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This is the homepage of di-netboot-assistant . A tool to download, update and extract the Debian Installer netboot image.
This homepage have moved to : http://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/NetbootAssistant.
Debian-Installer NetBoot Assistant
------------------------------------
Overview:
di-netboot-assistant is a tool simplify the preparation of
files for TFTP Net Booting: Download and Extract the files
in the right location.
It also create a "top level" menu, to select among installed
netboot images (i386, amd64 and ia64 only).
QuickStart:
1. Install the programs "di-netboot-assistant" and a tftp
server (like "tftpd-hpa").
if you netboot ia64 clients, also install elilo.
if you netboot i386 or amd64 clients, also install syslinux.
2. Run "di-netboot-assistant install lenny" or similar.
3. Configure the DHCP server, as explained in [1]. Also read the
"Architectures Notes" below. and see samples [2].
Architectures Notes:
* i386 / amd64
DebianInstaller uses Syslinux's PXElinux[3] for both platform.
Syslinux is a bootloader that provide a menu system to select
the kernel you want to boot.
di-netboot-assistant creates a "top level" menu, to select among
the DebianInstaller netboot menu you previously installed (etch,
lenny, testing, daily...)
DHCP configuration:
Most PC capable of netbooting use DHCP+PXE (as opposed to BOOTP).
You can either configure the DHCP to tell the PC to start the "top
level" pxelinux menu, or to directly start a given distribution's
pxelinux menu.
Case 1: Configure dhcp3 for a single distribution's menu.
in /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf, add:
# Declare pxelinux specific options _names_, at the top of the file.
# Those are compulsory (nothing to change).
option space pxelinux;
option pxelinux.magic code 208 = string;
option pxelinux.configfile code 209 = text;
option pxelinux.pathprefix code 210 = text;
option pxelinux.reboottime code 211 = unsigned integer 32;
# Configure PXE options for di-netboot-assistant
# Those are compulsory (nothing to change).
site-option-space "pxelinux";
option pxelinux.magic f1:00:74:7e;
option pxelinux.pathprefix "/";
if exists dhcp-parameter-request-list {
# Always send the PXELINUX options (specified in hexadecimal)
option dhcp-parameter-request-list = concat(option dhcp-parameter-request-list,d0,d1,d2,d3);
}
# Those are compulsory (adjust the values):
# Configure *your* TFTP server IP address here.
next-server 192.168.0.10;
# Provide netboot/pxelinux information, for example:
filename "debian-installer/lenny/i386/pxelinux.0";
option pxelinux.configfile "debian-installer/lenny/i386/pxelinux.cfg/default";
Case 2: Configure dhcp3 for "top level" menu.
If the package syslinux was installed before you "installed" the
netboot image (with "di-netboot-assistant install ..."), then you can
use the generated top menu. (The top menu is rebuilt each time you
install a boot image)
This is identical to the Case #1 above, except the options "filename"
and "pxelinux.configfile":
filename "debian-installer/pxelinux.0";
option pxelinux.configfile "debian-installer/pxelinux.cfg/default";
* ia64
IA64 uses EFI firmware instead of PC's BIOS. DebianInstaller uses the
bootloader elilo[4] (which supports boot-time menu).
Case 1: Configure dhcp3 for a single distribution menu.
This is identical to the i386, Case #1 above, except the options
"filename" and "pxelinux.configfile" should look like:
filename "debian-installer/lenny/ia64/elilo.efi"
option pxelinux.configfile "debian-installer/lenny/ia64/elilo.conf"
Case 2: Configure dhcp3 for "top level" menu.
If the package elilo was installed before you "installed" the
netboot image (with "di-netboot-assistant install ..."), then you can
use the generated top menu.
This is identical to the Case #1 above, except the options "filename"
and "pxelinux.configfile" should look like:
filename "debian-installer/elilo.efi"
option pxelinux.configfile "debian-installer/elilo.conf"
* alpha
* hppa
* sparc
Those architectures netboot using BOOTP (some can use RARP or DHCP).
They don't have a bootloader that would present a menu at boot-time. This
means that you must configure the dhcp to provide one given kernel. (of
course, the DHCP can provide different kernel image, based on the MAC
or IP address).
