>>> On Tue, Nov 20, 2007 at 2:43 PM, in message <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Susan Zimmerman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: -snip- > Today we mount the Linux installation CDs on a Fedora NFS and build the ISO > images that are then FTPed across the intranet to a zLinux guest. The
I'm not at all sure what you mean by "build the ISO images." Are you taking physical media, and copying from the raw device, say /dev/hdc, and outputting it to a file as something.iso? Why not just mount the CDs in the NFS server, and then copy the individual files? You don't really need .iso images to set up an install server. > install tree is then built on the linux guest. Creating Linux images from > the install tree on a linux guest (on a vswitch) is so much faster than > when the install tree is built on an NFS in the network. Absolutely, hence the SLES10 starter system concept. > I just thought that if we could provide the guest access to the DVD drive > we could build the ISO images directly to a file system on zLinux. (Not > sure if I'm adequately describing this.) Are you saying you don't have http access from your Linux guests to do the download directly? (Not uncommon, but I want to make sure.) > Admittedly, we don't need to do this often, but when we do, it seems that > it would be a big time-saver. I'm presuming the DVD in the HMC would be > able to read the SUSE SLES Installation CDs. I certainly think you can save time, but only if you have access to the internet from your Linux guests (or even your z/VM host). The other option would have a DVD reader attached to your local SAN, and access it over FCP. :) (Don't laugh, it's been done.) Mark Post
