AutoYaST provides a method to automatically and identically install groups of systems. The first step when preparing a AutoYaST installation is to decide how you want to install the target systems. The following scenario is a good example for how to set up and perform automated installations:
You need to install SuSE Linux on 50 new systems.
The development department owns 30 out of the 50 new dual processor and SCSI systems, and these systems must be installed as clients with development software.
The sales department owns 20 out of the 50 new, uni-processor IDE based systems and its systems must be installed as clients with end user software and office tools.
Prerequisites:
a boot server on the same Ethernet segment,
an installation server with the SuSE Linux OS,
an AutoYaST configuration server that defines rules and profiles.
A configuration repository holds the control files for multiple machines. The control files can have any file names, which have to be specified at the boot time of a target client. To avoid supplying the profile name for every client, you can define the directory of the control files. If a directory is specified, then the target client tries to load a file with a name matching its IP address in HEX mode. This has the advantage that you will be dealing with consistent file names rather than IPs as file names which might lead to some confusion.
The configuration repository is the same directory you specify when using the configuration system for creating control files.
To be able to use the HTTP protocol to
retrieve control files while auto-installing, you need a working
HTTP server on the server side. Install
Apache or your favorite Web server and enable it
using YaST. Normally the Web server root directory resides in
/srv/www/htdocs
so you need to create a
subdirectory which will serve your configuration repository.
Create a directory and export it via
NFS to the target clients. This
directory may the same location where you have copied the CDs. (i.e.
/usr/local/SuSE
).
By default the TFTP directory is
available under /tftpboot
which can also contain
boot images if you are booting over network. Do not forget to enable
TFTP in the Inetd configuration file
(/etc/inetd.conf
). Inetd
configuration can be done via YaST.