In /etc/dhcpd3/dhcpd.conf you can declare a kernel filename for all hosts
subnet 192.168.0.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {
filename "debian-installer/stable/sparc/boot.img"
}
Or You can declare a single host:
host myhost1 {
hardware ethernet 00:40:63:d8:02:2c;
filename "debian-installer/stable/sparc/boot.img"
}
* arm,armel,
* mips,mipsel
Those architectures can do netbooting, but aren't supported by this tool
at the moment (because there is no ".tar.gz" archive).
* m68k
* s390
Those architectures can't do netbooting.
MIRRORS
The file di-sources.list contains the canonical URLs for repositories
of netboot image.
You can set the variable MIRROR_REGEXPS to rewrite the URLs to your
prefered mirror (you can specify multiple space-separated regexp)
For example, you want to search "://ftp.debian.org/" and replace it with
"://ftp.fr.debian.org/debian/", then you declare
MIRROR_REGEXPS="s=://ftp.debian.org/=://ftp.fr.debian.org/debian/="
in /etc/di-netboot-assistant/di-netboot-assistant.conf
TFTP SERVER (daemon)
Any tftp server should work. However the packages tftpd-hpa and atftpd
are convenient, as they use /var/lib/tftpboot by default.
For other tftp servers, you will have to adjust TFTP_ROOT=
in /etc/di-netboot-assistant/di-netboot-assistant.conf
(There's also a "Using dnsmasq" section below).
DHCP SERVER
There are two typical scenarios:
+--------+
___ | Switch | +-------------------+
__/ \__ +--------+ | This host |
/ \ +--------------+ | | | | is the only |
( Internet )---| (DSL) Modem +----+ | +----| DHCP server |
\__ __/ | or router | | +-------------------+
\___/ +--------------+ | +-------------------+
+----| A client computer |
+-------------------+
First case: This host is already the DHCP server for the local network.
This is the best and recommended configuration. You simply
have to add some options to enable netbooting (typically,
the "filename" to boot, and the tftp server's address).
read [1] and example [2] and architectures specific notes.
+--------+
___ | Switch |
__/ \__ +---------------+ +--------+
/ \ | (DSL) Modem | | | | +-------------------+
( Internet )---| with +----+ | +----| This host |
\__ __/ | build-in DHCP | | +-------------------+
\___/ +---------------+ | +-------------------+
+----| A client computer |
+-------------------+
Second case: A DHCP already exists, but you can't/don't want to use it
for netbooting. This isn't the recommended configuration,
but it was successfully tested for netbooting PXE clients
(i386, amd64 and ia64) on network where the existing DHCP
server didn't provide netboot informations.
!!!! Do not setup rogue dhcp servers in your company !!!!
In this situation, you have to divide your DHCP subnet in
two ranges of IP address. The first range will still be
served by the existing DHCP server.
The second part will be served by "this host". It will only
reply to DHCP request sent during PXE netboot step. This is
possible because client computers (actually, their PXE agent
in the NIC's ROM) sends an option like this during PXE boot:
vendor-class-id= "PXEClient:Arch:00000:UNDI:002001"
Both dhcpd and dnsmasq can be instructed to provide answer
depending on such strings.
Note: For easy _home_ setup, you can choose not to reduce the
range of IP served by the existing DHCP server, and just
declare a *small* range of addresses on *both* DHCP (some
addresses that are unlikely to be used on the first one)
That's ugly, but it can work ! (as long your existing DHCP
don't allocate some of those IP ;-)
Using dnsmasq
dnsmasq is a simple all-in-one (dns, dhcp and tftp) server. QuickStart :
Install the package dnsmasq
apt-get install dnsmasq
Create tftp directory (YMMV)
mkdir /var/lib/tftpboot
Configure /etc/dnsmasq.conf:
#Simple/Tiny example:
#Enable built-in tftp server
enable-tftp
tftp-root=/var/lib/tftpboot
dhcp-range=vendor:PXEClient,192.168.0.81,192.168.0.91
#Force the address of the router (or DSL modem)
#dhcp-option=option:router,192.168.0.1
dhcp-option-force=208,f1:00:74:7e #PXE signature
dhcp-option-force=210,/ #tftp prefix
dhcp-boot=debian-installer/pxelinux.0
dhcp-option-force=209,debian-installer/pxelinux.cfg/default
Install the netboot images
di-netboot-assistant install lenny
TODO:
- Allow to specify location of extraction.
