Hoary net install half works

Fri Mar 18 19:58:24 CST 2005

In poking around the world of automated installs, I figured out how to 
boot the Hoary install over the lan.  I will bugzilla the 2 things that 
I think are bugs.

What I did:

sahara is the server.
shaz is the blank box that I am trying to install Hoary on.

1. get access to the CD (I am hoping to not have to bother burning a CD)
root at sahara:/ # mount -o loop hoary-install-i386.iso /mnt/iso/

2. install Trivial File Transfer Protocol server
root at sahara:/ # apt-get install tftpd-hpa
root at sahara:~ # cat /etc/default/tftpd-hpa
#Defaults for tftpd-hpa
RUN_DAEMON="yes"
OPTIONS="-l -s /mnt/iso/install/netboot"

2.5 point the server at the netboot dir on the CD
root at sahara:/var/lib # rm tftpboot
root at sahara:/var/lib # ln -s /mnt/iso/install/netboot tftpboot

root at sahara:~ # /etc/init.d/tftpd-hpa restart
(Doesn't report anything to the screen - bug?)
(Not really sure what starts it - I get the feeling this does nothing.)

3.  setup the dhcp server:
$apt-get install dhcp3-server

3.5 set the dhcp server to tell the clients what to boot
root at sahara:/etc # cat /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf
option domain-name "sahara.net";
option domain-name-servers 68.87.64.140
log-facility local7;
option broadcast-address 192.168.1.255;
option routers  192.168.1.1;
option time-servers  192.168.1.1;
filename="pxelinux.0";
subnet 192.168.1.0  netmask 255.255.255.0 {
         range 192.168.1.10 192.168.1.254;
          }

root at sahara:/etc # /etc/init.d/dhcp3-server restart
Stopping DHCP server: dhcpd3.
Starting DHCP server: dhcpd3.

4.0 Boot up the client box, config the bios to net boot

and you should get the Ubuntu Hoary screen and Boot: prompt. Yipee!

Hit enter, and it will prompt for language, location, keyboard - then 
detecting network, configuring dhcp, promps for Hostname: shaz(enter),

Now the fun part:
The title of the dialog is: [!!] Choose a mirror of the Ubuntu archive [!!]
But all of the body of the dialog is about HTTP proxy access:
<body>
If you need to use a HTTP proxy to access the outside world, tner the 
proxy information here.  Otherwise leave this blank.

The proxy infomation should be given in the standard form of 
"http://[[user][:pass]@]host[:port]/"

HTTP proxy information (blank for none)
</body>

So I hit enter, and a new dialog on a red backgroud:
The title of the dialog is the same: [!!] Choose a mirror of the Ubuntu 
archive
<body>
Bad archive mirror
The specified Ubuntu archive m not available, or does not have a valid 
release file on it.  Please try a different mirror.
Go Back  Continue
</body>
(nother screen shot of that message: 
http://dev.personnelware.com/carl/temp/e/p1010009.jpg )

checking the Alt-F4 console, I see it is doing:
wget -q http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu//dists/hoary/Release -O - | 
grep ^Suite: | cut -d' ' -f 2

Which doesn't return anything.  I am guessing Release didn't used to be 
in html, and now it is.

(guessing this is another bug.)

So this is where I am stuck.

I am going to try to mount the CD on my local apache and see if I can't 
work around it.  Will report back if I get something.

Carl Karsten