NetBoot/SUS Appliance now available

Further to my previous reply:

As the shelluser:

sudo vi /var/lib/reposado/preferences.plist

and insert the AdditionalCurlOptions. Be careful. Breaking this file breaks Reposado, so you may want to back it up first with:

sudo cp /var/lib/reposado/preferences.plist /var/lib/reposado/preferences.plist.saved

-Greg

Please add Australian Time Zones as well. It's missing at the moment.

JAMF, you're so...so...soo....SOOOO...ahhh...do you have a cigarette?

I love you.

It's -15°C, but this gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling.
Thanks guys!

This is great! I just finished the installation and configuration of Reposado on Linux :-/. Oh well I'll start over with the new appliance :)

timsutton,

Try renaming the DS NetBoot disk image from NetInstall.dmg to NetInstall.sparseimage and see if it now boots.

@bruienne just posted that on Twitter:

http://twitter.com/#!/bruienne/status/166896954687754241

http://twitter.com/#!/bruienne/status/166898268457013250

Thanks Rich. Yeah, we're sorting this out on ##osx-server this morning. I'm going to look at the possibility of adding multiple .nbi's as well, when I have spare time.

For those interested, here's how to host DeployStudio .nbi's on NetSUS:

http://glarizza.posterous.com/jamfs-netsus-appliance-netboot-in-a-box

http://derflounder.wordpress.com/2012/02/07/modifying-jamfs-netsus-to-host-deploystudio-netboot-boot-sets/

There are also multiple write-ups that have been started to help you out with all the bits you find in this appliance. I've got one here --> http://bit.ly/net-sus Rich has a couple here --> http://derflounder.wordpress.com/2012/02/06/converting-jamfs-netbootsus-appliance-to-vmware/ and Greg has a bunch of information on his site --> http://managingosx.wordpress.com/2012/02/06/netbootreposado-appliance/

This is great! Thanks. This may be just what I need to convince my superiors to pay for Enterprise Mac software.

Is it within the licensing agreement to make a CentOS clone of this? This would be a great place to co-locate with my Munki/Munkiserver setup.

Again, Thanks!
- Trey

Two bugs so far:

1. The URLs in the catalogs are incorrect after changing the IP address of the server. I noticed that the preferences file of reposed has not been updated. It still points to the old address. The /var/lib/reposed/preferences.plist file shows indeed that the LocalCatalogURLBase is still the old address. It seems that changing the SUS address does not update the preferences file.

2. DNS Server 2 stays empty while /etc/resolv.conf shows multiple DNS servers.

It also would be nice to see an status when clicking on the Sync button (like in the dashboard).

This is not going to work at all. Why? Because DocumentRoot of the site is configured at /svr/SUS/html/content/catalogs/ and downloads are stored in /svr/SUS/html/content/downloads/ so clients can never access the download. Before I start changes all kind of things I'm waiting for an response from JAMF support.

The client tries to download the file that's in the link but that shows a 404 Not Found. I noticed that the root of the web server is /svr/SUS/html/content/catalogs but downloads is at /svr/SUS/html/content/download so the client can never access the file.

The apache config file /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default is configured with DocumentRoot as /svr/SUS/html/content/catalogs/. This is not going to work.

Is there a way to serve multiple Netboot-Images? Like one for Casper, other for AppleHardwareTests?

Cheers,
Holger

PS: Your work is great, thank you!

Holger,

I just put that in as a feature request, as I'd like the same capability. For anyone else that wants to host multiple NetBoot images from the NetBoot/SUS Appliance simultaneously, please up-vote this feature request:

https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/featureRequest.html?id=261

@treydock it should be pretty easy to port to centos if you need to. throw together a kickstart file or use puppet to configure the server. i don't think there's any licensing issues to prevent this.

First of all I would like to thank everyone for the incredible response and contribution to the community about the appliance. The interest was more than we expected and we are excited to help seed the community with resources to help with Macs in the enterprise.

On another note we have noticed a few items that needed to be addressed in the NetBoot/SUS appliance and have put out a new release. The product download link has been updated.

The following issued were addressed in the 1.01 appliance:

SUS - fixed the Apache Document Root to support mirrored updates

SUS - changing base url now also updates the preferences.plist if the "Store software updates on this SUS" option is checked

SUS - updates the root branch on any SUS sync if one is set. This is done in case the download URL has been changed.

SUS - fixed the initial copy of the catalogs on the creation of a root branch

Network - fixed nameserver writes, it now writes DNS if using Static settings otherwise DNS comes from DHCP

Eric,

Thank you for giving us a new version on this short notice! Is there a possibility to update the current VM?

Thanks!

Eric,

Thanks for the updated appliance. Is there an apt repo or other source where the updates can be downloaded from? Right now, I don't see an upgrade path beyond "download new appliance, rebuild settings."

Amazing tool! I have been wanting something like this for a long time. Thanks.

In response to the backup and restore question -

This is something that we are thinking about for future updates but was not implemented in this release. In both releases we do have a simple backup page at https://<server_name>/webadmin/backup.php that creates a compressed backup that downloads to your machine. The backup includes all NetBoot images, NetBoot subnet settings, dhcpd settings, webadmin settings, Reposado metadata, and all SUS packages that were synced local to the appliance. This may not be ideal depending on what would all get backed up as this can result in an incredibly large backup file. Restoring that backup on a new appliance would require shell access and an extraction of the backup. Another option we are considering is posting a KB on how to store the data on a drive external to the appliance to allow for easier upgrading.

We are also looking to get the source of this project out so the community can contribute along with JAMF. We will keep everyone posted as we continue on with this project.

We are also looking to get the source of this project out so the community can contribute along with JAMF. We will keep everyone posted as we continue on with this project.

GitHub please!

Thanks, Eric. I appreciate the effort that's going into this VM appliance, as it's filling a need that a number of Mac admins have.

The fact that beginners can easily just use the appliance as-is, while more advanced folks can just as easily dive under the hood and start modifying it for their own needs, is extremely welcome.

if the base configs and source for all the php/shell stuff is stored on github (for example), you could probably do a git pull with hooks on the vm side to update/install the components. updating just what's required would allow the vas to keep running without producing and making available a whole new vm image every time. likewise, a puppet module to manage the vm is a good idea. ;)

Is it still necessary to hack it a bit to get it to recognize DeployStudio's .sparseimage files, or is that baked in now?

What is the correct command line for NetBoot from command line. We use the command line below to boot from OS X NetBoot servers;

/usr/sbin/bless --netboot --booter "tftp://192.168.1.118/NetBoot/NetBootSP0/Casper-NetBoot-10.7.2.nbi/i386/booter" --kernelcache "tftp://192.168.1.118/NetBoot/NetBootSP0/Casper-NetBoot-10.7.2.nbi/i386/kernelcache" --options "rp=nfs:192.168.1.118:/private/tftpboot/NetBoot/$NetBootSP0:Casper-Netboot-10.7.2.nbi/NetBoot.dmg" --nextonly

what path changes would we have to do in order to get this command to work?