[K12OSN] Re: Tossing around an idea...need some input

[Jim McQuillan]

On Sat, 13 Aug 2005, Matt Oquist wrote:

> > Now....notice the "next server" line up above and the
> >
> > option root-path              "10.0.15.253:/opt/ltsp/i386";
> >
> > These are in the global section....one question I had is....if I put these
> > in the workstation declarations down below pointing to Server #2
> > (10.0.14.253 ) would that override the globals?  Example:
>
> Yes.
>
> Also, I wonder if you could set up internal DNS and use hostnames
> instead of IP addresses for the root-path and next-server.  Assuming
> for our discussion that your two LTSP servers are 10.0.14.253 and
> 10.0.14.252, you would put this in your DNS zone file (after the SOA
> and all that):
>
> ltsp    A       10.0.14.252
> ltsp    A       10.0.14.253
>
> According to "DNS & Bind" (a book every administrator should have)
> this will give you Round Robin Load Distribution (p. 273).
>
> Your DHCP options would then be:
> option root-path        "ltsp.daves.school:/opt/ltsp/i386";
> option next-server      "ltsp.daves.school";

the 'next-server' parameter is used by the bootrom.  I know that
Etherboot isn't going to work with a hostname, because there is no
resolver in the Etherboot code.  It's only going to want an IP address.

I don't know if PXE has a resolver or not, so some experimenting is in
order.

the 'root-path' parameter is used by the LTSP initrd image. Again, a
hostname isn't going to work here, because the initrd doesn't have the
resolver libraries.  It's expecting a hostname and a directory pathname,
separated by a colon.

Jim McQuillan
jam at Ltsp.org