Subject: Re: diskless booting
To: James O'Kane <jo2y@positroncomp.com>
From: Simon Burge <simonb@telstra.com.au>
List: port-pmax
Date: 11/27/1998 15:20:15
On Thu, 26 Nov 1998 20:13:39 -0500 (EST)  "James O'Kane" wrote:

> I recently received a DS 3100, and I thought I could install netbsd this
> time without problem, since I figured it out with help when I got my 2100
> months ago.
> But...I've run into trouble NFS mounting the root drive. It seems that
> DHCP doesn't send the path to the nfs share like I think it should. The
> documents say to set bf=/path/to/root, but I can't find what I should use
> in DHCP to do the same thing.
> 
> I'm getting this error when I boot:
> nfs_boot: getfh - no pathname
> 
> Is anyone familiar with the settings for DHCP?

Here's an excerpt from an old message from this list - hope it helps...

Simon.
--

> From: Jonathan Stone <jonathan@DSG.Stanford.EDU>
> To: port-pmax@NetBSD.ORG
> Cc: Joop Carels <zombie@il.fontys.nl>
> Cc: Number 6 <no6@dhp.com>
> Subject:  NetBSD/pmax netboots uses bootp/dhcp, not bootparamsp/rarp
> Date: Sun, 29 Mar 1998 23:41:35 -0800 (PST)
> Message-Id: <199803300741.XAA00564@Cuisinart.Stanford.EDU>

Here's an example (lightly edited) based on I use at home:

------- begin dhcpd.conf
# we are an unoficial server.  Don't answer to unknown clients.
deny unknown-clients;

subnet 10.103.0.0  netmask 255.255.0.0  {
    option subnet-mask 255.255.0.0 ;
    option broadcast-address 10.103.255.255 ;
    default-lease-time 600 ;
    max-lease-time 7200 ;
    option routers 10.103.0.1 ;
    option domain-name-servers 10.103.0.36 ;
    option domain-name "Stanford.EDU" ;

# tftp pathname is "netbsd.ecoff"
# diskless root is at "/export/nfsclient/pmax-root"
host cuisinart {
     hardware  ethernet 08:00:2b:2e:7c:ed ;

     allow bootp;
     allow booting;
     fixed-address 10.103.0.50 ;
     filename "netbsd.ecoff"  ;
     # Warning!
     #  pmax proms  (e.g., KN02-CA v2.0m PROM) use bootp, not dhcp,
     *  and there is a hard limit on option size.  The PROMs fail to get
     #  an IP address if option  root-path has a string of >= 16 chars.
     # Use symlinks to keep the root-path <= 15 chars.
     # OK:        option root-path "xxxxyyyyzzzzaaa";
     # TOO LONG:  option root-path "xxxxyyyyzzzzaaaf";
     # ALSO TOO LONG: option root-path "/export/nfsclient/pmax-root" ;
     # OK ALTERNATIVE:  
     #   (after doing "ln -s /export/nfsclient/pmax-root /pmaxroot"
     #   on the NFS server)
     option root-path "/pmaxroot" ;
}
------- end dhcpd.conf