From owner-freebsd-sysinstall@FreeBSD.ORG Sun Feb 20 03:24:20 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-sysinstall@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 30BE11065674; Sun, 20 Feb 2011 03:24:20 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from doconnor@gsoft.com.au) Received: from cain.gsoft.com.au (cain.gsoft.com.au [203.31.81.10]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8CCEA8FC1D; Sun, 20 Feb 2011 03:24:19 +0000 (UTC) Received: from ur.dons.net.au (ppp203-122-198-244.lns6.adl6.internode.on.net [203.122.198.244]) (authenticated bits=0) by cain.gsoft.com.au (8.14.4/8.14.3) with ESMTP id p1K2ivsW091043 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=AES128-SHA bits=128 verify=NO); Sun, 20 Feb 2011 13:14:58 +1030 (CST) (envelope-from doconnor@gsoft.com.au) Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v1082) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii From: "Daniel O'Connor" In-Reply-To: Date: Sun, 20 Feb 2011 13:14:57 +1030 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Message-Id: <1F3921E9-5314-43CA-9515-EDAADFCD47B1@gsoft.com.au> References: To: grarpamp X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.1082) X-Spam-Score: 0.163 () BAYES_00,RDNS_DYNAMIC X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.67 on 203.31.81.10 Cc: freebsd-current Current , freebsd-sysinstall@freebsd.org Subject: Re: FreeBSD Installer Roadmap X-BeenThere: freebsd-sysinstall@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Sysinstall Work List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 20 Feb 2011 03:24:20 -0000 On 19/02/2011, at 20:04, grarpamp wrote: > 1 - I used install.cfg's on floppies to clone systems, a lot. Hands > on the box were needed with that. Operators skills were in question, > so having them use the dialog menus properly was a pain and often > resulted in non-zeroed disk or half built systems. And though all > else was cloned, it needed a separate .cfg for each box due > to: >=20 > fqdn, gateway, ip/mask > interface - sometimes changed > root disk - sometimes changed >=20 > Would have killed for a simple console shell script to ask those > questions of the operator, per machine. Not to get into the whole "wishlist for sysinstall Mk II" (aka second = system syndrome in full effect).. You can do this with sysinstall already (although it isn't very clean). Also, you don't need floppies, you can do the whole install off a FAT32 = USB stick with the aforementioned install.cfg file and a script run from = that. I do this at work to do a partition & minimal install, then untar a = pre-populated FS generated from a chroot. It also asks various questions = afterward for final tuning. -- Daniel O'Connor software and network engineer for Genesis Software - http://www.gsoft.com.au "The nice thing about standards is that there are so many of them to choose from." -- Andrew Tanenbaum GPG Fingerprint - 5596 B766 97C0 0E94 4347 295E E593 DC20 7B3F CE8C