5-steps - Netboot a Puppy over the LAN with NO Media (PXE)

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gcmartin

5-steps - Netboot a Puppy over the LAN with NO Media (PXE)

#1 Post by gcmartin »

Want to have PC booting on your network from a central PC? Yes, you heard that right; "5 simple steps". And your PUPPY will allow other machines on your LAN to boot Puppy without your having to walk over and install something on them.

Here’s how you setup for either 32bit and 64bit Puppies:
Open this document;Swing down to “implementation Basic
Last edited by gcmartin on Sat 21 Dec 2013, 01:24, edited 11 times in total.

Master_wrong
Posts: 452
Joined: Thu 20 Mar 2008, 01:48

#2 Post by Master_wrong »

Thank gcmartin for clarifying the pxe maze...

I have try all other tutorial and fail, feel like chasing my own tail.

I will try again with your tutorial
Cluster-Pup v.2-Puppy Beowulf Cluster
[url]http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=499199#499199[/url]

jamesbond
Posts: 3433
Joined: Mon 26 Feb 2007, 05:02
Location: The Blue Marble

#3 Post by jamesbond »

Master,

That guide will work for other puppies too. The netboot-server.pet is just a bunch of shell-scripts, it will work on any puppy. You just need to get a 32-bit binary dnsmasq for other puppies. jrb has created one on other forum of this thread, or you can use the one attached here (gunzip and drop it to /usr/bin). Too lazy to make it into a pet :twisted:
Attachments
dnsmasq.gz
gunzip, chmod to +x, and then move to somewhere in your path (e.g. /usr/bin).
(101.33 KiB) Downloaded 1760 times
Fatdog64 forum links: [url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=117546]Latest version[/url] | [url=https://cutt.ly/ke8sn5H]Contributed packages[/url] | [url=https://cutt.ly/se8scrb]ISO builder[/url]

Master_wrong
Posts: 452
Joined: Thu 20 Mar 2008, 01:48

#4 Post by Master_wrong »

:D :D :D

Thank you jamesbond, its success !!!!

I can boot to server via pxe already...

btw i cannot connect to network ?

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 640#492640
post by mhanifpriatama already solve that.

btw i change mknetboot.sh at /usr/sbin because my iso is big iso and eating all my memory.
edit the bolded text if you want to save @ other place, sdc2 is linux partition (ext3) btw
#!/bin/sh
#jamesbond 2011
# convert a puppy iso into netboot-compatible vmlinuz and humongous initrd.gz
# Edited by Master_wrong so can save to other media not just temp

Xdialog --title "mknetboot" --msgbox "This script will create a set of files suitable for puppy netbooting.
The input is a puppy ISO file. The output will be located in /tmp/netboot - one vmlinuz and one huge initrd.gz.
If /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg exist, the output files will be symlinked to this directory as well,
so you can use netboot-server to server them straight away." 0 0

ISO=$(Xdialog --title "Choose puppy ISO" -fselect "" 0 0 2>&1 | tail -n 1)
tmp="mnt/sdc2"
tmp2="mnt/sdc2"

if [ -n "$ISO" ]; then
rm -rf /$tmp2/netboot /$tmp/netboot_iso
mkdir -p /$tmp2/netboot/x /$tmp/netboot_iso
if mount -o loop "$ISO" /$tmp/netboot_iso; then
if [ -f /$tmp/netboot_iso/vmlinuz -a -f /$tmp/netboot_iso/initrd.gz ]; then
Xdialog --title "mknetboot" --no-buttons --infobox "This will take a while. Please wait ..." 0 0 60000 &
PID=$!
cp /$tmp/netboot_iso/vmlinuz /$tmp2/netboot
cd /$tmp2/netboot/x
zcat /$tmp/netboot_iso/initrd.gz | cpio -i
cp /$tmp/netboot_iso/*.sfs .
find . | cpio -o -H newc | gzip -9 > ../initrd.gz
cd /$tmp2/netboot
rm -rf x
if [ -d /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg ]; then
rm /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/vmlinuz /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/initrd.gz
ln -s /$tmp2/netboot/vmlinuz /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg
ln -s /$tmp2/netboot/initrd.gz /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg
fi
kill $PID
Xdialog --title "mknetboot" --infobox "Done. Output is in /$tmp/netboot." 0 0 10000
else
Xdialog --title "mknetboot" --msgbox "Invalid ISO - cannot find vmlinuz and initrd.gz" 0 0
rm -rf /$tmp2/netboot
fi
umount /$tmp/netboot_iso
rm -rf /$tmp/netboot_iso
else
Xdialog --title "mknetboot" --msgbox "Failed to mount $ISO" 0 0
fi
fi

