FC5 new install on cluster running RH9 Shrike

[Anne]

Is it possible to boot RH9 from a local disk, then install FC5 on
the same live system?

[stoat]

Anne,

I'm afraid that the way your question is phrased ran everybody off. I'm not sure what it means either. Maybe you can try again to state what it is you are trying to do. It sounds to me like you are asking about dual booting two Linux OSs which is not only possible, but easy to do and well documented in this forum.

[Anne]

Sorry about that.

We have a cluster running RH9 (Shrike) - 3 years old. The nodes only
have floppies and network connections. There are no USB ports for
an external CD or DVD. The BIOS doesn't have an option to boot from
the net.

I'm trying to figure out how to update each disk to FC.

The node master has a CD. I could replace this with a DVD. Then
I can upgrade the master node.

But if the nodes are booted up into RH9, I think it's not possible to
nfs-mount the CD/DVD from the master node and install FC5 onto
the nodes. We only want to run FC5 on the master and all the
nodes.

The problem is not having a net boot option in the BIOS and also
not having any external slot to attach a CD.

The one suggestion I had was to install FC cleanly onto a disk on
a workstation, then take that disk and install it physically into the
node. Then remove the disk from each node and dd the running
disk onto the slave disk.

Any suggestions appreciated.

[stoat]

Anne, I have no datacenter server experience. Sorry. I completely misunderstood your initial post. But it's at least clearer now what you want to do. Maybe someone with appropriate experience and an idea will post it for you.

What about copying the Fedora Core DVD ISO image to a hard drive, installing that as a slave in the node for the pupose of doing a hard drive installation on the master drive from the ISO image after booting from the floppy drive? I'm certain that I am embarrassing myself now.

I hope someone helps you. I for one, would appreciate your taking a moment to come back and tell how you eventually solve this

[ccrvic]

Originally Posted by Anne

We have a cluster running RH9 (Shrike) - 3 years old.

It's a good idea to upgrade :-)

Originally Posted by Anne

The nodes only
have floppies and network connections. There are no USB ports for
an external CD or DVD. The BIOS doesn't have an option to boot from
the net.

You'll need to boot from a local drive & do a network install, then.

Originally Posted by Anne

The node master has a CD. I could replace this with a DVD. Then
I can upgrade the master node.

Have you got another machine you could *temporarily* attach to the network as an NFS server? It would make life simpler...

Alternatively, how much disk space have you got on your master machine?

Originally Posted by Anne

The one suggestion I had was to install FC cleanly onto a disk on
a workstation, then take that disk and install it physically into the
node. Then remove the disk from each node and dd the running
disk onto the slave disk.

If you're going to do that, you might as well find yourself a bootable LInux floppy & dd across the network...

But here's what I'd try instead :-

Make a new directory on each machine & copy the contents of the isolinux directory from CD1 into each (use rsync to do this across the network).
Make a kickstart file to describe the installation you want & put it in the same place
Add a new entry to your grub.conf file to point to the kernel in your new directory (beware that the filesystem at boot time might not be like it is when the system is running - use any other grub.conf entries as a guide).
Add arguments to your kernel line so that is will follow your kickstart - something like "ks=hd:hda1:/fedora/ks.cfg" (depending on where you put it, of course).

You should now be able to boot that machine & select your new grub entry - that will load the FC5 kernel from the install media & launch your kickstart config. If you've got everything right, that will allow you to install over the network from your NFS server.

Vic.

[Anne]

# hammond 10/07/05
title Red Hat Linux with console (2.4.27)
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.4.27 ro root=/dev/hda5 scsihosts=aic79xx:aic79xx:
aacraid reboot=warm

Here's the default boot entry and the kickstart entry:

# hammond 061906
title Fedora Core 5 with kickstart (2.6.15)
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-fc5 ro root=/dev/hda5 scsihosts=aic79xx:aic79xx:aac
raid reboot=warm

I copied all the files from CD1 isolinux to /boot, renaming vmlinux to vmlinux-fc5.
None of the other filename conflicted.

It boots, but after checking for RAID disks, there is a
Kernel panic--not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unknown-block

I haven't created the ks file--thought the system might be able to boot into the screen
with the "press any key to install" in graphical mode.

Will keep trying. This would be a neat way to upgrade. I've created the rpm repository
on a disk on the server, so the updates can hopefully be nfs-mounted.