NetSUS NetBoot Server will not start

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Posted on 12-21-2014 03:35 PM
I have deployed the appliance to a production vSphere 5.1 environment.
I have uploaded the nbi file and set the subnet to 10.160.24.0/22 ( 255.255.252.0 )
The ip address of the NetSUS appliance is 10.160.24.31/22 so it's in the same subnet.
I can not get the NetBoot service to enable.
Am I missing something or can't the NetSUS appliance handle non standard subnets ?

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Posted on 12-22-2014 01:23 AM
I've had trouble with this in the past and it has normally been subnet related, although we do have a few sites with complex subnets working ok.
The only other possibility is that it doesn't like the nbi that has been uploaded. Are there any spaces in the nbi name?

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Posted on 12-22-2014 04:29 PM
I have tried the nbi file that I've been using successful from an OSX server plus I created a new one just in case.
The file name was casper1.nbi so less than 8 characters. no spaces or non alphanumeric characters.
I will simplify the name further and see if that works.
Thanks for letting me know that the subnet should work.

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Posted on 12-22-2014 05:29 PM
Created a new nbi file called C1.nbi using Casper NetInstall Image Creator 5.0 from a base OSX 10.9.5 dmg created using the "Build OS Package" in Composer 9.62.
Settings used were;
Image Name = C1
Image Index = 1101
Enable this NetInstall Image = True
Set this NetInstall Image as the Default Image = true
Compress image = true ( tried false last time )
Added the 9.62 casper imaging app
Created Casper Preference file
added the correct JSS url
NetBoot will not enable. In /var/log/auth.log on the NetSUS appliance I can see "setnbiimages C1.nbi"
Also tried a simple subnet but NetBoot will not enable

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Posted on 12-22-2014 07:44 PM
I'm not doing much with NetSUS at work as our (currently) supported client range is too broad (benefits from multiple NBI's and filtering). I did mess around with NetSUS 3.02 briefly at home this weekend. vSphere 5.5 with Ubuntu 14.04 and CentOS 7. Ubuntu worked straight away with NetBoot enabling/disabling as expected. CentOS was quirky and would enable but not disable NetBoot. NetBoot on CentOS 7 also didn't remain enabled/persist across reboots in limited testing (dhcpd.service likely not enabled @ boot)

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Posted on 12-23-2014 04:39 PM
I am admitting defeat after spending a lot of time trying to get this to work.
I have gone back to a physical mac running server which works reliably all the time.
The NetSUS concept is a great idea but after many hours of playing with it I could get it to work occasionally but I never worked out why and it wasn't stable.
Restarting AFP seemed to work 1 out of 10 attempts. eg restart AFP then enable netboot.
Simply to unreliable and time consuming for a production environment with, I'm guessing here, complex subnets.
