On Thu, 6 Jan 2000, Frank Arnold wrote:
>
>I am interested in the possibility of cloning a preconfigured
>linux box by putting the img on a network drive and then
>writing it to several new boxes with the same hardware
>configuration.
>
>Has anyone any experience doing this?
>A script would probably needed to set up users
>on the cloned machines.
If you're going to make a fresh install, and then clon the
machine, you could find useful 'kickstart' feature from redHat
and if I remember correctly, Mandrake 6.1. It helps you
automating the installation process. I didn't try it, though.
If you aready have installed system, thing are a little bit
more complicated, but some people claim it's achievable.
I remmber reading some HOWTO's on this topic, so check the
standard HOWTO installation with your distribution.
I don't know what do you think when you write 'putting the img
on a network drive', but the HOWTO's I read are talking about
the copying the files.
If you're going to simply copy the files, use -a switch
cp -a /orig/* /dest
to prevent all the permissions.
However, I'd suggest tar with -p switch (preserve permissions,
although it's a default, I think).
About the users: user informations are stored in /etc/passwd
and /etc/shadow. Shadow is read-only for root only, so be
careful. Do you need the same users on every machine? If not,
it helps a lot.
However, I'd consider kickstart feature, even if you already
have a running box.
--
v
Davor Cengija
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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