CentOS - Oct 2014 - trying to kickstart a vm guest from my datastore

I have a new ESXi server (5.x), and trying to load some VM guests on there.
I have the guests configured, but when I try and boot from ISO image, 
the graphics are so bad it is futile. No worries I normally use 
kickstart anyways.

Because the ESXi (on the same network as my physical servers) cannot 
talk to the PXE server. But works fine on the network (I can ssh/scp in 
and out of the ESXi server). i am unable to kickstart from the network. 
As this is a blade, there is not DVD access. But I have a kickstart 
file, an iso image on my datastore.

Really I have two questions:
1. how do I "test" or troubleshoot WHY ESXi cannot reach the pxe
server.
The mac addresses/ips/hostnames of the VM guests are in DNS and DHCP.
2. How do I kickstart a VM guest from the datastore kickstart file/iso 
image?

D.

On 10/06/2014 10:36 AM, Dan Hyatt wrote:
>
> I have a new ESXi server (5.x), and trying to load some VM guests on there.
> I have the guests configured, but when I try and boot from ISO image,
> the graphics are so bad it is futile. No worries I normally use
> kickstart anyways.
>
> Because the ESXi (on the same network as my physical servers) cannot
> talk to the PXE server. But works fine on the network (I can ssh/scp in
> and out of the ESXi server). i am unable to kickstart from the network.
> As this is a blade, there is not DVD access. But I have a kickstart
> file, an iso image on my datastore.
>
> Really I have two questions:
> 1. how do I "test" or troubleshoot WHY ESXi cannot reach the pxe
server.
> The mac addresses/ips/hostnames of the VM guests are in DNS and DHCP.
> 2. How do I kickstart a VM guest from the datastore kickstart file/iso
> image?
>
> D.
I can't say much about (1), but I do kickstart my VM installs all the 
time.  My approach might not work for you, but here goes.

I put all my ISO images on an NFS share from my workstation, which I 
then configure on my EXSi boxes as a datastore.  I then put my kickstart 
files in a directory reachable via http.

I configure the VMs using VSphere and power them on.  Since I don't have 
a PXE server configured it pauses there, so I open the console to the 
VM, point the CD drive to an ISO image on the datastore, and reboot the 
VM using "send ctrl-alt-del," which then boots from the ISO image. 
When
the boot menu comes, up, I hit tab and append "ks=http://{url to 
kickstart file}" to the kernel line and continue from there.  The 
installation generally continues without much manual intervention from 
there, other than the "Initialize Disk?" messages.

There's a LOT more manual intervention here than I like, but there are 
constraints in my environment that will not allow me to stand up a PXE 
server.  I have been able to do this with the VSphere client on Windows 
(grumble!) and the web GUI via VCenter.

YMMV!
-- 
Jay Leafey - jay.leafey at mindless.com
Memphis, TN