RHEL/CentOS Diskless Clients

Note: This article seems to have been pasted, but not

previewed, before it was commmitted. On its face it reports a
mixed success (i.e., a partial failure). You may find that the
Linux Terminal Server Project has similar, but more proofread
content, and works with CentOS just fine.

Currently CentOS 5 support for system-config-netboot is not

working. There are technical difficulties in the package that
don't allow for ease of use. You can install the A Fedora Core 6
package for system-config-netboot and it will work, for some
definitions of: work but there are many other issues.

This guide may assist in trying to get things to function in a

CentOS 5 environment, but the initial author of this article was
unsuccessful even after following those instructions.

The Linux Terminal Server Project has similar content, but in a

form that works with CentOS just fine.

The original author asserted that Red Hat plans a fix and to
include a working system-config-netboot in the future, but no
ETA for such a fix was stated. This shouldn't prevent loading
CentOS 4 or 5 machines as the actual diskless clients, but only
meant he had problems using a CentOS 5 as the NFS Diskless
Image Server. Note again, that this is the opinion of the original
author; a later revisor of this page, RussHerrold runs such, with
SElinux labelling fixes on the NFS server side without incident.

This guide will help you setup an NFS server to dish out
diskless clients on your network. This is useful if you want to
bring up workstations quickly, without the hassle of hard drives,
and or worrying about multiple installations along the way.
 Some of the commands are from the official Red Hat Docs.
This guide will assume you're creating two different installation
types, a server and a desktop installation.

NFS Server Setup

1. Install NFS and Create Directories

The first step is to create a NFS server if one is not already set
up. The client OS filesystem lives (is stored) on that NFS
server. As part of the PXE boot process a host with a PXE boot
enabled network card, will issue a broadcast for a an IP
address, and be provided that IP assignement by DHCP server
aloing with a optional field for a so-called 'next-server' and an
initial boot image to chain load after the minimal boot image
used by the network card (from ROM, or other source) . The
host the retreives its files and configurations from the NFS
share configured in this section.

Having spare disk space available in the NFS export becomes

a necessity as one starts adding more than one variety of an
installation, because the entire client system OS will be copied
to the NFS server. Customarily, the end user /home is not
carried in those images, but separately mounted. Go ahead and
install the NFS packages if they aren't already installed on your
server.

# yum install nfs-utils nfs-utils-lib sytem-config-nfs

Next, create the directories that you will be needing later on.
 These will be the actual NFS shares specified. If you want to
put these somewhere else, or you can to specify different
names, do so. You can share them from anywhere. The first
directory will host a server installation of CentOS4, and the
second directory a CentOS installation with a desktop
environment.

# mkdir -p /srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S/root
# mkdir -p /srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4D/root

2. Configure NFS Mounts

Now you need to create the actual actual shares and start the
NFS server.

# vim /etc/exports
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S/root/
*(ro,sync,no_root_squash)
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S/snapshot/
*(rw,sync,no_root_squash)
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4D/root/
*(ro,sync,no_root_squash)
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4D/snapshot/
*(rw,sync,no_root_squash)

Start the NFS server and verify the NFS shares are ok and start
the service. If NFS services are already running, then reload
them.

# service nfs start (reload)

# chkconfig nfs on
# nfs-export -l

Directory Permissions
Hosts
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S/root/ ro
*
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S/snapshot/ rw
*
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4D/root/ ro
*
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4D/snapshot/ rw
*

DHCP Server Configuration

If you don't already have a Linux DHCP server going on your
network, then please see the documentation regarding setup of
a DHCP server. It's completely acceptable to install a DHCP
server on the NFS server if you want. For my example, there is
a separate DHCP server already running.

1. PXE DHCP Configuration

Place the following configuration within /etc/dhcpd.conf. This
specifies that network booting will be allowed. When the DHCP
server comes across such a request, it will direct the client to
the NFS server you have specified. Please remember or keep
in mind that if you already have a DHCP server on the network,
be careful with adding a second one.

# vim /etc/dhcpd.conf
allow booting;
allow bootp;
class "pxeclients" {
match if substring(option vendor-class-identifier, 0, 9) =
"PXEClient";
next-server 192.168.1.20;
filename "linux-install/pxelinux.0";
}

2. Setup tftp
Ensure that xinetd and tftp are installed on the DHCP server.

# yum install xinetd tftp-server

Ensure both services are setup on the DHCP server.

# chkconfig --level 345 xinetd on

# chkconfig --level 345 tftp on

Install/Configure/Copy an Installation
Next you have to actually install an installation, or use an
existing system from somewhere. For this experiment, I've
installed a fresh basic non-gui load of CentOS 4.6. Completely
setup the host as you wish, because this will be the actual copy
of all the diskless clients in a bit. For my purposes, I've
installed, updated, and copied any local configurations I want or
need on my network to my host. Anything you want customized,
do it now because it's easier to set it up once the right way. A
 perfect example of this is if you need third-party RPM packages
installed, go ahead and install them on the host now. The only
package that is required on the host is busybox-anaconda.

