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Digital Unix autoinstall

Requirements

  • DHCP/bootp server (DU's "joind" does DHCP)
  • TFTP server
  • NIS service recommended
  • A dedicated disk for the OS (the partition table will be written so all data will be lost).
  • TFTP & NFS access to autoinst (should be true for all subnets at UCI).
  • Root access to autoinst for configuration of disk info (i.e. partition tables) and each scripts

Gotchas

  • Check SCSI id:  Before you begin, note that this install procedure always does a full repartitioning, and that it will try rz0, then rz3, then rz8, then rz16 in that order. It'll install the OS on the first one it finds! ...so don't put user filesystems on, EG, rz8, even if you have a system disk at rz0 - in case rz0 is powered off sometime when you start an install.
    •   The specific drive can be configured on autoinst - more on this later.
  • Firmware:  Firmware might need an update - going from 3.2c -> 4.0, a firmware upgrade is almost necessary
    •  On the Alphastation 255s (e.g. carina.ps), the firmware upgrade erases the ISA configuration. The video on the 255 is on the ISA board (as opposed to the PCI bus).  Make sure that you write down the configuration of the ISA board (isacfg) before you do the firmware upgrade and then after the upgrade, but before power cycling, configure the ISA board with isacfg.  One of our former SysAdmins power cycled before reconfiguring the ISA board and the motherboard had to be replaced as none of the ISA components (keyboard, serial port) would work after that!  This problem has not been seen on the Alpha 400s or the 200s.
    • Firmware can be setup via bootp+tftp, but the firmware image has to be downloaded from Digital (at http://ftp.digital.com/pub/Digital/Alpha/firmware/readme.html.  If this is done, then it should be done before the setup autoinst. 
    • Some of the older Alphas (e.g. athena.eng, a DEC 3000) didn't like the faster CDROM drive (ours from Western Scientific - a Toshiba 12x or 15x).  So, the slower single speed drive had to be used.
  • OSF-BASE PAK:  It is important to have the lmf information on the host.
    • On a new system out of the box, you will probably see the paperwork for the PAK (Product Authorization Key) information.  The important one is the OSF-BASE. You should do the following to save you some grief:
      • boot the machine in single user:
          boot -fl s
      • mount some filesystems:
          /sbin/bcheckrc
      • configure the primary interface. If your IP address is 128.200.A.B, this would look like:
          ifconfig tu0 128.200.A.B netmask 255.255.255.0 broadcast 128.200.A.255
      • define a default route:
          route add default 128.200.A.1
      • start up inetd:
          /usr/sbin/inetd
      • cat /etc/motd > /tmp/preinstall-info
      • uname -a >> /tmp/preinstall-info
      • setld -i >> /tmp/preinstall-info
      • lmf list full >> /tmp/preinstall-info
      • ftp somewhere.else.uci.edu
          cd /tmp
          lcd /tmp
          put preinstall-info
          quit
      • Back down to the prom...
          /sbin/halt
  • BOOTP:  DEC, for whatever reason, makes it's vmunix.bootp do bootp in two major sections - one at the very beginning of the boot, and one just after vmunix kicks in.
    • OSF1/ 3.0 & OSF/1 3.2c:  Sometimes this second bootp will fail. You can recognize this, from the "portmap not responding" messages. If this happens to you, just ^c, halt, and redo the boot. Odds are high it will work the next time.
    • DU 4.0d (maybe 4.0b):  Incomplete blocks get transmitted.  I find that you may have to do an init at the boot prom and power cycle.

Changes from 3.2c

  • There is no more autoinstall from the CD (but see the hokey-install documentation if need be).  It is conceivable that it could be done, but I haven't looked into it.  Part of the problem is that for networking, you would like to write things to /etc (e.g. hosts, resolv.conf) and since the CD is readonly, this is difficult.  I guess one could try to get a memory file system going and then mount it on /etc, but I never wanted to venture down that path.  Since picking out the subsets to install is a pain, it was nice to just put it in a script and go from there.

The Install via DHCP/bootp

  • Configuring dhcp/bootp: You can update the bootptab file with /dcslib/allsys/etc/setup-autoinst. Be sure some machine on the subnet is serving the info off of procyon (/dcs/maint). This is set in /etc/inetd.conf. Check bingy.acs or meter.eng for an example.
    • autoinstalled NIS masters are usually configured to run bootp or dhcp (Digital Unix calls their DHCP server "joind").
  • Configuring tftp: Be sure there's a tftpd configured in /etc/inetd.conf on some machine on the subnet.
    • autoinstalled NIS masters are usually configured to run tftpd
  • Configuring NIS: Check autoinst.acs:/auto_install/generic-after/each/006-domainname. This is where (for DEC's) the YP domain is set (if any). If you don't want YP, that's done in 007-YP-false. The default is to use a YP domain name made from the DNS domain, prefixed by "YP.".
  • Configuring SCSI & disk info:  this step is optional, but recommended.  If you do not setup a $HOSTNAME.disk, then you live with DEC's partition scheme.  The install process will look for the following optional files: $HOSTNAME.disk, $HOSTNAME.disk.part, and $HOSTNAME.disk.scsi (where $HOSTNAME is the host that you are installing)
    • $HOSTNAME.disk is the worst file to configure.  This has the partition table.  I suggest setting up one for a particular drive and then symlinking to the file.  That way, the same partition can be preserved for other installs.
    • $HOSTNAME.disk.part specifies which partitions will be used.  Options are root, swap, usr, var, home, and tmp.  If this file does not exist, then root, swap, and usr go on partitions a, b, g, respectively.  Syntax is as follows:  {$part}dev=rz0a (where {$part} would be replaced with the word "root" ."swap",etc.)  The important part is the last character.  The SCSI id (in this case 0) is ignored, but was left in for readability.
    • $HOSTNAME.disk.scsi specifies the SCSI ID.  If this file does not exist, the script will check (in order!) rz0, rz3, and then rz8.  The syntax of this file is easy:
      • # syntax is scsi-id=0
      • scsi-id=0
    • For DU-4.0b, this is found in the following directory: autoinst.acs:/auto_install/DU-4.0b
    • For DU-4.0d, this is found in the following directory: autoinst.acs:/auto_install/DU-4.0d/nacs-uci
  • Boot the Alpha from the net:
    • On DEC 3000's (despite what "show dev" says) :
      • boot ez0
    • On smaller alpha's:
      • set ewa0_protocols bootp
      set ewa0_inet_init bootp
      boot ewa0
    • If you have trouble booting (no ethernet traffic in response to the appropriate boot command), then inspect the value of ewa0_mode. Sample values for this variable include:
      • Twisted-Pair
      • Full Duplex, Twisted Pair
      • AUI
      • BNC
      • Fast
      • FastFD
  • You will need to type boot at the prom, after the install completes; there is no readily apparent way of getting an alpha to reboot off a device different from that on which it was running when a reboot command is invoked - IE, reboot wants to restart the install (because it reboots off the prior boot device in this case, the net).
  • Once that's done, if this is a Model 3000, then:
    • log in as root
    • run lmf modify OSF-BASE
    • double the units field (should be 24 -- Alphastation 200s are 12).

Prior notes

http://www.nacs.uci.edu/support/sysadmin/automation/dec-install.html 

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Revised: February 13, 1998
dcs@uci.edu (fw)