From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Sat Dec 10 12:32:01 2005 Return-Path: X-Original-To: questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D3E6B16A41F for ; Sat, 10 Dec 2005 12:32:01 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from norgaard@locolomo.org) Received: from strange.daemonsecurity.com (59.Red-81-33-11.staticIP.rima-tde.net [81.33.11.59]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 25BA343D5D for ; Sat, 10 Dec 2005 12:32:00 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from norgaard@locolomo.org) Received: from [172.16.2.1] (unknown [172.16.2.1]) by strange.daemonsecurity.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4652B2E041; Sat, 10 Dec 2005 13:30:00 +0100 (CET) Message-ID: <439ACABB.2070305@locolomo.org> Date: Sat, 10 Dec 2005 13:31:55 +0100 From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Erik_N=F8rgaard?= Organization: Locolomo.ORG User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.6 (X11/20050909) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: pete wright References: <57d710000512092223q6683431bqe6d694420286a106@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <57d710000512092223q6683431bqe6d694420286a106@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: fbsdq Subject: Re: Projects List page X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sat, 10 Dec 2005 12:32:01 -0000 pete wright wrote: > Saw the newly posted list of projects that need volunteers. One > project in particular caught my eye: > > http://www.freebsd.org/projects/ideas/#p-pxeinstaller > (FreeBSD PXE Install support) > > I do not see an email contact regarding this, has anyone started > working something like this? In the bottom is a list of people associated with a group of projects, so I guess you can write to one of them and ask and/or volunteer. I don't know what exactly they have in mind, they write good PXE knowledge is required, but I see the main task to provide a good UI. I see two things to do: 1) preconfiguring a server 2) configuring the pxe-install 1) is the easy part: You just need the live disk to be preinstalled with isc-dhcpd (or similar) and tftp preconfigured. I guess ftp-install would be the viable method using an external ftp-server, else a native ftp server should be preconfigured and populated with install files. The problem is 2) It's fairly easy to create a memory disk boot image that is fetched with tftp. The problem is that this contains the script file that scripts the installation and that script should be customizeable. The script is a sysinstall script and sysinstall is largely undocumented in this regard. Further sysinstall, AFAIK, is regularly suggested for an overhaul, and it is at least listed for a minor update on the project list. So, in my point of view, the obvious solution would be to work on sysinstall, adding an option "save configuration" which would generate the script. Then we only need to save it in the memory disk image. I don't know if the listed network people are reading this, or maybe those who are not yet responsible for sysinstall. But I would be interested in working on this... (well, not exactly sysinstall as much as the easy parts :-) Cheers, Erik -- Ph: +34.666334818 web: http://www.locolomo.org S/MIME Certificate: http://www.locolomo.org/crt/2004071206.crt Subject ID: A9:76:7A:ED:06:95:2B:8D:48:97:CE:F2:3F:42:C8:F2:22:DE:4C:B9 Fingerprint: 4A:E8:63:38:46:F6:9A:5D:B4:DC:29:41:3F:62:D3:0A:73:25:67:C2