> > Here is a bit of an odd request... II'm in a large company with lots of > politics getting in the way of things. We were able to convince the main IT > team to let us take over a subnet and run our own DHCP server. This lets us > create a really nice PXE environment where we can build servers and ship > them out. However, now we are in need to rebuild servers already deployed. > We have machines in over 70 subnets around the company. Politics won't let > me update the DHCP settings to point to my TFTP server. >How fancy is your pxe config file? Could you just burn the contents of your /ftfpboot directory to a CD-ROM and use isolinux to load the files from the CD-ROM? Eliminate DHCP, TFTP, and PXE entirely. If you get the kernel and initrd loaded with the right commandline, the kernel will initialize the network interface and let you finish the process via TCP/IP...
On Thu, Nov 19, 2015 at 8:20 PM, Phil Pokorny via Syslinux <syslinux at zytor.com> wrote:>> >> Here is a bit of an odd request... II'm in a large company with lots of >> politics getting in the way of things. We were able to convince the main IT >> team to let us take over a subnet and run our own DHCP server. This lets us >> create a really nice PXE environment where we can build servers and ship >> them out. However, now we are in need to rebuild servers already deployed. >> We have machines in over 70 subnets around the company. Politics won't let >> me update the DHCP settings to point to my TFTP server. >> > > How fancy is your pxe config file? Could you just burn the contents of > your /ftfpboot directory to a CD-ROM and use isolinux to load the files > from the CD-ROM? Eliminate DHCP, TFTP, and PXE entirely. > > If you get the kernel and initrd loaded with the right commandline, the > kernel will initialize the network interface and let you finish the process > via TCP/IP...Just a matter of setting the commandline essentially the same. Just don't try to use PXE to feed IP addresses. Use it to seed a real DHCP client (and hopefully accelerate the DHCP transaction.>> So, is there a way to create an ISO image that will do the job of the >> initial DHCP request and can either send the TFTP request to my server, >> or simply run pxelinux for me pointing to the configuration on my TFTP >> server? I tried gPXE's rom-o-matic and got it to work for VM's but the >> second I ran it on HP machines it complained about memory issues (didn't >> like it when gPXE tried to overwrite the ethernet card's driver I >> think).If you want an ISO, you'll likely need iPXE or gPXE since you could do the initial DHCP for addressing then load your stuff. Precise errors will help your diagnosis. -- -Gene
In this environment I don't have access to DHCP. I can't build a server on the subnet nor point it to another one... So, I have to get to my tftp server somehow... ipxe was exactly what i needed. Sorry for the delayed response... Thank you guys for helping with it. Scott On Nov 19, 2015, at 10:04 PM, Gene Cumm <gene.cumm at gmail.com> wrote:> On Thu, Nov 19, 2015 at 8:20 PM, Phil Pokorny via Syslinux > <syslinux at zytor.com> wrote: >>> >>> Here is a bit of an odd request... II'm in a large company with lots of >>> politics getting in the way of things. We were able to convince the main IT >>> team to let us take over a subnet and run our own DHCP server. This lets us >>> create a really nice PXE environment where we can build servers and ship >>> them out. However, now we are in need to rebuild servers already deployed. >>> We have machines in over 70 subnets around the company. Politics won't let >>> me update the DHCP settings to point to my TFTP server. >>> >> >> How fancy is your pxe config file? Could you just burn the contents of >> your /ftfpboot directory to a CD-ROM and use isolinux to load the files >> from the CD-ROM? Eliminate DHCP, TFTP, and PXE entirely. >> >> If you get the kernel and initrd loaded with the right commandline, the >> kernel will initialize the network interface and let you finish the process >> via TCP/IP... > > Just a matter of setting the commandline essentially the same. Just > don't try to use PXE to feed IP addresses. Use it to seed a real DHCP > client (and hopefully accelerate the DHCP transaction. > >>> So, is there a way to create an ISO image that will do the job of the >>> initial DHCP request and can either send the TFTP request to my server, >>> or simply run pxelinux for me pointing to the configuration on my TFTP >>> server? I tried gPXE's rom-o-matic and got it to work for VM's but the >>> second I ran it on HP machines it complained about memory issues (didn't >>> like it when gPXE tried to overwrite the ethernet card's driver I >>> think). > > If you want an ISO, you'll likely need iPXE or gPXE since you could do > the initial DHCP for addressing then load your stuff. > > Precise errors will help your diagnosis. > > -- > -Gene