Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[technosaurus]

Well, I guess this thread is dead now.
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/08/10/1916222/google-granted-cloud-os-patent
apparently USPTO never heard of "prior art"

[Aitch]

What happened to the 'prior art' principle?
...... it wasn't destroyed by the claim of patent, so I hope it can be traced back, and they get sued!

Aitch

[gcmartin]

This thread is still active and flourishing. It works. PXE is a standard that is used in all PC chipsets over the past decade and so.

Couple months back, booted a whole switch full of PCs at the same time as a demo of PUPPY POWER!

JamesBond recently built his FATDOG600+ in such a way as it only needs to be loaded in the TFTP and any 64bit PC on the LAN can boot without running the NETBOOT script. (Instructions are pending his next round of fixes-changes to FATDOG600+.)

Hope this helps

[technosaurus]

I was referring to Google patenting our prior art and killing off innovation, not the traditional "dead thread" ... By the uspto measures, puppy could have a patent portfolio that could compete with the best (or worst) of them.

[greengeek]

Hi gcmartin - I have been having a lot of problems with PXE booting a variety of PCs and although most of those may be related to specific hardware designs I do feel that there may be an issue with the dnsmasq and/or server3 pet currently on offer.

Specifically, I have a "Penguin computers Green 731" laptop which would consistently fail the PXE load attempt when using the current pets referred to in the google docs (it would hang after searching for the "default", but this was not an issue with location or structure of that file). I found I was able to succeed with a PXE load only when I used the server that jrb had built into PupServer435TNG. TNG version of PupServer found here:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=60406&start=44
(However that PXE server version had a bug which did not allow the client PC to surf the web after booting if the PXE server was still on line...)

I have found a way to make the server3 pet work, but I don't fully understand the ramifications of what I have found - except that there may be other people who have stumbled against this issue too. I think maybe some hardware cannot cope with the specified "tftp-prefix" and/or the design/location of the pxelinux.0 file

I have documented this here:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?p=651753#651753

jrb mentions another solution which retains the PupServer435TNG server and involves installing a different version of the dnsmasq pet. I would welcome your opinion if you have time, as I believe I am using the correct pets you have specified and wonder if there may be some benefit in using jrb's server and dnsmasq pet (possibly for all puppies...), or at least working out why the server3 pet creates a pxelinux.0 file that is incompatible with some machines.

EDIT: just confirmed identical behaviour when using Akita8, so not just an issue with PupServer

[greengeek]

Also...if anyone has a suggestion for the best way to view the contents of the pxelinux.0 file (which seems to be ascii) I would be keen to understand the structure of it. Leafpad and Geany don't seem to be the right way (unless I'm using them wrong...)

[gcmartin]

Hi @Greengeek. this understanding "may" help your current troubles.

The prime problem I have ever had with the PXE subsystem's use has been the PXE client's microcode not being current/not having correct Intel compliance.

That's my only problem. I have NOT encountered any problem with 2006+ PCs.

That being said, I have NOT encountered a problem with specific distros.

There are 2 movements currently underway and should provide some possible release (although, the changes are more cosmetic versus structural changes.). They "may" have a positive impact for you.

The 2 are a change in the document that is used to be more up to date with the PPM changes that has occurred in Puppy Linux, where DNSMASQ is concerned. And, there is a new Netboot Script under development that will make use of Netbooting a "little" (maybe a lot) more intuitive.

Please give a couple days to see the 2 items hit the forum.

Lastly, if you don't mind and think it useful, I will post my FATSlacko CD's ISO that has a working Netboot subsystem for you to test as a PXE server on your LAN. If you feel it will help, check your PM for instructions. I have been using FATSlacko since its release as a NAS, a Netboot server and a desktop since its community availability. The ONLY thing ever installed-added was the Netboot server because everything else was already present. In fact, I also have employed LightHouse64, similarly. In each's case, I found these 2 distros to deliver very suitable functionality OOTB where Netboot was the only subsystem added and available for use via the desktop.

Let me know if this helps until the arrival of the upgraded Netboot PET and more current instructions updates when using it.

Here to help

[greengeek]

Thanks GC. I am making progress with my PXE trials... and I have a question for anyone who may be able to help me with the set up of the netboot-server-jb.sh script:

I have modified the script so that it runs automatically in debug mode without asking me which mode I want to use, and this is working correctly but I don't know how to tell it to use a "minimised window".

My modification is that I "comment out" some lines at the bottom of the script:

[greengeek]

[slenkar]

i got it to work on a different distro thanks

[gcmartin]

[greengeek]

If anyone is keen to try PXE booting but wants it to be made as simple as possible I have made a modified version of Pupserver435 (thanks jrb!) and I have added the PXE bootfiles for ThinSlacko inside the iso.

This means that all you have to do is boot the first PC from a CD containing my iso, then set the second PC to boot from network, and it will all happen automatically without any other intervention from the user. Very handy if you are trying to boot a PC that has no hard drive or CD.

See last 2 posts of thread here http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=80620