fai-chboot - manage the network boot configuration files

fai-chboot [OPTION]... KERNELNAME ROOTFS HOST...

fai-chboot -l [-e|-r|-t|-o|-g] [PATTERN]

fai-chboot -e HOST...

fai-chboot -r HOST...

fai-chboot -c HOST|TEMPLATE HOST...

fai-chboot -i [OPTION]... HOST...

fai-chboot -I [OPTION]... HOST...

This command creates the configuration files for network booting.

KERNELNAME is the file name of the kernel that will be booted. This kernel will mount the root filesystem from device ROOTFS. You can add additional kernel parameters and define some FAI specific flags. For each host one configuration file is created. The file name of the configuration file is its IP address in upper case hexadecimal. HOST can be a host name or an IP address.

-B

Set default values for FAI_FLAGS. This is the same as -f verbose,sshd,reboot

-c

Copy an existing config file to one or more hosts or templates and enable them for network booting.

-d DIR

Set the default directory for the network boot configuration to DIR. The default value is /boot/fai/pxelinux.cfg/.

-e

Reenable network booting for HOST. This renames the config file and removes the suffix .disable from it, so the next time it uses the old PXE configuration.

-f fai_flags

Set FAI_FLAGS. The flags must be comma separated.

-F

Set default values for FAI_FLAGS. This is the same as -f verbose,sshd,createvt

-h

Show simle help and version.

-i

Set parameters for booting the FAI install kernel. Same as -k "ip=dhcp devfs=nomount" vmlinuz-install /dev/nfs. This does not set FAI_ACTION.

-I

Same as -i but also sets FAI_ACTION=install. So a fully automatic installation will be performed. ATTENTION! This will erase most of the data on the install clients local disks.

-k parameters

Set kernel append parameters.

-l

List the configuration for all hosts in short format. If PATTERN is given, list only hosts matching PATTERN. Lists hostname, FAI_ACTION, kernel name and IP address in hex. With -l, list only enabled hosts. With -r list only disabled hosts. With -t list only templates. With -o list only hosts that does not match any of the other categories. With -g list the configuration for all hosts, sorted and ordered by groups (enabled, disabled, templates, others).

-L

List the configuration for all hosts. Also list the kernel append parameters. If PATTERN is given, list only hosts matching PATTERN.

-n

Do not create configuration but show what will be done. This also enables the verbose flag.

-o

Do localboot via PXE. Do not boot via network card, but use next boot device which is specified in the BIOS. Normally this is the local disk.

-p

Preserve existing config files. The default is to overwrite an existing config file.

-r

Disable network booting for HOST. This renames the config file and adds the suffix .disable to it.

-S

Same as -i but also sets FAI_ACTION=sysinfo.

-v

Create verbose output.

fai-chboot -l

List the configuration for all hosts.

fai-chboot -iFv atom02 atom03 dom kueppers

The hosts atom02, atom03, dom and kueppers will boot the FAI install kernel. FAI_ACTION will not be set unless specified with option -k or -I. You can also use the script class/LAST.var on the install server to set FAI_ACTION.

fai-chboot -FSv atom02

The host atom02 will boot the FAI install kernel but with FAI_ACTION sysinfo.

fai-chboot -IBv atom02

The host atom02 will be installed. ATTENTION! All data on the local hard disks are lost in most cases, because we want to install a new system. After the installation the host automatically reboots.

fai-chboot -v atom-localboot /dev/hda1 atom03

Next time atom03 will boot the kernel atom-localboot which mounts the root filesystem from /dev/hda1.

fai-chboot memtest86+ koeln atom02

The host atom02 will boot the memory test. Install the package memtest86+ and copy the executable memtest86+.bin to /boot/fai. Since memtest does not need a root filesystem, you can use any string for it.

fai-chboot -o default

All hosts, that do not have a PXE configuration for their IP-address will do a localboot, means booting from local disk.

Currently only PXE boot is supported. BOOTP configuration can be managed using the tlink utility.

This program is part of FAI (Fully Automatic Installation). See the FAI manual for more information on how to use fcopy. The FAI homepage is http://www.informatik.uni-koeln.de/fai.

Thomas Lange <lange@informatik.uni-koeln.de>