Hello, all -
I've been throwing the question around on the kickstart-list for the last few days here, and can't quite get ahold of things. Please, allow me to explain.
I am in the process of making a custom CentOS/RHEL kickstart install. It works well right now; however, it's a hackjob, and I am not comfortable with it as of yet.
For the past few days, I've even gone as far as making a custom comps.xml file, for the purpose of the kickstart. What I'd like to do is not include any @groups or -/+files in my kickstart file; rather, I'd like to edit comps.xml's @Base and @Core so that I need nothing else in my kickstart file, except for the configuration options. I know that this isn't required, I'm just anal about the whole situation ;)
This would also give me a chance to package, along with my install, newer and updated packages/RPMs so that I don't have to run an update process on the newly installed machine. My understanding is, if this is done, a new base/hdlist{2} file{s} is/are needed to be created. I've read around a bit, and apparently I'm supposed to use a tool named "genhdlist", but I've not been able to find any documentation on this tool, what exactly it does, and how exactly to use it.
I'm expressing my frustration, along with many other people who have been in the same situation, as seen from the kickstart-list.
I guess what I'm asking for, is if someone has ever made a completely custom kickstart install that does the following:
1) edits comps.xml to modify @base and @core 2) takes newer packages into consideration 3) compiles this information, creates new hdlist{2} reference files 4) gets the mother to work.
This seemingly simple process seems to lack a bit of documentation. I ahve found sniplets all over the 'net where it would show a small process of how to get all this done, however, the author fails to document the utility or method in detail, or the process is for something totally archaic such as RH6.2.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks! -dant
On Wed, 2005-06-29 at 16:42 -0700, dan.trainor wrote:
Hello, all -
I've been throwing the question around on the kickstart-list for the last few days here, and can't quite get ahold of things. Please, allow me to explain.
I am in the process of making a custom CentOS/RHEL kickstart install. It works well right now; however, it's a hackjob, and I am not comfortable with it as of yet.
For the past few days, I've even gone as far as making a custom comps.xml file, for the purpose of the kickstart. What I'd like to do is not include any @groups or -/+files in my kickstart file; rather, I'd like to edit comps.xml's @Base and @Core so that I need nothing else in my kickstart file, except for the configuration options. I know that this isn't required, I'm just anal about the whole situation ;)
This would also give me a chance to package, along with my install, newer and updated packages/RPMs so that I don't have to run an update process on the newly installed machine. My understanding is, if this is done, a new base/hdlist{2} file{s} is/are needed to be created. I've read around a bit, and apparently I'm supposed to use a tool named "genhdlist", but I've not been able to find any documentation on this tool, what exactly it does, and how exactly to use it.
genhdlist is part of anaconda-runtime
Here is some good info:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Anaconda
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/AnacondaBinaries
Here is all the stuff you need to run the anaconda binaries:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/AnacondaBuildEnvironment
(Although anaconda is very much undocumented)
I'm expressing my frustration, along with many other people who have been in the same situation, as seen from the kickstart-list.
I guess what I'm asking for, is if someone has ever made a completely custom kickstart install that does the following:
- edits comps.xml to modify @base and @core
- takes newer packages into consideration
- compiles this information, creates new hdlist{2} reference files
- gets the mother to work.
This seemingly simple process seems to lack a bit of documentation. I ahve found sniplets all over the 'net where it would show a small process of how to get all this done, however, the author fails to document the utility or method in detail, or the process is for something totally archaic such as RH6.2.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Here is the script I use to build the ISOs from the main tree:
On Wed, 2005-06-29 at 19:02 -0500, Johnny Hughes wrote:
On Wed, 2005-06-29 at 16:42 -0700, dan.trainor wrote:
Hello, all -
I've been throwing the question around on the kickstart-list for the last few days here, and can't quite get ahold of things. Please, allow me to explain.
I am in the process of making a custom CentOS/RHEL kickstart install. It works well right now; however, it's a hackjob, and I am not comfortable with it as of yet.
