Solaris 7 Network Installation(Custom Jumpstart)


Installing solaris over the network, involves a series of steps that must be taken before the actual installation. In this example we will be installing an Ultra 2 machine. We will be using the CD-Rom drive of the install server (lito) as the installation image. If you need to install some patches afterwards, you'd  be probably better off, if you allocate some disk space for the installation image. This would allow to install the patches once and propagate the changes on every machine that is installed via the network. It also assumes that a NIS domain is already installed and running.
 

1. Once we powered on the machine, wE need to get the ethernet MAC address of the sparc server.

    STOP-A
    ok banner

    The banner command will display the PROM banner. This banner includes a logo, system type, PROM revision  level, the ethernet address, and the hostid.

2.  I assume that a working NIS server is installed, we are now ready to introduce our new server (ultra2) to the NIS domain.

    Add the ethernet MAC address to the file /var/nis/ethers

      08:00:20:7D:7D:C9       ultra2

    Assign a new IP address to our new server  to /var/nis/hosts

      10.1.200.100       ultra2

   These tables will be used by the RARP Daemon (rarpd) to assign the proper IP address to our new server.

 3. Rebuild the NIS maps to reflect the newly added host.

   #cd /var/yp
   #make
   make[1]: Entering directory `/var/yp'
   updated hosts

   pushed hosts
   updated ethers

   pushed ethers
   updated ypservers

  pushed ypservers
  make[1]: Leaving directory `/var/yp'
  #

4. Mount the Solaris 7 installation CD, we are now ready to create network boot image.

   #cd /cdrom/sol_7_1199_sparc_sun_srvr/s0/Solaris_2.7/Tools
   #./setup_install_server -b /opt/boot
   Verifying target directory...
   Calculating space required for the installation boot image
   Copying Solaris_2.7 Tools hierarchy...
   Install Server setup complete

   This procedure might take while to copy the boot image, depending on the speed of your CD-ROM and disk drive.

5. We are now ready to configure the system identification file for the new server.

     #mkdir /opt/boot/sysid
     Create the system ID on the  /opt/boot/sysid/sysidcfg

     system_locale=en_US
    timezone=US/Pacific
    terminal=sun-cmd
    timeserver=ntpserver
    name_service=NIS {domain_name=nisdomain.com
                name_server=nisserver(10.1.1.2)}
    network_interface=hme0 {hostname=ultra2
         ip_address=10.1.201.101
         netmask=255.255.0.0 }
   root_password=XXXXXXXXX

 The root password was derived from the root password of file /etc/shadow.

6.  Next we have to configure the jumpstart rules and profiles.

     #mkdir /opt/boot/jumpstart

     Create the file /opt/boot/jumpstart/rules

      hostname ultra2 - host_class -

    Our rule here is host specific to ultra2 and will be using the host_class profile to configure the server.

    Creat the profile /opt/boot/jumpstart/host_class

       install_type    initial_install
      system_type     standalone
      partitioning    default
      cluster         SUNWCall

      This is a straightforward  "Entire Distribution" installation using a the default disk partitioning.

    Check the rules.

    #cd /opt/boot/jumpstart
    #/cdrom/sol_7_1199_sparc_sun_srvr/s0/Solaris_2.7/Misc/jumpstart_sample/check
   Validating rules...
   Validating profile host_class...
   The custom JumpStart configuration is ok.

     The check script will create the file rules.ok,  if doesn't encounter any misspelling and missing rules.

   #ls -l
total 6
-rw-r--r--   1 root     other        249 Jan 19 15:15 host_class
-rw-r--r--   1 root     other         31 Jan 19 14:29 rules
-rw-r--r--   1 root     other         57 Jan 19 16:24 rules.ok

#cat rules.ok
hostname ultra2 - host_class -
# version=2 checksum=2768

   As you can see the rules.ok file is the same as the rules file plus checksum.

7. Add the client boot files.

   #./add_install_client -s lito:/cdrom/sol_7_1199_sparc_sun_srvr/s0 -c lito:/opt/boot/jumpstart -p lito:/opt/boot/sysid ultra2 sun4u

  making /tftpboot
  enabling tftp in /etc/inetd.conf
  updating /etc/bootparams
 copying inetboot to /tftpboot

 This will create the file /etc/bootparams and start the trivial FTP daemon to serve the client boot image.

#cat /etc/bootparams
ultra2 root=lito:/opt/boot/Solaris_2.7/Tools/Boot       install=lito:/cdrom/sol_7_1199_sparc_sun_srvr/s0
boottype=:in sysid_config=lito:/opt/boot/sysid install_config=lito:/opt/boot/jumpstart  rootopts=:rsize=32768

#ls -l /tftpboot
total 280
lrwxrwxrwx   1 root     other         28 Jan 19 16:31 0A01C965 -> inetboot.SUN4U
.Solaris_2.7-1
lrwxrwxrwx   1 root     other         28 Jan 19 16:31 0A01C965.SUN4U -> inetboot
.SUN4U.Solaris_2.7-1
-rwxr-xr-x   1 root     other     129632 Jan 19 16:31 inetboot.SUN4U.Solaris_2.7
-1
-rw-r--r--   1 root     other        322 Jan 19 16:31 rm.10.1.201.101
lrwxrwxrwx   1 root     other          1 Jan 19 16:31 tftpboot -> .
 

8. We now have to export our boot image and the solaris installation cdrom.

   #share -o ro,anon=0 /opt/boot
   #share -o ro,anon=0 /cdrom/sol_7_1199_sparc_sun_srvr/s0
   #share

  -               /opt/boot   ro,anon=0   ""
  -               /cdrom/sol_7_1199_sparc_sun_srvr/s0   ro,anon=0   ""

   Since, we didn't create any install server we have explicitly NFS share our installation CD.

9.  Power on the sparc server and we're ready to install the OS via the network.

    STOP-A
    ok  boot net - install