Success!!!
Thanks very much for the help Tom and Benjamin, Tom that wiki you pointed us
to really helped us get things going and explained the process clearly. And
Benjamin your tips and example dhcpd.conf file ended up solving the last
issues we ran into, so I can't thank you enough.
We ended up going with a simple dhcpd.conf file
********************************************************
ddns-update-style interim;
allow booting;
allow bootp;
subnet 10.10.10.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {
range 10.10.10.100 10.10.10.254;
default-lease-time 600;
max-lease-time 7200;
}
group {
option routers 10.10.10.1;
filename "/tftpboot/yaboot";
next-server 10.10.10.1;
host node0 {
hardware ethernet <our xservs mac address>;
}
}
**********************************************************
Placed all the files in the root of the tftpboot directory
initrd.gz, vmlinux, yaboot (These 3 files came from this site
here<http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/lenny/main/installer-powerpc/current/images/powerpc/netboot/>
)
yaboot.conf (came from from the wiki
page<http://wiki.ppckernel.org/w/Mac_Netboot>but we had to modify it
as follows (we combined some of the parts from the
current yaboot.conf
<http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/lenny/main/installer-powerpc/current/images/powerpc/netboot/>
file) ):
**********************************************************
device=enet:
partition=0
timeout=50
init-message="Debian GNU/Linux Network boot"
default=linux
image=vmlinux
initrd=initrd.gz
label=linux
initrd-size=13546
#append="init=/linuxrc"
image=vmlinux
initrd=initrd.gz
label=linux
initrd-size=13546
#append="init=/linuxrc"
***********************************************************
Once we had this setup we did a "boot enet:0,yaboot" from OpenFirmware on
the XServe and it worked great.
Cheers,
Patrick
On Tue, Jan 11, 2011 at 7:17 PM, Patrick Boutet <[email protected]>wrote:
> I only had an hour today to work on it and I ran into a small tftp issue
> which I will resolve when I try again on Thursday, so I still didn't get it
> working. But with the suggestions of Tom and now your's Bejamin I think were
> really close. I'll check the logs again and compare the DHCP config file to
> my own and hopefully this should work on Thursday.
>
> Thanks again for the suggestions, I'll keep everyone posted on how it goes.
>
> Cheers,
> Patrick
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 11, 2011 at 5:15 PM, Benjamin Cama <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> Netbooting iBook/PowerBook has always been strange to me, so here are my
>> advices :
>>
>> > Can anyone offer any guidance as to what files to
>> > place in the tftpboot directory? We are assuming vmlinux, initrd.gz,
>> yaboot,
>> > yaboot.conf and boot.msg from
>> >
>> http://http.us.debian.org/debian/dists/lenny/main/installer-powerpc/current/images/powerpc/netboot/
>> > is
>> > this right or wrong? What should the directory structure look like?
>>
>> All these files should just be at the root of your tftp directory. No
>> need for the gtk directory if you don't use the graphic installer.
>>
>> > Next, what do we do for the part that says"You may have to make a link
>> from
>> > that file to the file which tftpd will use for booting a particular
>> client.
>> > Unfortunately, the file name is determined by the TFTP client, and there
>> are
>> > no strong standards." We really don't know what to do for this part.
>> When
>> > it mentions TFTP client does it mean the one that the xserver uses, does
>> > OpenFirmware use a client somehow? Because were attempting to initiate
>> > booting from TFTP through Open Firmware on the xserver via "boot enet:0"
>> and
>> > "boot enet:0,yaboot" both of which did not work. Were assuming because
>> we
>> > don't have the right files and in the right structure in the tftpboot
>> > directory.
>>
>> I recall using "boot enet:0,yaboot" with succes (maybe with no 0? but
>> still, "yaboot" as a file name is needed, I think).
>>
>> > Any advice on how to get this xserver to netboot would be amazingly
>> helpful,
>> > we've been fighting with it for many weeks now and not getting anywhere
>> :(
>>
>> The main issue, for me, was the DHCP server configuration, as my
>> PowerBook seems to need some guidance. An excerpt from my dhcpd.conf
>> (using a 192.168.7.1/24 addressing on the server):
>>
>> group {
>> option routers 192.168.7.1;
>> filename "yaboot";
>> server-name "myservername";
>> server-identifier 192.168.7.1;
>> next-server 192.168.7.1;
>>
>> host powerbook {
>> hardware ethernet <mac address of your G4>;
>> }
>> }
>>
>> Just replace "myservername" with the DNS name of your server, replace
>> "powerbook" with anything you like, and put the mac address of the
>> computer you're netbooting at the right place.
>> I'm not sure if everything is needed, but it's what I found lying in my
>> config file.
>>
>> Regards,
>> benjamin
>>
>>
>