For the past few days, I've even gone as far as making a custom comps.xml file, for the purpose of the kickstart. What I'd like to do is not include any @groups or -/+files in my kickstart file; rather, I'd like to edit comps.xml's @Base and @Core so that I need nothing else in my kickstart file, except for the configuration options. I know that this isn't required, I'm just anal about the whole situation ;)
This would also give me a chance to package, along with my install, newer and updated packages/RPMs so that I don't have to run an update process on the newly installed machine. My understanding is, if this is done, a new base/hdlist{2} file{s} is/are needed to be created. I've read around a bit, and apparently I'm supposed to use a tool named "genhdlist", but I've not been able to find any documentation on this tool, what exactly it does, and how exactly to use it.
genhdlist is part of anaconda-runtime
Here is some good info:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Anaconda
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/AnacondaBinaries
Here is all the stuff you need to run the anaconda binaries:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/AnacondaBuildEnvironment
(Although anaconda is very much undocumented)
I'm expressing my frustration, along with many other people who have been in the same situation, as seen from the kickstart-list.
I guess what I'm asking for, is if someone has ever made a completely custom kickstart install that does the following:
- edits comps.xml to modify @base and @core
- takes newer packages into consideration
- compiles this information, creates new hdlist{2} reference files
- gets the mother to work.
This seemingly simple process seems to lack a bit of documentation. I ahve found sniplets all over the 'net where it would show a small process of how to get all this done, however, the author fails to document the utility or method in detail, or the process is for something totally archaic such as RH6.2.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Here is the script I use to build the ISOs from the main tree:
Here is my .rpmmacros of i386:
Johnny Hughes wrote:
On Wed, 2005-06-29 at 19:02 -0500, Johnny Hughes wrote:
On Wed, 2005-06-29 at 16:42 -0700, dan.trainor wrote:
Hello, all -
I've been throwing the question around on the kickstart-list for the last few days here, and can't quite get ahold of things. Please, allow me to explain.
I am in the process of making a custom CentOS/RHEL kickstart install. It works well right now; however, it's a hackjob, and I am not comfortable with it as of yet.
For the past few days, I've even gone as far as making a custom comps.xml file, for the purpose of the kickstart. What I'd like to do is not include any @groups or -/+files in my kickstart file; rather, I'd like to edit comps.xml's @Base and @Core so that I need nothing else in my kickstart file, except for the configuration options. I know that this isn't required, I'm just anal about the whole situation ;)
This would also give me a chance to package, along with my install, newer and updated packages/RPMs so that I don't have to run an update process on the newly installed machine. My understanding is, if this is done, a new base/hdlist{2} file{s} is/are needed to be created. I've read around a bit, and apparently I'm supposed to use a tool named "genhdlist", but I've not been able to find any documentation on this tool, what exactly it does, and how exactly to use it.
genhdlist is part of anaconda-runtime
Here is some good info:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Anaconda
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/AnacondaBinaries
Here is all the stuff you need to run the anaconda binaries:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/AnacondaBuildEnvironment
(Although anaconda is very much undocumented)
I'm expressing my frustration, along with many other people who have been in the same situation, as seen from the kickstart-list.
I guess what I'm asking for, is if someone has ever made a completely custom kickstart install that does the following:
- edits comps.xml to modify @base and @core
- takes newer packages into consideration
- compiles this information, creates new hdlist{2} reference files
- gets the mother to work.
This seemingly simple process seems to lack a bit of documentation. I ahve found sniplets all over the 'net where it would show a small process of how to get all this done, however, the author fails to document the utility or method in detail, or the process is for something totally archaic such as RH6.2.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Here is the script I use to build the ISOs from the main tree:
Here is my .rpmmacros of i386:
Hey there, Johnny -
I've been playing around for the past few days with the info that you have provided, and it has been a great help. I'd like to thank you for that.
However, I'm still just a bit confused.
My problem is, that I don't need to create a whole new distribution, but rather, just remaster the data on an ISO that I've made of all the packages I'll be needing, including editing comps.xml and generating base/hdlist{2} files from the editing. As far as I can gather, this is a lot to ask.