for cloud pxe goto here :
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=66435

other pxe discussion by jamesbond here:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=65232
Cluster-Pup v.2-Puppy Beowulf Cluster
[url]http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=499199#499199[/url]

PupGeek
Posts: 353
Joined: Sun 06 Sep 2009, 11:30

#5 Post by PupGeek »

I tried using the howto in the OP of this thread, I successfully made the humongous initrd file, it already symlinked it to the specified directory (I forget exactly what it is at the moment) and I symlinked it to a tftpboot directory (or something like that) and started the tftp server.

Upon powering up my client, it successfully connected to the pxe server, booted the kernel, loaded the initrd.gz file (the humongous one, I assume), loaded the modules to access disk drives and began searching for puppy files on computer drives, which is where I started having problems.

It seems the init script cannot find the .sfs file in the humongous initrd.gz file. I have extracted the initrd.gz file created by mknetboot.sh and confirmed that the .sfs (stud_330.sfs) is there. I have used the PDEV1=rootfs workaround, but still to no avail. I attempted this with Puppy Studio 3.3 rt with the above results.

I am assuming that the problem lies within the init script or maybe with the .sfs' filename. I will continue trying to edit that script, but what should I be looking for? I will also try using straight Lupu 5.2 tonight and see if I can get any better results.

gcmartin

Problem using Netboot Functions

#6 Post by gcmartin »

PupGeek wrote:I tried using the howto in the OP of this thread, I successfully made the humongous initrd file, it already symlinked it to the specified directory (I forget exactly what it is at the moment) and I symlinked it to a tftpboot directory (or something like that) and started the tftp server.
As you describe here, seems that the problem you are having relates to a manual operation you may have done.

Question:
Did you do the symlinks manually for some reason?
The install process AND the Netboot script should have setup (automatically, without ANY manual manipulation) everything you would need for all to work smoothly. Assuming you did NOT change anything: There was an issue with system such that older versions of Puppy had a "built-in" bug which disrupted certain versions of PUPs from booting. AND, there is an alternate "default" file that you would need so that the LAN PC will successfully navigate to a desktop. That "default" file is found at /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default.

I am attaching 2 default files for you to replace in that location. I'm not sure which should work, but, if one doesn't try the other, please. Either way, let us know if this resolves the condition. My advice is rename your current "default" take the most logical one I present to you and save it in your tftpboot folder on your server as "default". Then reboot your LAN PC.

Hope this helps.
P,S, In the document, posted in this thread, you are made aware of an addition which will allow you to setup you server such that your LAN PCs are presented with a menu of several PUPs that the LAN PC can select for booting. (This is an extension that you can try after you get your 1st PUP to boot over the LAN.)
Attachments
Replacement DEFAULT files.tar.gz
(245 Bytes) Downloaded 1554 times

PupGeek
Posts: 353
Joined: Sun 06 Sep 2009, 11:30

#7 Post by PupGeek »

The scripts automatically placed those links in the directory you specified. I placed symlinks to those in another directory (/root/netboot or something like that.) after trying to boot and ending up with an error of not being able to find vmlinuz in that directory. That was not a big deal, however. It's the crash during init that puzzles me.. I am aware of the option to include multiple puppies and intend to do that if I can get this one running. Thank you for the new default files, I will try them out tonight. I believe my puppy(based on Lupu5.2) falls into that category of those with that bug.

