Re: [Etherboot-developers] [RFC] Relocation techniques...

[Peter L. <P.L...@sy...>]

> On Mon, 8 Jul 2002, Peter Lister wrote:
> > > Alternatively the type of NIC is supplied in the DHCP query.
> > .
> > > Given that it is safer for the loaded image to bring along it's
> > > network driver, and stack, because the loaded image can be recompiled
> > > and fixed.
> > I agree with what you say, Eric, but this implies complexity on the
> > dhcp server side to give out images with the right driver. People find
> > that complicated, so there will be pressure to supply use the initial
> > firmware driver to be nicely device indepedent.
> 
> It's not complicated to set up DHCPD to do this; you can find code that
> will automate it completely in contrib/initrd.

*I* know that, *you* know that, *Eric* knows that. :)

But sites regard DHCP servers as critical, and have strict "no buggering
around" rules on amending the main server which handles leases or
setting up another config only server which should respond only to
requests with the EB VCI. The worst effect of all is if an adventurous
sysadmin trying non MS code for the first time gets his fingers burned
and his MS fixated boss decides that it's a sacking offence to run
another dhcp server.

WRT safety of design, Eric's absolutely right, though it's worth noting
that the "opposition" is PXE so the quality threshold is not high. :) I
think my point is valid; a user who doesn't know much *does* know that
PXE lets him not worry about which driver to use, so that many people
will expect drivers to stay resident. Even if one's net booting a full
Linux kernel, using an EB driver is still useful. If a Linux 'driver'
for the EB driver using is built in, the kernel can use the EB driver
for its initial DHCP config; the system can boot and then dynamically
load a better network driver module later on.

> As is, this will create NBI files for each network module and will
> provide dhcpd.conf fragments that deal with automatically selecting
> the correct NBI based on the PCI/ISA IDs that Etherboot sends.  (I
> need to update this to use the new binary structures.)

If new LTSP users can automagically get something that just works, then
that's a significant step forward, but my perception is that most people
find dhcp voodoo a bit scary, especially if it seems that they have to
do (as they see it) dangerous things before anything good happens. Yes,
it's a dhcp server config issue, but we still have to cope with it.