppy, USB-key, nor any other removable media.
http://osdev.berlios.de/netboot.html - Network-booting Your Operating System - the part I like: "...loads the GRUB, the second-stage loader, off the server." --- PPC Mac related links
http://www.macgeekery.com/hacks/how_to_install_debian_via_network_boot_from_a_mac