P.S. I tried editing the default file to use the PDEV1 cheat but did not include the loglevel=7 one
Update: 04/25/11 pupgeek wrote: Tried using the new default files from gcmartin, but still got the same result. After looking at the init script in geany, I didn't see any reference to 'rootfs', but saw plenty of references to 'tmpfs'. I replaced 'rootfs' with 'tmpfs' to see if it would work and it did.

Also, I found out that I downloaded a different version of dnsmasq (2.55, or something), which created a directory /root/netboot. That is the directory where my pxe client was trying to read from (Your client should specify where it is trying to read from on the server). I had to make sure all the necessary files or symlinks were in there for it to work

To anyone still having trouble even when using "PDEV1=rootfs", try changing it to "PDEV1=tmpfs". It might work for you.

gcmartin

The Publication is still accurate

#8 Post by gcmartin »

Update: 04/25/11 pupgeek wrote: ... Also, I found out that I downloaded a different version of dnsmasq (2.55, or something), which created a directory /root/netboot. ... .
Hi Pupgeek.
Glad to see that there is an answer. I worked very closely with JamesBond to generate the directions that you see in this thread. It was tested by me, over and over again, to insure its accuracy.

When you alerted your problem in this thread, I "re-tested" the documentation, last night ahead of you, to insure that those directions were accurate for the PUP525 ISO that you're using. It worked perfectly without the alternate DEFAULT file that I made available.

I found that the documentation is consistent and it instructs correctly where to find the DNSMASQ and NETBOOT PETS needed for a start to finish implementation. And was awaiting your attempts with some logs, if needed.

If you have time, and are willing, would you try the documentation to insure that it is consistent. I would welcome ANY advice or concerns you would raise on that information. The document has been referenced over 2000 times, but we had not receive any critiques or corrections, thus far. Your insights would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

PupGeek
Posts: 353
Joined: Sun 06 Sep 2009, 11:30

#9 Post by PupGeek »

The documentation, for the most part is very accurate. I did experience some trouble with the links. Dnsmasq seems to go to a forum page saying that I am unauthorized to view or download the file (meaning I had to look elsewhere for it, so I probably picked up a different version). The netboot link works ok, but it doesn't contain the mkmulti script for some reason. The MultiPup link takes you to a porn gateway site, so that might need to be edited 8) .

As for the "PDEV1=rootfs", I'm sure that some versions use that, but I found that LuPu 5.2 uses "PDEV1=tmpfs" successfully.

What I specified in my update worked well for me. I'm fully satisfied with it for now. I still cannot seem to locate the mkmulti.sh script, however, as I do intend to boot multiple puppies this way. I am currently looking to find a version of netboot with one, but I learned how to work with puppy by trying different things out..... beginning with using .deb packages for puppy 2.15. I like to share my experiences and fixes so that others can benefit from them as well.

Also, I tried manually to make a menu by trying to get pxelinux.0 to load grub, but it didn't work. :(
Update 04/30/11 pupgeek wrote: I was able to manually make a menu giving the choice of more than one puppy to boot from. This saves the trouble of making a multi-ISO image as well. With it, you can now just make a pxe-bootable image of your new puppy and add the new entry to the menu and it should work.

I downloaded a .deb of syslinux to get an additional file and referred to a faq page about pxelinux to figure out how to do it.

The page includes examples to really make pxelinux.0 sophisticated with multiple menus and all. I took bits and pieces of it and used the syntax to make one simple menu. You can click here for more information on this. To make use of the information contained in the page, you need the file "menu.c32" to be placed in your tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg directory. You can download that file below or you can get the syslinux package from the ubuntu repo for all associated files.
Attachments
menu.c32.tar.gz
(28.35 KiB) Downloaded 1471 times

c7jaff
Posts: 13
Joined: Mon 07 Feb 2011, 19:29

#10 Post by c7jaff »

