booting/installing Solaris over HTTP

[mcb30]

(2013-06-11 18:57)sab Wrote:  I am planning to skip the DHCP altogether. So basically, I am thinking if there's a way for me to reach an "initial prompt" with iPXE from where I am okay to assign the IP manually and point the client to a HTTP server using some iPXE commands so that it can start downloading the boot image and start loading the Solaris OS.

You can definitely do that. iPXE gives you a command line; you can configure the IP address using e.g.

Code:

set net0/ip 192.168.0.10
set net0/netmask 255.255.255.0
set net0/gateway 192.168.0.254
set net0/dns 8.8.8.8

and then boot your required OS via HTTP.

To eliminate some tedious typing, you can use an embedded iPXE script to prompt you for the network configuration and then automatically boot the correct URL, e.g.:

Code:

#!ipxe
ifopen net0
echo -n IP address: && read net0/ip
echo -n Subnet mask: && read net0/netmask
echo -n Default gateway: && read net0/gateway
set net0/dns 8.8.8.8
echo -n DNS server: && read net0/dns
chain http://my.web.server/solaris.ipxe

Michael