From owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Jan 12 19:25:00 2015 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher AECDH-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id ACF15B2E for ; Mon, 12 Jan 2015 19:25:00 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail-la0-x233.google.com (mail-la0-x233.google.com [IPv6:2a00:1450:4010:c03::233]) (using TLSv1 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-RC4-SHA (128/128 bits)) (Client CN "smtp.gmail.com", Issuer "Google Internet Authority G2" (verified OK)) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 4BC70EA1 for ; Mon, 12 Jan 2015 19:25:00 +0000 (UTC) Received: by mail-la0-f51.google.com with SMTP id ms9so25796568lab.10 for ; Mon, 12 Jan 2015 11:24:58 -0800 (PST) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=20120113; h=mime-version:sender:date:message-id:subject:from:to:content-type; bh=eQ2UVGdUBCPqSEVuhukhXwWqPTZEW7k81NUF0AhjNZM=; b=T5/cE5a7vLYOnhUOp2EIVn7Hud+78Ngwavzy2+1e3v1kFAM6btXyIG/l7y+9Srn5lC iXsgZGdNZcJgykxi05m4vfcfTaOVFF4yNoBQ2BoPtdDLund4b5MQFFYX1kvNBm9D0Qap /xMN27aFVJ/HmXtXx5e6d1hEHhfJLBrz/zfZocnAfkfkiGdjTpqOuBgVyy39haWA6/JL bhazdggCBsU5chhAJnuuxHZPAVzDjKqvULIi00dWKnSyGUth43qOLGn55mPm6NSjiuUf 33DrwfLWOUUQPP47u8Vj62o+3ycyiQeJy+6Kw/kAzCNWQfvQRWbmApPzUjqfmJScCkc0 Ohlg== MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Received: by 10.112.148.73 with SMTP id tq9mr38424975lbb.37.1421090698320; Mon, 12 Jan 2015 11:24:58 -0800 (PST) Sender: crodr001@gmail.com Received: by 10.112.141.5 with HTTP; Mon, 12 Jan 2015 11:24:58 -0800 (PST) Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2015 11:24:58 -0800 X-Google-Sender-Auth: LA7uA1ygbYeG9_tVXEGD4Hvnruc Message-ID: Subject: Devops question: unattended installs of FreeBSD? From: Craig Rodrigues To: freebsd-current Current Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 X-Content-Filtered-By: Mailman/MimeDel 2.1.18-1 X-BeenThere: freebsd-current@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.18-1 Precedence: list List-Id: Discussions about the use of FreeBSD-current List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2015 19:25:00 -0000 Hi, I had a devops person who is familiar with setting up hundreds of Linux nodes in cloud environment ask me what is the best way to do unattended installs in a cloud environment. Linux has kickstart installs, which are quite useful and popular. What is the equivalent in FreeBSD? In the sysinstall days, the sysinstall.cfg config file could be created which drove large parts of the installer. Now that sysinstall is gone, what is the alternative? Searching the web, I found two answers: (1) Write your own script (2) Use pc-sysinstall from the PC-BSD project http://wiki.pcbsd.org/index.php/Creating_an_Automated_Installation_with_pc-sysinstall/10.0/en I am trying to work with a devops team who is very experienced with setting up Linux environments in the cloud. Based on the available docs, it is not clear to non-FreeBSD experts how to accomplish similar things with FreeBSD. By the way, I would be very interested in hearing from people who have experience in installing, configuring, and upgrading hundreds or even thousands of FreeBSD nodes in devops and cloud environments. For people who are not FreeBSD experts, but who are Linux devops experts, is it easy to do, or is there a lot of custom scripts which need to be written? Thanks. -- Craig