Would you mind me asking where you gathered the information to create this script, or like everyone else, did you hear from a friend of a friend who's cousin found a note written by someone who used to work for RedHat that had a friend that made these distributions? That's the story I hear every single time.
For something so critical, I don't know why this process is so cryptic. Anaconda and kickstart installations have tremendous power, and it's all going to waste becase only a small handfull of people can actually pull it off.
Thanks again for your time, Johnny -dant
Quoting "dan.trainor" dan.trainor@gmail.com:
Hey there, Johnny -
I've been playing around for the past few days with the info that you have provided, and it has been a great help. I'd like to thank you for that.
However, I'm still just a bit confused.
My problem is, that I don't need to create a whole new distribution, but rather, just remaster the data on an ISO that I've made of all the packages I'll be needing, including editing comps.xml and generating base/hdlist{2} files from the editing. As far as I can gather, this is a lot to ask.
Would you mind me asking where you gathered the information to create this script, or like everyone else, did you hear from a friend of a friend who's cousin found a note written by someone who used to work for RedHat that had a friend that made these distributions? That's the story I hear every single time.
For something so critical, I don't know why this process is so cryptic. Anaconda and kickstart installations have tremendous power, and it's all going to waste becase only a small handfull of people can actually pull it off.
While Fedora's Wiki could have more usefull documentation, there are some very usefull links:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/AnancondaUsefulLinks
For example, the very first link is to an article from Linux Journal. It deals with Red Hat 8.0, but most of it is still applicable to Fedora Core and/or Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
So, yeah, the information is scattered all around and scarce, but with more or less research, most of it is out there somewhere ;-)
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alex@milivojevic.org wrote:
Quoting "dan.trainor" dan.trainor@gmail.com:
Hey there, Johnny -
I've been playing around for the past few days with the info that you have provided, and it has been a great help. I'd like to thank you for that.
However, I'm still just a bit confused.
My problem is, that I don't need to create a whole new distribution, but rather, just remaster the data on an ISO that I've made of all the packages I'll be needing, including editing comps.xml and generating base/hdlist{2} files from the editing. As far as I can gather, this is a lot to ask.
Would you mind me asking where you gathered the information to create this script, or like everyone else, did you hear from a friend of a friend who's cousin found a note written by someone who used to work for RedHat that had a friend that made these distributions? That's the story I hear every single time.
For something so critical, I don't know why this process is so cryptic. Anaconda and kickstart installations have tremendous power, and it's all going to waste becase only a small handfull of people can actually pull it off.
While Fedora's Wiki could have more usefull documentation, there are some very usefull links:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/AnancondaUsefulLinks
For example, the very first link is to an article from Linux Journal. It deals with Red Hat 8.0, but most of it is still applicable to Fedora Core and/or Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
So, yeah, the information is scattered all around and scarce, but with more or less research, most of it is out there somewhere ;-)
Hey there, Alex -
I've gotten a bit farther since we had last talked. However, I'm getting stuck now during the Anaconda install. If you (or anyone else out there) wouldn't mind taking a moment to tell me what I'm doing wrong, I'd greatly appreciate it. Here's some info to help the situation:
comps.xml: http://pastebin.com/309018
Anaconda VC1: http://img113.imageshack.us/img113/4018/screenshot5sd.png
Anaconda VC3: http://img298.imageshack.us/img298/816/screenshot10dx.png
comps.xml is comprised of a slimming down of the @base and @core groups, in addition to adding a few RPMs that I had made. I created what I think was all needed by using the following commands:
genhdlist --withnumbers --productpath=CentOS /tmp/centos-1/
pkgorder /tmp/centos-1 i386 >/tmp/pkgorder.txt
genhdlist --withnumbers --productpath=CentOS --fileorder=/tmp/pkgorder.txt /tmp/centos-1
buildinstall --comp dist-4.0 --pkgorder /tmp/pkgorder.txt --release "CentOS-4 i386" --product "CentOS-4 i386" --version 4 `pwd`
That's all I've got for now. Please let me know if I can provide some more information.
Thanks! -dant
-
alex＠milivojevic.org -
dan.trainor -
Johnny Hughes