Red Hat NETWORK 3.2 - PROVISIONING Reference Manual

Also see for NETWORK 3.2 - PROVISIONING: Reference guide

Contents

62 Chapter 4. Red Hat Network Website4.4.10. KickstartTo satisfy the provisioning needs of customers, RHN provides this interface for developing kickstartprofiles by which new systems may be built. This enables systems to be installed to particular speci-fications automatically.WarningSince RHN Proxy Servers direct files from the central RHN Servers, and those servers do not dis-tribute the files necessary for kickstart, systems connected to a Proxy not being served by an RHNSatellite Server must be kickstarted using an external installation tree. Refer to Section 4.4.10.8Distributions for instructions on setting up installation trees.4.4.10.1. Kickstart PrerequisitesAlthough Red Hat Network has taken great pains to ease the provisioning of systems, some prepara-tion is still required for your infrastructure to handle kickstarts. For instance, before creating kickstartprofiles, you should have:• Installed and have running a DHCP server.• Installed and have running a TFTP server.• Configured DHCP to assign required networking parameters and the bootloader program location.• Specified within the bootloader configuration file the kernel to be used and appropriate kernel op-tions.For a decription of the innerworkings of the kickstart process, refer to Section 4.4.10.2 KickstartExplained.4.4.10.2. Kickstart ExplainedWhen a machine is to receive a network-based kickstart, the following events must occur in this order:1. After being placed on the network and turned on, the machine’s PXE logic broadcasts its MACaddress and a request to be discovered.2. The DHCP server recognizes the discovery request and extends an offer of network informationneeded for the new machine to boot. This includes an IP address, the default gateway to be used,the netmask of the network, the IP address of the TFTP server holding the bootloader program,and the full path and filename of that program (relative to the TFTP server’s root).3. The machine applies the networking information and initiates a session with the TFTP server torequest the bootloader program.4. The bootloader, once loaded, searches for its configuration file on the TFTP server from which itwas itself loaded. This file dictates which kernel and kernel options, such as the initial RAM disk(initrd) image, should be executed on the booting machine. Assuming the bootloader programis SYSLINUX, this file will be located in the pxelinux.cfg directory on the TFTP server andnamed the hexadecimal equivalent of the new machine’s IP address. For example, a bootloaderconfiguration file for Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS 2.1 should contain:port 0prompt 0timeout 1default My_Labellabel My_Label