LTSP on Ubuntu - great job!

[John Marshall]

Hi,
Last night I finally got LTSP on Breezy going between
an Ubuntu-based Pentium 4 1.6GHz (384Mb) and a
PXE-booting Compaq DeskPro Pentium 2 300Mhz (256Mb)
sans hard-disk.

I'm EXTREMELY impressed with the result, the
connection feels snappy and responsive and my USB
keyboard and wireless mouse were detected perfectly.

I pretty-much followed the how-to at
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ThinClientHowto although I
must say it could do with an update, specifically some
of the file locations (I had to edit a couple of
config files to correctly point to the pxelinux.0
file, which is not mounted where the how-to implies.
Because I wanted the latest ltsp-utils package (with
the latest kernel etc), I also had to refer to the
directions at
http://wiki.ltsp.org/twiki/bin/view/Ltsp/LTSP-42, and
peek at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LTSPHowTo so I think I
might have a bit of a mongrel installation.

My biggest issue was (of course) between keyboard and
chair. The Compaq was getting a DHCP address from the
server but then bombing out saying "No PXE Server
found" or some such garbage. I was convinced I had my
TFTP settings wrong (because the how-tos above are
somewhat conflicting about where things live). I tore
my hair out for a few hours, then I Googled the error
message and it was due to a bad motherboard firmware
version on the Compaq. 

One reflash later and I was through that trauma. I DID
have the TFTP path set wrong but the syslog messages
from the TFTP daemon were able to set me right. One
more config file tweak to export the right directory
from NFS (again, the how-tos have differing ideas on
the path to export) and my client went straight in.

Note I didn't have to do any of the ssh configuration
stuff mentioned on the Ubuntu wiki. Indeed the file
referred to doesn't even exist on my system (?)

I'm really impressed with how helpful the error
messages are during client boot - it told me almost
exactly what the issue was when it couldn't mount from
NFS - AND HOW TO FIX IT! :-)

I imagine the LTSP experience with Dapper will be even
better as it'll have the latest LTSP build included,
and doco in line with that. Can't wait. May I suggest
that the doco has a prominent section about ensuring
clients have up-to-date PXE firmware? :-) 

In the meantime, congratulations on a great job and a
great OS.

Best Regards,
John Marshall


		
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