On Mon, 9 Jul 2001, Jenkins, Graham K [IBM GSA] wrote:

> I'd really like to see a NetBSD terminal server project. We have a
> deployed a number of old 486 machines as Xterminals in a DHCP
> environment - but the users tend to do horrible things with their
> power switches - which can result in corrupt filesystems.
>
> So a client terminal bootable via a NIC-PROM and/or floppy - would
> solve a lot of problems for me.  I know I could set all this up
> myself, but having a number of more experienced heads working on this
> thing as a project could produce a superior end result, able to be
> used by a large number of people.

	I've setup a couple of netboot installations where several
	hosts share the same nfs exported filesystem, completely
	netbooting in the vax and sparc case or loading a kernel
	with root on nfs from floppy or HD. Just setup a standard
	diskless nfs environment as for one box, ensure you do not
	set the hostname or interface in the startup scripts, then
	add a small tweak to swapon and mount /var from directories
	based on the hostname.

	If the disks in the hosts are large enough you might want to
	consider running them with readonly filesystems - just mount
	an mfs over /var and extract a tarfile into it during boot.
	You gain all the performance of local disk (slightly more as
	you do not need to update atimes), plus complete immunity from
	those powercord pullers...

-- 
		David/absolute		-- www.netbsd.org: No hype required --