Playbooks

PXE Boot Server

Description

Playbook to install and configure a PXE boot server for your local environment.

Pre-requisites

1. Ansible
   • Installation Guide
2. Two machines/virtual machines:

   • Machine Minimum Specs:

     • PXE Server:
       • 2 vCPUs
       • 2 GB RAM
       • 60 GB Disk
         • Partitions:

           Name	Size (GB)
           /	9
           /boot	1
           /boot/efi	1
           /home	4
           /tmp	4
           /var	28
           /var/log	4
           /var/log/audit	4
           /var/tmp	4

     • Test Server:
       • 2 vCPUS
       • 2 GB RAM
       • 40 GB Disk
         • Partitions:

           Name	Size (GB)
           /	10
           /boot	1
           /boot/efi	1
           /home	8
           /tmp	4
           /var	4
           /var/log	4
           /var/log/audit	4
           /var/tmp	4

   • Note: I suggest installing a hypervisor and using virtual machines. Here's a list of common affordable hypervisors

     • HyperV (Windows)
     • KVM (Linux)
     • VirtualBox (Cross Platform)
3. OS images to offer as PXE boot options
4. Kickstarts for images to offer as PXE boot options

Usage

1. Clone Repository

   git clone https://github.com/danagarcia/linux-automation.git

2. Edit Inventory

   cd linux-automation
   vi ansible/inventory

   • Replace: 192.168.86.46 with the IPv4 address of the server you want to serve as a PXE boot server
3. Edit Variables

   cd linux-automation
   vi ansible/playbooks/configure-pxe-server.yml

   • Update values to match your configuration for variables:
     • host -> vars -> images
     • host -> vars -> dhcp_config
4. Generate SSH Key

   ssh-keygen -b 4096

5. Add Key to Authorized Keys

   ssh-copy-id -i ~/.ssh/<name-of-your-key>.pub <username-for-pxe-machine>@<ipv4-address-for-pxe-machine>

   • Replace vaalues between <>
6. Update Ansible Config

   vi ansible/ansible.cfg

   Update values for remote_user and private_key_file
7. Create Ansible Temp Directory

   ssh <username-for-pxe-machine>@<ipv4-address-for-pxe-machine> -i ~/.ssh/<name-of-your-key>
   sudo mkdir /var/ansible
   chmod 777 -R /var/ansible
   exit

8. Run Playbook

   ansible-playbook ./playbooks/configure-pxe-server.yml --become --ask-become-pass

   • You will be prompted for the password of the remote user account. This is to evelate to root as many steps require it.
9. Watch The Magic
10. Launch PXE Boot on Test Machine
11. Select Image
12. Watch The Magic