Pxe boot?

Exebat · 07-08-2008, 02:35 AM

Hi everyone

I am going to Pxe boot a debian system from my server, the only thing is that the debian system is allready installed and comfigured, and have been for many years and i dont want to do a clean installation..

My questing is:

Is there anyway to make a pxe boot image from this existing debian installation, so i dont have to reinstall and reconfigure it?

Kind Regards Exebat

indienick · 07-08-2008, 07:43 AM

If you want to create a *perfect* backup of your drive, use "dd", and copy the dumps to your server:

Code:

$ sudo dd if=/dev/hda1 of=hda1-backup-$(date).dd.img
$ scp hda1-backup-$(date).dd.img user@server:/dir/to/store/disk/image

If anything goes wrong with the install, you can just reverse the dd command to dump the image back onto the partition you got it from.

PS. Depending on how long "many years" is, Debian installations are significantly easier than they were 5 years ago.

estabroo · 07-08-2008, 08:02 AM

I'd guess that your current initrd image would work fine for pxe booting that server, but the question is if its already setup why pxe boot it?

IsaacKuo · 07-08-2008, 09:04 AM

Yes, it's possible. Look up my how-to on this web site's wiki. Simply skip the step where I say to install Debian on the client system.

I've learned a lot of little refinements here and there since I wrote that how-to. The most important refinement is to create the PXE boot version of initrd.img on the client system instead of the server. That way, you'll create the required initrd even if the server is running a different kernel (or even a different OS).