Using the script from the above Master_wrong Fri 04 Feb 2011, 06:08 post, I place the 2 resulting files on the server (along with lupu-511.sfs) and this config:

label netboot
menu label netboot ()
kernel netboot/vmlinuz
append initrd=netboot/initrd.gz PDEV1=tmpfs

...and can successfully net boot puppy 5.11. I'm using Ubuntu with tftp and dnsmasq as the server. I can also PXE boot minipup, ploplinux(uses Samba), thinstation, and ubuntu. Also LTSP. I can duplicate these setups. However, none of them are persistent (except LTSP but I don't want to go that direction yet) and I can't save anything back to the source location on the server. I can save a lupusave.3fs back to a USB drive but I want save back to the server only. I'm getting closer to the DisklessUbuntuHowto that can save back over NFS. It boots but with lots of errors and the desktop only shows the bottom panel with the clock and restart/shutdown options. I'd like to try this with puppy.

The point/questions I'm getting at it: Can puppy netboot and save the session lupusave.3fs back to the server? If so, how is that done, with NFS or Samba?

I think I've read every PXE related post on here more than once and either I'm still not seeing something or the they point to dead links. Others are just not clear about whether the session is saved. Help/links appreciated.

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puppyluvr
Posts: 3470
Joined: Sun 06 Jan 2008, 23:14
Location: Chickasha Oklahoma
Contact:

#11 Post by puppyluvr »

The MultiPup link takes you to a porn gateway site, so that might need to be edited


LOL.... 8) 8)
Close the Windows, and open your eyes, to a whole new world
I am Lead Dog of the
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Join us!

Puppy since 2.15CE...

gcmartin

Bad webpage redirect.

#12 Post by gcmartin »

puppyluvr wrote:
The MultiPup link takes you to a porn gateway site, so that might need to be edited
I am not getting that. Can you give me the line of text in the document that takes us to the bad site?

I will correct it? But, right now, for me, its going to the MultiPup forum thread.

Thanks in advance

c7jaff
Posts: 13
Joined: Mon 07 Feb 2011, 19:29

#13 Post by c7jaff »

Here's my Ubuntu svr dir path w/Puppy files. It didn't work until I put lupu-511.sfs there:

/tftpboot/netboot/initrd.gz (126.4 MB made w/mknetboot.sh script)
/tftpboot/netboot/lupu-511.sfs (177.9 MB - copied from CD)
/tftpboot/netboot/vmlinuz (2.1 MB made w/mknetboot.sh script)

vmlinuz didn't appear like the script affected it though.

I recall getting a gateway last month from a PXE link but I don't think it's there now. It may have been a *.asia link. I just went through the links. While checking the links below...I found the below MultiPup thread which I'll try to figure out and whittle down to some usable steps - if it applies to a netbootable puppy with non-local save file:
12 pages [174 Posts]
http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic. ... 486#491486

---
This page had the below links, my comments in double parens:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bkM ... l=en&pli=1#
---

Procedure 1 - Implementation Steps/Instructions [you can use this or Procedure 2, below]

1. Go and install dnsmasq PET (you only need to do this once)


For 64bit Puppies - get it from [here] ((http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F% ... rjkP86MVpg I didn't try it))

For 32bit Puppies - get it from [here] ((http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F% ... NoZUTZZIMg goes to not authorized page))

---

4. Run mknetboot.sh ((http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F% ... O2t2CNvUcg goes to not found page but I got the script elsewhere))
1. From console - open console/terminal, then type “mknetboot.sh

Master_wrong
Posts: 452
Joined: Thu 20 Mar 2008, 01:48

#14 Post by Master_wrong »

I have been thinking...

what if...

we use gpxe as i use here
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=66435

then just for the pxe puppy, we change the routine :

1 always seek load savefile via nfs/unfs* ?
2 change the saving state place... ? maybe via nfs/unfs* ?

