Automating Gentoo Installation

phipo · Posted: Sun Aug 22, 2004 5:11 pm Post subject: Automating Gentoo Installation

Hello,

I plan to install gentoo on 6 machines. what possible ways are there to automate this?

it's not that I don't like the gentoo installation, but it's kind of boring doing the same thing six times.

thanks for any input or references.

phipo

jdgill0 · Posted: Sun Aug 22, 2004 5:14 pm Post subject:

Are all six machines of the same type, for example all are AMD x86 machines? If so, just install once and copy the install drive to each of the other machines' drives. The big thing to account for is the bootloader. You could use the dd command to copy the drive.

phipo · Posted: Sun Aug 22, 2004 5:24 pm Post subject:

yes, all machines happen to be similar. dd would work for now, but it's likely that there will be more machines coming in later, with different hardware.

and what about updating these machines? doing the same emerge commands on all pc's? there must be something nicer?

os · n00b Joined: 15 Aug 2004 Posts: 3 Location: Aylesbury, UK

Hi,

I certainly agree about the boredom factor of installing on multiple machines.

One thing you could try is writing a script or two to do the installation(s). Installation is basically just a series of 'unix' commands so there's no reason why you can't put that in a bash script.

A few months ago I wrote an installation script for Gentoo which reads configuration options from a file and runs all the commands in the installation handbook depending on what you put in the file. I'm trying the smarten it up at the moment, but if you want to give it a go I'll be happy to provide it if you don't mind being a bit of a 'guinee pig'. :wink:

It's not perfect, but it does remove much of the drudgery (though I've only tested it on 3 x86 machines so far...)

There is currently an 'official' installation system in development (http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/releng/installer/index.xml), which does sound like the kind of thing you want, but I don't know what the progress is...

Ol.
_________________
"The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter." - Winston Churchill

nbkolchin · Posted: Sun Aug 22, 2004 10:50 pm Post subject:

johnhenry · n00b Joined: 22 Aug 2004 Posts: 25

Why not take a Partimage copy of the first installation onto CD(s) and then Partimage Restore it onto the other machines? The Restore is fast, though the initial backup is rather slower as it is creating the compression.

I have found this system works very well.

johnhenry

jdgill0 · Posted: Fri Aug 27, 2004 4:45 pm Post subject:

This tool might be useful for automating installations: http://www.udpcast.linux.lu/ ... I just ran across it and have not had time to really check it out, let alone use it ... here is a quote from their website:

BlackEdder · Posted: Fri Aug 27, 2004 4:49 pm Post subject:

There is also this:
http://gentoo.vidalinux.com/?q=node/view/35
Which is a gentoo installation project that seems to be in working order (not sure if it will work with all hardware)