Debian/Ubuntu Diskless Folding HOWTO

What you need:

• Broadband always on Internet connection.

• Router for the Internet connection which can have DHCP disabled on it.

• PC to act as a server for the diskless clients. This can be your ordinary PC but it is going to need to be on all the time – it should be on all the time folding anyway!

• Other PCs as diskless clients. These need at a minimum:

  • Motherboard, processor, memory, power supply.

  • Network card that supports PXE booting. This can be built in to the motherboard, in fact nearly all the ones that are built in to the motherboard seem to support network booting.

  • You will need a keyboard, graphics card and monitor to set them up initially, but once the diskless computers are running they are not required. Usually just use one of each between all the diskless computers.

Setting it up:

IP Address: 192.168.1.24
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 192.168.1.254
DNS Servers: 206.191.0.140,
             206.191.0.210

• IP Address and subnet mask in the output of /sbin/ifconfig
  
• Default Gateway in the output of netstat -nr - it is the Gateway listed for the Destination 0.0.0.0
• DNS Servers listed as "nameserver" in the file /etc/resolv.conf

iface eth0 inet dhcp

iface eth0 inet static
	address 192.168.1.24
	netmask 255.255.255.0
	gateway 192.168.1.254

apt-get install dhcp3-server tftpd-hpa

#
# Sample configuration file for ISC dhcpd for Debian
#
# $Id: dhcpd.conf,v 1.1.1.1 2002/05/21 00:07:44 peloy Exp $
#

# The ddns-updates-style parameter controls whether or not the server will
# attempt to do a DNS update when a lease is confirmed. We default to the
# behavior of the version 2 packages ('none', since DHCP v2 didn't
# have support for DDNS.)
ddns-update-style none;

# option definitions common to all supported networks...
option domain-name-servers 206.191.0.140, 206.191.0.210;
option routers 192.168.1.254;
next-server 192.168.1.24;
filename "PXEClient/pxelinux.0";
use-host-decl-names on;

# If this DHCP server is the official DHCP server for the local
# network, the authoritative directive should be uncommented.
authoritative;

# Use this to send dhcp log messages to a different log file (you also
# have to hack syslog.conf to complete the redirection).
log-facility local7;

subnet 192.168.1.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {
  range 192.168.1.30 192.168.1.200;
  default-lease-time 3600;
  max-lease-time 7200;
}

backup.$IP.A.$Instance
backup.$IP.B.$Instance
latest.$IP.$Instance