* because all connected client will load/save its better to mount folder on server something like :
/mnt/save/192.168.2.115/savefile.sfs
/mnt/save/192.168.2.114/savefile.sfs
etc
so client can automatically load/save to their savefile...
:?:
Cluster-Pup v.2-Puppy Beowulf Cluster
[url]http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=499199#499199[/url]

gcmartin

Can NETBOOTed PXE PC save the session at Shutdown/Reboot

#15 Post by gcmartin »

c7jaff wrote: ... For now my question is still open: Can puppy netboot and save the session lupusave.3fs back to the server? If so I'd like to know how.
@c7jaff Thanks for your comments. I have tried to address issues with the links in that document. Seems to be butting up against some Google security issues; ..., now, getting to your questions:

Currently the Netboot+DNSMASQ faciliity allows a PC without any peripheral except a LAN card to boot from the PXE server. But, today, there has not been any save-session feature provided to this service. We need that AND I believe that someone will address that in this facility's future.

JamesBond has attempted to "inspire" us on how to do this, but, participation and maybe understanding is lacking on an approach to do this.

I seem to remember that I had success by saving to a local HDD/USB such that it is there on reboot. But, this starts to get a little out of hand when I work on multiple PUP distros as in some cases one distro when booting thought a saved-session file on the HDD from another distro was to be used by it during boot.

If you do decide that this is a requirement you may want to search for JamaesBond's threads and comments on this, overy past 3 months. Master_Wrong and he also have discussed this very thing as well.

Hope this helps

c7jaff
Posts: 13
Joined: Mon 07 Feb 2011, 19:29

#16 Post by c7jaff »

Yes, it helps, thanks. You're welcome gcmartin.
...But, today, there has not been any save-session feature provided to this service. We need that AND I believe that someone will address that in this facility's future.

JamesBond has attempted to "inspire" us on how to do this, but, participation and maybe understanding is lacking on an approach to do this.
Count me in for testing if that helps as long as my netboot systems are still running. I have 3 of them now but they don't work at the same time. I finally got the persistent NFS boot to work as outlined in the DisklessUbuntuHowto on the 3rd try. The first 2 times I used the alternative method and Ub 10.10, the final time I used the non-alt method and Ub 11.04 and that worked. It saves data back to the server. It takes a long time to boot, but not as long with a gigabit network system. I think the main dir it uses on the server: /nfsroot/<clientusername> is several GB's. 4.55 GB? I don't know how much of that it needs to send over PXE but any puppy has got to be smaller. This may not be the greatest argument for investing time in enabling a persistent puppy PXE boot but I like puppy's small size and capabilities and think it would be ideal for such a project.

For that NFS boot, provided the server is already setup and working, some boot settings are changed on the client machine's OS (in initramfs.conf), a tool to create a new initrd.img is run, and then the client OS is copied back to the server over NFS. The client OS is then removed from the client machine and that machine is rebooted and success! It's basically an NFS remote install intended for PXE booting. Maybe a similar approach would work with puppy?

At the moment if this could somehow work, I personally wouldn't care if it wouldn't accommodate multiple puppy distros or multiple puppy users.

These posts mention persistency - pupsave. I can already PXE boot puppy and save back to a USB drive. I'd like to eliminate the USB drive. sshfs or cifs is mentioned over nfs due to separating accts. I'll keep returning to the posts:

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 2&start=15
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=65232

Also, a comment from 'Oliver' here https://help.ubuntu.com/community/DisklessUbuntuHowto may suggest that the LTSP framework could enable replacement OS install if removing the Ubuntu install from the LTSP dir and replacing it - unless my interpretation is wrong. I just don't see how that would tie into the accts on that server if replacing that package with something like puppy though. Maybe he's only talking about Ubuntu desktop.

