Bug#342076: installation-guide: should give the right path to TFTP root directory
Package: installation-guide
Severity: normal
X-debbugs-CC: Ross Boylan <RossBoylan@stanfordalumni.org>
Below are reports by Ross Boylan for suggested changes to the
installation guide about PXE boot setup.
I confirm Ross comments about the real location of the tftpboot root
directory. I went on the issue myself but as I didn't read the
documentation, I didn't know it was wrong..:-)
----- Forwarded message from Ross Boylan <RossBoylan@stanfordalumni.org> -----
Date: Sun, 4 Dec 2005 16:10:39 -0800
To: debian-boot@lists.debian.org
Cc: Ross Boylan <RossBoylan@stanfordalumni.org>
Subject: PXE booting documentation
From: Ross Boylan <RossBoylan@stanfordalumni.org>
X-Mailing-List: <debian-boot@lists.debian.org> archive/latest/95017
I just spent several hours trying, ultimately successfully, to get PXE
booting to work for an install. I believe the documentation is not
simply unclear, but actively misleading. Some better documentation
would be nice. In this message, I try to indicate what areas gave me
problems.
I used the instructions here:
http://d-i.alioth.debian.org/manual/en.i386/ch04s06.html
1) Where do the files go?
The documentation says to use
filename "/tftpboot/pxelinux.0";
in dchcpd.conf. It also (4.6.4) instructs you to put stuff in
/tftpboot. So I did.
But the tftpd-hpa package, installed on the advice of the guide, has
this in /etc/default/: OPTIONS="-l -s /var/lib/tftpboot".
I wasn't sure if that file was used when the program was started from
inetd rather than /etc/init.d/ (I choose the former), but it seems it
is.
Things started working when I a) moved the files to /var/lib/tftpboot
and b) stripped the leading path components from the filename
designation in dchpd.conf.
2) What to do with the netboot.tar file? I followed the
instructions, but then got clever. I thought /debian-installer/i386/
was to be stripped out, and move the files accordingly (even though
there was a file name collision). In other Debian contexts, the top
levels of the directory tree are to be removed. Perhaps some advice
to leave the untarred files exactly as the are would be good.
Admittedly, if I just did as I was told I would have been fine :)
So I followed the instructions I should have ignored, and ignored the
instructions I should have followed.
3) It was unclear how to combine the examples (or if they were to be
combined) given at the start of 4.6.2 and 4.6.2.1
4) The documentation on dchp and tftp was hard to pin down. I
couldn't tell how names, or pathnames, were interpreted (though
references to chroot were a clue). In fact, the in.tftpd man page
lists a directory name as a required command line argument without, as
far as I could see, explaining what it did. There was a reference to
a directory for the -s option.
Maybe all these points are 2nd nature to those who work with these
things, and/or have read all the relevant RFC's, but a little more
guidance for the rest of us would be nice.
Ross Boylan
P.S. I had the old, v2, dhcp.
--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-boot-REQUEST@lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster@lists.debian.org
----- End forwarded message -----
--
Reply to: