[ipxe-devel] iPXE and booting ISOs over the network

[IT1 Stuart Blake Tener, USNR]

  Adam,

Perhaps I was a bit inarticulate there, when I said "they are so  
useless", I meant the answers not the people. However, having read  
over what I said I surely can see how the inference you drew was taken  
from that. An email list in my view is far better given each answer is  
individual and replied to in order and must be read and thought about.

Your reply does raise a few good points that I did not speak to in my  
question, so I will clarify and amplify my concerns in pursuance of  
everyone understanding my goals.

1. In general I think whatever solution that I craft should be  
functional for BIOS booting for now, UEFI I will address later once I  
have a BIOS based solution working. Granted, perhaps knowing I would  
do that would be useful to assure I do not go down any rabbit holes  
that will cause a future UEFI solution to mean major redesigns of what  
I do now.

2. I do understand the difference between PXE (a standard) and iPXE  
(software). I realize that PXE has no ability to boot ISOs directly  
(please do correct me if I am wrong). Initially I was thinking to boot  
iPXE via a USB stick, but I like the idea of starting out being able  
to PXE boot iPXE, that is far better. In fact, several servers I have  
(IBM x3650s) have difficulty booting certain types of USB sticks  
(depending as best I understand it on if the USB stick's internal  
firmware presents the USB stick as a hard drive, floppy or CD-ROM).  
Thus, to PXE boot iPXE I think is really the best choice for me.

If may also ask, what are the differences, advantages and  
disadvantages of booting via memdisk vs sanboot?

Any recommended reading on each that you can offer I will surely go  
and read up on.

3. So, I am interested in being able to boot ISOs, though I do realize  
copying them into directories and such is what many people do.  
However, for me, I prefer to be able to just pull updated ISOs, toss  
them in a directory and have a manner for a menu to be generated  
offering the option of booting any one of say 5 or whatever ISOs in  
that directory.

4. I do like Debian and dnsmasq, but I had a lot of trouble finding  
any really good documents (other than the man pages, which I believe  
are not all that clear as to how to use dnsmasq). Granted, that said,  
I am happy to learn and make use of dnsmasq.

So, let me see if I get what I should be looking to build so far:

Phase 1 testing

5. A virtual machine running debian that has dnsmasq and tftp  
installed. In order to PXE boot iPXE from this system, I would need to  
use the directory method to copy all the files off of the iPXE ISO to  
achieve this?

6. A second virtual machine that will be the system to be booted via  
PXE/iPXE. I could also just feed this VM the iPXE ISO also I realize,  
though PXE booting iPXE is the more clever and interesting solution to  
me.
 
  Thank you to everyone on the list and stay safe from looting thugs  
and healthy from the pandemic.

Very Respectfully,

Stuart
 

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