semi howto Headless instal/upgrade

[Bret Hughes]

On Mon, 2003-11-17 at 13:02, Bret Hughes wrote:
> On Mon, 2003-11-17 at 10:48, Matthew Saltzman wrote:
> > On Mon, 17 Nov 2003, Jesse Keating wrote:
> > 
> > > On Sunday 16 November 2003 14:08, Matthew Saltzman wrote:
> > > > Is it possible to use the VNC install option to do a completely headless
> > > > install?  How does one pass the vnc-related boot options to the
> > > > bootloader if one doesn't have a keyboard?  Is kickstart the only way?
> > >
> > > Carefully crafted boot CD that has all the VNC info set in the default
> > > image that you have set to timeout to.  You can mess with the boot.iso
> > > provided and set up the options you want to use in isolinux config files.
> > 
> > I was hoping it would be easier than that.  Can it be done with a floppy
> > and a network or hard disk install?
> > 
> 
> not sure about the remote part but I was able to install fedora by
> booting to the iso installation kernel an initrd provided in the
> installation tree.  I am dinking now.  
> 

ok I got this to work but sort of involved.  The box I did this from has
no external media at all so ther are a few steps a normal person might
not have to do.

These steps involve three machines, the box to be installed/upgraded
(test1), the nfs server (hughesfw) and the machine to display the
installation on (bretsony)

the boot loader I use is lilo so you may have to translate this to grub
if that is what you use.

I have all the isos in an nfs exported directory on a server with the ip
10.23.0.254.  The dir is /files/yarrow-binary-i386-iso

The secret to the headless is to create a kickstart file with enough
information to get connected to the network and anaconda for a nfs
install.  I did this by putting a ks.cfg file in the same dir as the
isos.


[bhughes at hughesfw yarrow-binary-i386-iso]$ ll
total 1928980
-rw-rw-r--    1 bhughes  bhughes       140 Nov 17 13:37 ks.cfg
-rw-rw-r--    1 bhughes  bhughes       575 Nov  6 12:19 MD5SUM
-rw-rw-r--    1 bhughes  bhughes  660340736 Nov  7 04:47 yarrow-i386-disc1.iso
-rw-rw-r--    1 bhughes  bhughes  667516928 Nov  7 04:47 yarrow-i386-disc2.iso
-rw-rw-r--    1 bhughes  bhughes  645464064 Nov  7 04:47 yarrow-i386-disc3.iso

the contents of the ks.cfg file is:
#**************************** ks.cfg **********************  
# this is the kickstart file used to perform a remote upgrade to fedora
#  on a headless box
lang en_US

network --bootproto dhcp

#set this to the ipaddress of your nfs server that contains the isos 
nfs --server 10.23.0.254 --dir /files/yarrow-binary-i386-iso

#set this to the driver for your NIC
device ethernet 8139too

keyboard "us"
# *************** end of ks.cfg ********************

Copy the vmlinuz and initrd.img from the isolinux dir on the first iso
to the install box /boot/instvmlinuz  and /boot/instinitrd.img
respectively.


[root at test1 boot]# ls inst*
instinitrd.img  instvmlinuz


Next I created a lilo.conf that would pass the necessary options to the
kernel.  the stanza I added looks like this:

image=/boot/instvmlinuz
	label=reminstall
	read-only
	initrd=/boot/instinitrd.img
	append="ks=nfs:10.23.0.254:/files/yarrow-binary-i386-iso/ks.cfg vnc vncconnect=10.23.0.50"


10.23.0.254 is the nfs server. 
10.23.0.50 is my laptop that I wanted to display the install on.

on the install box run
 
lilo -v 

if everything is ok, on the install box run 

lilo -R reminstall

to tell lilo to boot the reminstall config on the next boot only


on my laptop (10.23.0.50) I ran 


vncviewer -listen


[bhughes at bretsony install]$ vncviewer -listen
vncviewer -listen: Listening on port 5500 (flash port 5400)
vncviewer -listen: Command line errors are not reported until a
connection comes in.


next I rebooted the install box and lo and behold I had a tightvnc
window pop up on my laptop with the graphical install in it.  I am sure
this could be done via a hard disk install as well, I have just never
done it that way

HTH

Bret