Re: status of grub netboot in GRUB2

[Vladimir 'φ-coder/phcoder' Serbinenko]

On 09/01/2010 10:40 PM, Turner, Ian wrote:
> John,
>
> What happens when you load GRUB from media and then load the pxe module? 
Nothing
> Do you get access to the PXE filesystem?
No
>  I think you can even specify the tftp server to use by setting some 
> variables.
>
>   
AFAIK PXE rom simply isn't designed to be executed without causing it to
attempt netboot. It may be possible with some black magic to make it do
so, but the resulting code will be very unstable.
> --Ian
>
> (Apologies for the HTML mail - this mail client doesn't support composing 
> plain text messages)
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: address@hidden <address@hidden>
> To: grub-devel maillist <address@hidden>
> Sent: Wed Sep 01 11:12:26 2010
> Subject: Re: status of grub netboot in GRUB2
>
>
> Thanks for the numerous replies.    Some comments interspersed and one 
> question at the end.
>
> Lennart Sorensen wrote:
>
> |  What is the point of having a bootloader that needs to sit on a disk on
> |  a box, when then network boots?  With PXE and the like you don't need
> |  any disk and means you are really net booting.
>
> There are various situations where PXE is not an answer.   Examples -
>    no PXE in the NIC
>    The system BIOS can't or won't communicate with my tftp network server -
>          e.g. maybe this is an Apple IMac which refuses to tftp to my server
>    and other posters mentioned other reasons.
> Basically,   I am hoping for what GRUB1 offered -
> fetch a linux kernel over the network using tftp under control of GRUB.
>
> Ian Turner wrote:
> |  But I suspect you can boot GRUB from physical media
> |  and then still activate the PXE module afterwards.
>     ...
> |  Netboot works in grub2, but only using the PXE protocol. 
>
> Very interesting  -  but how?   see my question below.
>
> Vladimir Serbinenko wrote:
> |  Manoelo Abranches is working on this feature:
> |  http://bzr.savannah.gnu.org/r/grub/people/mrabran/grub_net/
>
> I looked and don't see any content anywhere under that page
> or the neighbouring 
> http://bzr.savannah.gnu.org/r/grub/people/phcoder/net/.bzr/
>
> Lennart Sorensen wrote:
>
> |  Well a neat program for booting over the internet would be gPXE:
> |  http://boot.kernel.org/
>
> Yes and no.   It can fetch a kernel over the network,  but it's not GRUB!
>    -  when run in boot program mode, can't be embedded on hard disk (I think),
>       has to reside on floppy or CDRom
>    -  I think this mode of use was never its primary intention -  it's 
> designed to be
>       burned into a eeprom and operate automatically  - hence ...
>    -  ... really ugly user interface as compared to GRUB
>           (no command recall, useless help, no completion, etc)
>    -  strange and apparently sometimes unsuccessful method for building a 
> version with support
>       for my NIC  -  I have to go to some site and "order" it,   rather than 
> configure / make etc.
>
> Question:   is the current (1.98) netboot/PXE functionality documented 
> somewhere?
> I did try reading the 1.98 info but the node for "Network" is empty -
> and it seems nothing there in the .texi.   Sorry if this is all covered back 
> in the archives
> but I don't see it or it's out of date.
>
> John
>                                         
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-- 
Regards
Vladimir 'φ-coder/phcoder' Serbinenko

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