hands off install

[Carl Karsten]

Summary of questions:

0. Can the CD be used as a source for files when using the CD's netboot?

1. What is the best way to keep the hoary install up to date?

2. Is a hands off install currently available, or is that beyond the 
scope of the current project?

3. Can the network parameters be passed via kernel parameters so that 
the preseed file be pulled from the LAN?

Here is the root of theese questions.

Personally, I want to rebuild the same box once a day (or as often as 
there is a new build released), using the same preseed file each time. 
This mostly benefits the ubuntu team (i would think) and myself too 
(problems the config I like will be found sooner, and possibility fixed 
sooner.)  I actually have 2 or 3 boxes that might be used for this.   If 
I can get the prcess smoothed out, perhaps others will adopt it too. 
Lets call this group of people Testers.

I have also heard of admins that might want to install on many (100's) 
of boxes.  For them I am pursuing this a bit more aggressively than my 
for my own testing.  Lets call this group Admins.

All of these share some common issues.

0. Install media – buring CD's is time consuming, adds an opportunity 
for errors,  and costly (a few $/week and the trip to the store to buy 
more blanks.)  From what I can tell, the whole install can be done over 
a LAN but it seems that only the boot files are used and the rest is 
pulled from the Internet.


1. Bandwidth: it seems that the current netboot is geared at pulling 
most of the files from a server on the Internet.

The Testers will need to pull the most of the content down every test. 
The previous days will be discarded.

The Admins will need to pull down the content for each box.  Some Admins 
don't even have access the Net.

In an attempt to reduce the amount of data that needs to pulled from the 
mirrors which will be kind to the mirros and speed up the installs for 
both groups, I would like to see a good plan for pulling down the 
content to a server on the LAN, and the installs using that for the 
content.  For the Testers, this will allow them to use rsync to keep the 
source up to date, and for the Admins it will allow them to put one copy 
on the LAN and install multiple boxes from it.

Bit Torrent works well for the Admin group to get .iso's, but I haven't 
figured out if the Testers have much to be gained from it.  I am not 
sure how well BT will adjust an .iso that has minor changes to it.  I 
can see it working well on the dir tree that the iso is built from.  Get 
ver1.torrent, get files, seed until there is a ver2.torrent.  Stop the 
bt client, get ver2.iso, start the client.  Client will scan the 
existing files looking for incorrect chunks.  The correct chunks will 
immediately be ready for seeding to new clients.


2. The less  user interaction, the better.  Ideally, boot the box, let 
it be for a few hours, done.  This can almost be accomplished like so: 
bios is set to boot from floppy, hd, lan.. 2 floppies are created. Flop1 
is bootable, has the needed program to erase the MBR from the HD so that 
it wont boot.  Replace Flop1 with Flop2, reboot.  Flop2 is not bootable, 
so boot proceeded to HD, then lan, Lan boot times out in 5 seconds,loads 
install kernel which loads preseed.conf. From Flop 2.  Flop 2 is removed 
and Admin goes to next box.

There are a few flaws with this plan.  First, nowhere have I seen 
documentation telling how long the preseed file needs to be around.  I 
am assuming it gets opened, read into ram and after that the media can 
be removed.  It would be nice if that was the case. Next is the “remove 
media and press any key to reboot” step.  That needs to be optional.  A 
preseed file option seems the obvious answer.

3. Getting rid of a floppy. The preseed file can be read over the lan, 
but only after the box has network support.  I thought I saw something 
that would drive that via kernel parameters that can be passed in from 
pxelinux.cfg/default, but I can't find that any more.

Carl Karsten