- Allow to be invoked from non-root user (or explain dpkg-statoverride).
- Allow to specify alternate name for repository (save 'daily' as '$date')
- support non pxelinux platforms (yaboot powerpc, mips
sb1-bcm91250a/sb1a-bcm91480b)
- Implement "clean-cache" action to remove cached files.
- Implement "remove" action (don't purge DL cache).
- Default to 64bits on amd64 platform (syslinux DEFAULT64, bug 485656)
- Use vesamenu rather than menu (for Lenny+1 images).
See also:
http://www.klabs.be/~fpiat/linux/debian/di-netboot-assistant/
http://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/NetbootAssistant
and
http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/debian-installer/
----------------------------------------------------------------------
[1] "Installation Guide", especially the sections
"4.6 Preparing Files for TFTP Net Booting"
and "5.1.5 Booting with TFTP"
http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/installmanual
[2] Sample dhcp configuration files are located in:
/usr/share/doc/di-netboot-assistant/examples/dhcpd.conf.simple
/usr/share/doc/di-netboot-assistant/examples/dhcpd.conf.multiarch
/usr/share/doc/di-netboot-assistant/examples/dnsmasq.conf.multiarch
[3] PXElinux homepage.
http://syslinux.zytor.com/wiki/index.php/PXELINUX
[4] Elilo bootloader
http://elilo.sourceforge.net/
[ ] Preboot Execution Environment (PXE) Specification
http://www.intel.com/design/archives/wfm/downloads/pxespec.htm
[ ] Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI)
http://developer.intel.com/technology/efi/index.htm
-- Franklin PIAT
The following commands should be run as root (use sudo, or open a terminal as root)
$ apt-get install di-netboot-assistant tftpd-hpa syslinux elilo
$ di-netboot-assistant install lenny
I: Processing lenny/i386 ... I: Downloading...extracting... prepare menu... done. I: Building PXE-Linux' top-menu I: Building Elilo's top-menu
$ di-netboot-assistant install daily --arch=ia64,sparc
I: Processing daily/ia64 ... I: Downloading...extracting... prepare menu... done. I: Building PXE-Linux' top-menu I: Building Elilo's top-menu I: Processing daily/sparc ... I: Downloading...extracting... prepare menu... done. I: Building PXE-Linux' top-menu I: Building Elilo's top-menu
tree /var/lib/tftpboot/debian-installer --dirsfirst
/var/lib/tftpboot/debian-installer/ |-- daily | |-- ia64 | | |-- boot-screens | | | |-- elilo_menu.msg | | | |-- general.msg | | | `-- params.msg | | |-- elilo.conf | | |-- elilo.conf.ORIG | | |-- elilo.efi | | |-- initrd.gz | | |-- version.info | | `-- vmlinuz | `-- sparc | `-- boot.img |-- lenny | `-- i386 | |-- boot-screens | | |-- adtext.cfg | | |-- adtext.cfg.ORIG | | |-- f1.txt | | |-- f10.txt | | |-- f2.txt | | |-- f3.txt | | |-- f4.txt | | |-- f5.txt | | |-- f6.txt | | |-- f7.txt | | |-- f8.txt | | |-- f9.txt | | |-- menu.cfg | | |-- menu.cfg.ORIG | | |-- prompt.cfg | | |-- prompt.cfg.ORIG | | |-- splash.png | | |-- stdmenu.cfg | | |-- stdmenu.cfg.ORIG | | |-- text.cfg | | |-- text.cfg.ORIG | | `-- vesamenu.c32 | |-- pxelinux.cfg | | |-- default | | `-- default.ORIG | |-- initrd.gz | |-- linux | |-- pxelinux.0 | `-- version.info |-- pxelinux.cfg | |-- default | `-- menu.c32 |-- elilo.conf |-- elilo.efi `-- pxelinux.0
di-netboot-assistant is now in Debian :
I use Debian's bug tracking system :
.
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