Re: [Etherboot-users] pxe boot ?

[Roy W. <roy...@ya...>]

Thanks Marty and Cristian, this is great. The PXES
HowTo is useful, and I came across that about 2 months
ago, but again it decsribes some important parts but
there is a big grey fog at the bit where (in my
opinion) it should say "ok, here is the link to a
pre-built FreeDOS image and a pre-built Linux image,
just pop them in the PXELINUX folder, here are the
working configuration scripts and hey presto, you're
off. Now you can hack the scripts, read the more
complex documentation to your heart's content and
learn what you need to learn WHEN you need to learn it
...". But it's missing, so again, I'm stumped. But
what you are saying Cristian is incredibly useful and
I really want to get up and running with the route
that you describe.

About what I'm trying to achieve, I described it a bit
in my first email, but basically, I have some Fujitsu
Stylistic tablet PC's with no floppy drives and no
cd-rom's. They have 4 GB hard drives and Pentium 233
CPU's with 64MB. ok, I cannot boot from floppy or CD,
but they do have PXE support on the NIC's. These
little systems will run Debian or Win98 very nicely
and for firewall/email/ftp servers there really is
enough power to do that under Debian but I cannot boot
them without using the PXE function on the network
cards ! But *generically*, this is something I've
wanted for ANY system for a long time, a way to always
be able to boot an image across the network for
diagnostics, Ghost, repartitioning etc.

It seems that STEP 1 for anyone doing PXE network
booting is to boot a system across a network, and to
do that is almost imporssible without spending 10
hours wading through very awkward documentation. As an
example, I've got an honours degree in physics and
over 15 years of working in large corporate networks
(so I'm fairly used to looking at dry documentation),
and in many hours of looking at this documentation I
cannot get to STEP 1 ... it's like SYSLINUX and
Etherboot are incredibly cool technology, but they are
a bit crippled for the lack of someone saying "Here's
the quick way : get a tftp/dhcp server <some examples
of what's suitable>, here's a FreeDOS and a Linux boot
image <download links>, here's some sample
configuration scripts for these images, now put this
here, and that there, turn on the tftp/dhcp server and
you are DONE". I swear I've been trying to get
something like this to work for a LONG time, I want to
be able to USE the cool Etherboot technology, but this
is not written to allow a very cool and useful
function to be used by EVERYONE, and instead seems
only written for a very very small select group of
people who need all the very complex and cool features
and there does not seem an easy way IN. It just seems
to me, that if everyone could get the STEP 1 part
going simply and without any fuss, THEN they could
start to investigate the documentation and learn all
the very cool stuff that is behind Etherboot or
SYSLINUX or whatever, but the documentation that's
there with Etherboot and SYSLINUX with all the
preamble's and cross-references (without any simple
way to do it) is not, how should I put this ...
warm-and-friendly ? Sometimes it's great fun to read
10's of hours of complex documentation, but sometimes
you want to do things fast, and you just want to get
it WORKING, and then later when you have more time,
you can come back to it, and learn other features, but
that is *very* difficult here. You have to read all
the documentation or nothing it seems.

I will *gladly* write a Quick Guide page (well for
Windows anyway) and post up example FreeDOS and Linux
images and configuration scripts, as I simply don't
want anyone else to go through this. It's incredibly
frustrating and blocks a whole very very cool area of
technology from being used by a huge number of people
people (who don't have the time to wade through all
the documentation, and frankly don't NEED 95% of the
features, they just want network booting to work
quickly for it's very obvious usefullness).

Does anyone have example FreeDOS images and Linux
images, that they actually use, pre-made that I could
have ? Cristian, the images you have sound ideal,
could you let me have a look at those please ? I know
they are your own personal work, so if you do not want
to let me see those I understand.

Thanks !   (... and I'm sorry for the long emails !!)
:o)

Roy.



--- Marty Connor <md...@et...> wrote:

> On Sep 24, 2005, at 5:32 PM, Roy Wiseman wrote:
> > Please, I would be so grateful if someone could
> send
> > to my private email address or point me to premade
> > images for DOS or Linux and the configuration
> files
> > that go along with them all to run from a Windows
> box
> > with tftpd32 so that PXELINUX can boot ? Then I
> can
> > start to play with the settings described on the
> > PXELINUX page and really learn something.
> 
> Hi Roy,
> 
> Here is a link for using tftpd32 on a Windows box:
> 
>     
>
http://pxes.sourceforge.net/howtos/ms_only_environment/
> 
> I hope you find it enlightening.
> 
> If I might also offer a suggestion:
> 
> I have been reading your messages, and I must ask,
> what is it that  
> you are trying to accomplish?
> You have described difficulties getting this
> component or that to  
> work, but never really explained what your larger
> goal is.  If you  
> could describe it, perhaps we could be of more help
> to you.
> 
> Etherboot has a lot of capabilities and options.  It
> can load  
> operating systems in a lot of ways.  Our
> documentation is currently  
> rather out of date and not particularly coherent. 
> We do, however,  
> have a lot of dedicated people who really want to
> help people succeed  
> with Etherboot and network booting in general, and
> who would enjoy  
> helping you.  We are working to improve our
> documentation as well.
> 
> So, please take a deep breath and tell us what
> you're really trying  
> to do, and we'll suggest how you might use Etherboot
> to help you do  
> it. (or not, if there's an easier way).
> 
> Thanks for taking the time to write, and we look
> forward to hearing  
> from you.
> 
> Marty
> 
> -- 
>      Try: http://rom-o-matic.net/ to make Etherboot
> images instantly.
> 
>     Name: Marty Connor
> US Mail: Entity Cyber, Inc.; P.O. Box 391827;
>           Cambridge, MA 02139; USA
>    Voice: (617) 491-6935; Fax: (617) 491-7046
>    Email: md...@et...
>      Web: http://www.etherboot.org/
> 
> 
> 



		
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