# yum install busybox-anaconda

Once you have your installation configured the way you want,
go back over to the NFS server and rsync the installation to the
NFS share. If you don't want to see what's being copied,
remove the -v switch.

# rsync -v -a -e ssh --exclude='/proc/*' --exclude='/sys/*'

host_of_installation:/ /srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S/root/
receiving file list...
<snip buckets of output>

Diskless Client Setup

1. Netboot Configuration
Head back over to your NFS server now. If you are remotely
accessing the server via SSH, then you must forward X with the
session.

# ssh -X nfs_server
Install the netboot configuration tool if it's not already on the
system, and launch the tool. There are differences between 4.6
 and 5.1 during this step. RHEL 5 does not include system-
config-netboot due to technical problems. You can however
install the FC6 binary with a little extra work.

# yum install system-config-netboot

# system-config-netboot
You should have a nice little X window pop up asking you what
you want to do. The first time you run this, you should get the
little wizard popup. Click Diskless to continue. The steps are
outlined for what you have to do. The rsync step has already
been completed. Click Forward and enter an OS name and
description. The next screen is where you enter your NFS
information. In the Server IP Address, enter the NFS server
IP. In the Directory section, enter the first NFS share --
/srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S. On the next screen, pick the kernel
that you want running on your diskless clients. When complete,
click Apply and wait a few moments as it does its magic. This
tool automatically creates and configures an image file and
places it in the PXE boot directory.

2. Host Configuration
Once the diskless OS environment is setup, you can create and
configure a new host system with the configuration tool. If you
need specifics of what all the parameters are, then check out
the adding hosts section of Red Hat's documenation. In the GUI
tool, select New to start the host creation process.

The machine you're adding must have a valid IP or hostname

on the network, which shouldn't be an issue. For my instance, I
took an existing PC off my network, pulled the hard drive, and
used it to boot diskless. In the hostname field, go ahead and
 enter a valid machine. Since you only have one OS
environment setup at the moment, the only option for OS will be
the one you just created in step 1 of the netboot configuration. If
you have more than one OS, then choose the appropriate OS
you desire in the drop-down menu. If you leave the snapshot
name blank, then it will automatically fill it in with the hostname
it finds on your network. Remember we exported an NFS mount
point for this: /srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S{D}/snapshot. Lastly, if
you want the host to log remotely, then fill in your system logger
that accepts remote logging. When finished, click ok to create
the host.

If you don't want to have to deal with the wrong hostname on

any new machine, then go ahead and wipe it out of the synced
files. For instance, I'm creating a server install because I want
to have it as generic as possible, and I also want to have it boot
on multiple machines. If I leave the information in the files, then
it'll pick up the hostname of the machine the OS was created
on. It's a minor annoyance. If you don't care, leave it alone.

# vim /srv/diskless/i386/RHEL4S/root/etc/sysconfig/network-
scripts/ifcfg-eth0{1,2,3} (whatever your NIC is)
HWADDR= <--- blank this out
DHCPDHCP_HOSTNAME= <-- blank this out

Now when you boot up the new diskless host, it won't get mad
about the MAC address being different, and it won't have a
hostname. It should only be named localhost. Obviously you
can set the hostname at will.

That's it for adding hosts. You can now repeat this entire
process for each OS environment type. Don't forget if you
create a new OS type, then you're going to want to add a new
directory under NFS to export. Think of it as housing different
 OSes, so make the names distinguishable. For my uses, I'm
creating the already mentioned server and desktop installation.
You can use it for anything you want, though. Let's say you
want to create an instance for a very specific task, but don't
have a hard drive for the machine. This allows you to create an
instance on VMware, or any other virtual environment, and
copy that installation over to NFS. Now you can boot it up on
any machine with a PXE network card.

PXE Boot
A note about PXE, which is short for Preboot Execution
Environment. Do a Wikipedia search if you really desire
deeping meanings. In short, the network card's firmware
searches for a PXE redirect, which happily passes this
information along from the DHCP server, which then points it to
your NFS server specified. It then downloads via tftp the boot
file path into memory, and continues to execute it. Ultimately,
you have your OS boot up from memory then.

All network cards are different, so consult the manufacturer of

the card for information on enabling PXE on your system. Most
new cards support it right out of the box, and it's just a matter of
turning it on in the BIOS (on board NICs), or by accessing a
utility menu from the network card. Again, all cards are
different.

Once you have the NIC and system ready to go, fire it up and test
it out. You should have it boot to the NIC menu, it might say
something about the MAC address, or about bootp loading. It
should immediately get passed on to your NFS server, and then
boot the Linux image. Now you can go steal all of those hard
drives out of your PCs at work, huh.