ShellyCat
Posts: 39
Joined: Fri 13 May 2011, 05:38
Location: USA

Re: 5-steps Netboot a Puppy over the LAN with NO Media (PXE)

#17 Post by ShellyCat »

Hi! This is my first time trying PXE. The BIOS on my laptop is screwed up and I cannot boot from CD or USB (no floppy, but I'm sure results would be the same). Priority is recovering personal files from "Documents" partition on the hard drive. For PXE, I am following Procedure 1 (Basic) in this document:

[quote="gcmartin"]Here’s how you do it for both 32bit and 64bit Puppies and FATDOG:
Open this document;Swing down to “implementation Basic
Puppy Distro: [url=http://openlab.jp/puppylinux/download/quickset_puppy/]pup-431JPqs3 "Quickset Puppy Linux (Japanese/English bilingual)"[/url]
Previous distros: Slackware (preferred), Fedora Core 6 (in school), Ubutntu (not much)

gcmartin

#18 Post by gcmartin »

@ShellyCat
No, your server and PC positioning does NOT have any impact on the service that Netboot delivers. So, you have a correct LAN arrangement for your PC to be able to reach the Netboot server.

I going to guess that if you have inadvertently started a firewall, this may be the thing that is NOT allowing your Netboot server to be contacted by your PC. Turn off you Puppy F/W. Beside, your Linksys router does a very effective job of firewalling your complete LAN. If it will make you feel more compfortable after you get your Netboot PC booting, you can appeal to this community for configuring your F/W back on so that it doesn't get in the way.

Once you have run the
  • mknetboot.sh script and
  • started your Netboot server (in Diagnostic mode; it should have asked you on netboot server start)
any PC, including those with "bad" MB NIC support will have messages showing on both the server Netboot status window as well as your PC console.

Questions
  1. Which PUP are you running your Neboot server on?
  2. And which PUP ISO did you feed the mknetboot.sh script with?
More Info
On the netboot (PXE) PC that will be trying to boot, when powered-on, you will see immediately after BIOS start:
An announcement of invoking PXE (sometimes, with the PXE version number)
a PXE Bootrom version announcement
a "CLIENT MAC ADDRESS" announcement
DHCP start up where your PC is trying to find your Netboot server

And on your netboot server, you will see it servicing that PC in its Netboot status window.

Code: Select all

dnsmasq: started, version 2.55 DNS disabled
dnsmasq: compile time options: IPv6 GNU-getopt no-DBus no-I18N DHCP TFTP
dnsmasq-dhcp: DHCP, IP range 192.168.143.110 -- 192.168.143.200, lease time 1h
dnsmasq-tftp: TFTP root is /root/tftpboot 
dnsmasq-dhcp: DHCPDISCOVER(eth1) 00:e0:4c:bf:28:a6 
dnsmasq-dhcp: DHCPOFFER(eth1) 192.168.143.150 00:e0:4c:bf:28:a6 
dnsmasq-dhcp: DHCPREQUEST(eth1) 192.168.143.150 00:e0:4c:bf:28:a6 
dnsmasq-dhcp: DHCPACK(eth1) 192.168.143.150 00:e0:4c:bf:28:a6 
dnsmasq-tftp: sent /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.0 to 192.168.143.150
   o
   o
   o
   o
Hope this helps
Attachments
Start netboot server like this after running mknetboot.sh script.png
After running mknetboot.sh, start your Netboot server in Debug mode
(128.44 KiB) Downloaded 2760 times
Netboot server status window.png
After running &quot;mknetboot.sh&quot; and starting the netboot server in Debug mode
(17.24 KiB) Downloaded 2725 times

ShellyCat
Posts: 39
Joined: Fri 13 May 2011, 05:38
Location: USA

#19 Post by ShellyCat »

I was able to do my first PXE boot! Now Puppy and Pburn are happily burning my files to DVD!

Thank you so much for your help, gcmartin. The other PXE solutions look pretty scary! However, I have some questions for the future, if you don't mind. Also, some errors on the PXE server which may be normal or not: can you tell me?

netboot-server (PXE server) output, not verbatim!

