On 06.08.2015 [14:32:47 +0900], Scott Mattan wrote:
Jennifer,
You are specifying that on a system already registered in cobbler
that you want to be able to switch the BIOS setting for boot source? As Alvin mentioned, at the moment this is not possible, as an alternative you could script it yourself... I am however, curious to understand the reason for your needing this functionality provided that you can tell me.
I assumed, based upon the context in the first e-mail, that Jennifer's SuperMicro systems (note also mentioned working around the SuperMicro tool) are somehow "broken" at the BIOS level and don't maintain this setting.
The reason why I am curious is mainly due to the fact that once
your server is set to boot from PXE you shouldn't need to have it changed. Unless you are pre-defining your servers in cobbler and then using it to deploy each one?
I agree with you -- it's unclear why that's a necessary step.
My set up uses the default system settings to install a base
operating system, automatically register the system to cobbler, determine the system type (virtual or physical) , reinstall the correct OS/Profile, and then configure it automatically. This allows me to get my servers from the factory preset to PXE, press the power button and go.
It would be great to see an article about your setup (presuming your allowed by your employer to publish it) or maybe contrib some of your tooling around cobbler!
I would like to see various functionality like this integrated
into the cobbler framework however... of particular interest is turning on and off CPU components i.e. hyperthreading or virtualization at the BIOS level.
I'd be pretty impressed if BIOS level settings are so standardized/exposed that it could really be integrated -- and would actually work -- in Cobbler!
I'm not sure how much makes sense to integrate into cobbler proper (given that cobbler's sole goal should be installation of clients, not the configuration of the clients in some sense) but maybe in snippets (if the BIOS is exposed to the client from within the client).
-Nish