Great to hear, Alan! I went ahead and opened an issue (feature request) on the cobbler GitHub.
Best, Will -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Alan Evangelista Sent: Friday, September 26, 2014 3:51 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [cobbler] Can deploy Ubuntu using a kickstart file rather than a preseed? On 09/26/2014 01:29 PM, Will Dennis wrote: > Hi Nish, > > Yes, you are correct, the install does blow up in the Ubuntu installer, but > it's because the installer is looking for a preseed file... This is driven by > the kernel append options that Cobbler is providing. I did a Wireshark packet > capture of the PXE netboot process, and the interesting bit is the boot menu > that Cobbler send to the client: > > ===== > ..tsize.2026.blksize.1380......... > DEFAULT menu > PROMPT 0 > MENU TITLE Cobbler | http://www.cobblerd.org/ TIMEOUT 200 TOTALTIMEOUT > 6000 ONTIMEOUT local > > LABEL local > MENU LABEL (local) > MENU DEFAULT > LOCALBOOT -1 > > [...redacted...] > > LABEL ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x86_64 > kernel /images/ubuntu1404svr-x86_64/linux > MENU LABEL ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x86_64 > append initrd=/images/ubuntu1404svr-x86_64/initrd.gz ksdevice=bootif > lang= > ks=http://192.168.1.150/cblr/svc/op/ks/profile/ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x86_64 > text auto-install/enable=true priority=critical > url=http://192.168.1.150/cblr/svc/op/ks/profile/ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x86_64 > hostname=ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x8664 domain=local.lan suite=trusty > ipappend 2 > > LABEL ubuntu1404svr-x86_64 > kernel /images/ubuntu1404svr-x86_64/linux > MENU LABEL ubuntu1404svr-x86_64 > append initrd=/images/ubuntu1404svr-x86_64/initrd.gz ksdevice=bootif > lang= text auto-install/enable=true priority=critical > url=http://192.168.1.150/cblr/svc/op/ks/profile/ubuntu1404svr-x86_64 > hostname=ubuntu1404svr-x8664 domain=local.lan suite=trusty > ipappend 2 > > > > MENU end > .... > ===== > > The "ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x86_64" option is the one I'm using. For > comparison, the " ubuntu1404svr-x86_64" one is the "plain vanilla" one that > Cobbler made when I imported the ISO. On the "ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x86_64" > one I added the following to the "Kernel Options" field in cobbler-web: > ks=http://192.168.1.150/cblr/svc/op/ks/profile/ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x8 > 6_64 > > As you can see, it has inserted this in the append line, but kept the rest of > the line beginning with " text auto-install/enable=true [...]", which is > what makes the installer look for a preseed file, and which is handing it the > kickstart file in the " > url=http://192.168.1.150/cblr/svc/op/ks/profile/ubuntu1404svr-x86_64"; bit of > the append line. Since that is not a valid Debian preseed format file, the > installer rightly chokes on it, and blows up with the "installer failed to > process the preconfiguration file" message. > > So as a test, I PXE-booted the client machine again, selected the > "ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x86_64" menu option from the Cobbler menu, hit [Tab] to > edit the line, and removed the following from the append line: > text auto-install/enable=true priority=critical > url=http://192.168.1.150/cblr/svc/op/ks/profile/ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x > 86_64 hostname=ubuntu1404svr-am-asi-x8664 domain=local.lan > suite=trusty > > Then hit Enter, and the installer took off and processed the kickstart file > correctly (as it does when I use my USB key with the kickstart on it.) > Interestingly enough, it names the node's hostname "kickseed" :) It did > format and partition the disk correctly as per the kickstart directives, etc. > > So, again, I believe the profile breed type of "ubuntu" is driving the way > that Cobbler forms the append line. (Can Jörgen or someone else who knows the > code confirm?) What I'd like to see is an option to tell Cobbler to use > kickstart instead of preseed for Ubuntu nodes, and form the append line > correctly for that option... (If only I could code to the level of Cobbler, > I'd jump in and make a patch!) > Hi, Will, I am a Cobbler developer. Thank you for the feedback. Yes, Cobbler assumes that Debian installations use preseed and automatically adds some d-i-specific kernel options to installation kernel command line. This seems easy to fix and I can do it if Jörgen agrees in adding kickstart support in Ubuntu installations. Regards, Alan Evangelista _______________________________________________ cobbler mailing list [email protected] https://lists.fedorahosted.org/mailman/listinfo/cobbler _______________________________________________ cobbler mailing list [email protected] https://lists.fedorahosted.org/mailman/listinfo/cobbler