Code: Select all

DHCP ip range 192.168.1.100-192.168.1.200 lease 1 hr
eth0 00:a0:d1:63:46:8d
offered 192.168.1.172
requested 192.168.1.172
error 0 TFTP Aborted received from 192.168.1.172
failed sending /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.0 to 192.168.1.172
sent /root/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default to 192.168.1.172
(ditto for vmlinuz and for initrd.gz)
FYI, PXE server and image being served are both Quickset. I'm using Puppy live to back up documents before I do anything else! (Like testing hard drive, then flashing BIOS from hard disk but using PXE to do it...fun, no?)
gcmartin wrote:No, your server and PC positioning does NOT have any impact on the service that Netboot delivers. So, you have a correct LAN arrangement for your PC to be able to reach the Netboot server.
Thank you. I was more worried about possible conflicts between the router's DHCP and Puppy PXE server's. Other solutions implied as much. Does your program check automatically? Or is it still possible to have DHCP conflicts?
gcmartin wrote:I going to guess that if you have inadvertently started a firewall, this may be the thing that is NOT allowing your Netboot server to be contacted by your PC.
Apparently, it was just lack of re-starting Netboot-Server. It was already running. (Turned on by "mknetboot.sh" I presume?) So apparently Quickset Puppy does not turn on a Firewall by default, thank goodness.
gcmartin wrote:Beside, your Linksys router does a very effective job of firewalling your complete LAN.
Very common misconception.

They will tell you at Best Buy that a home switch/router has a firewall, when all it has is Network Address Translation. (Best Buy salespeople are technically clueless, and when I bought my Linksys device 10-11 years ago, so was I.) NAT has nothing to do with firewalls. Try using one with Windows XP and no firewall -- you'll get a trojan in minutes!
Puppy Distro: [url=http://openlab.jp/puppylinux/download/quickset_puppy/]pup-431JPqs3 "Quickset Puppy Linux (Japanese/English bilingual)"[/url]
Previous distros: Slackware (preferred), Fedora Core 6 (in school), Ubutntu (not much)

c7jaff
Posts: 13
Joined: Mon 07 Feb 2011, 19:29

#20 Post by c7jaff »

Info to share on 3rd persistent diskless Netboot success:

In addition to getting Ubuntu to work with LTSP and a persistent NFS net boot, I also got Tinycore 3.5.1 and 3.7.1 to work with a persistent NFS Netboot (http://wiki.tinycorelinux.net/wiki:netbooting). It was so much easier than the Ubuntu NFS install. For Tinycore, all you need is the PXE default code (2 blocks provided) below once the server is setup...and also place 2 files (bzImage & tinycore.gz) in their own /tftproot sub dir. I used the same server that worked with the first NFS Netboot. It saves all your work, apps, and even the shell history into a /tce/ NFS sub dir. In the attachment you can see the default settings on the desktop when shutting down. These save session data back to the server.

Things to note here are: nfsmount= and tce=

label tc371
menu label tc371
kernel tc371/bzImage
append initrd=tc371/tinycore.gz nfsmount=192.168.x.x2:/nfsroot/tc371 tce=nfs/tce
# bzImage & tinycore.gz live on /tftproot/tc371,
# tce dir where files are saved to reside on /nfsroot/tc371/tce

label tc351-use
menu label tc351-use
kernel tc351/bzImage
append initrd=tc351/tinycore.gz nfsmount=192.168.x.x1:/nfsroot/tc351 tce=nfs/tce
# bzImage & tinycore.gz live on /tftproot/tc351,
# tce dir where files are saved to reside on /nfsroot/tc351/tce

This OS was finicky though. Many directions I followed didn't work as written but I eventually got this going. Applications are called extentions. Firefox didn't work for me but Opera did. The total OS was less than 10 MB but once I added Opera, Gedit, and a few utils, the total space used was well over 30 MB. I tried about 5 versions of the OS but v 3.5.1 and v 3.7.1 were the best for me. v 3.5.1 was probably the most stable. The Netboot only worked in persistent mode on half of my PCs. For some reason NFS mounting didn't work on all of them. Of course, I'd love to do the same with Puppy somehow. If this does happen with Puppy, I envision it being done in a similar way.
Attachments
tc-nfs-save2.png
Screen pic of default session save options from desktop
(26.6 KiB) Downloaded 2599 times

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