Unix as a Second Language

Setting up Jumpstart clients: Create a profile

Configuration of Jumpstart clients requires creating a profile as well as adding the client's hostname, IP address and MAC address to the appropriate files on the
jumpstart server. A client profile can include the type of installation being performed (e.g., an upgrade or initial install), the system type (standalone or server), partitioning information, the particular cluster you want installed (e.g., the entire distribution or end user support) and particular packages that you want to omit or include beyond the specified cluster. Profiles can be extremely skimpy or can include a lot of detail.

Only the install_type is required for Solaris 10 jumpstart installations, plus the root_device specification if the system contains more than one root file system (e.g., if you have an alternate root you can boot from and want both upgraded).

Profiles are simple text files created with your favorite text editor. In the example shown below, we are requesting an initial install using the default partitioning. We are installing the developer cluster, but omitting man pages.

install_type            initial_install
system_type             standalone
partitioning            default
filesys                 any 1024 swap
cluster                 SUNWCprog
package                 SUNWman delete

You can start with the sample_profile provided with the jumpstart setup if you wish. It will look something like this:

install_type    initial_install
cluster         SUNWCXall
partitioning    explicit
filesys         c0t0d0s0 14000 /
filesys         c0t0d0s1 4096 swap
system_type     standalone

Note that this default profile specifies a specific layout of the file systems.

Client profiles can also include patches, though many sysadmins install patches in scripts that are run following the basic installation. Patches are specified with the patch keyword. In this example, the patch is obtained from another system.

patch 118855-33 nfs 10.2.10.1:/jumpstart/patches

The layput_constraint keyword specifies limits you want to place on auto-layout. For example, you can specify a minimal size for file systems as shown in this example in which two file systems must be allocated at least 2 GB each:

layout_constraint c0t0d0s4 changable 2000
layout_constraint c0t0d0s5 changable 2000

Profiles must be referenced in your rules file to tell jumpstart when to use then. In this example, we are telling jumpstart to use the profile boson_profile for the client boson and fermion_profile for fermion. You do not not need to build a profile for every system you are going to jumpstart. If a number of systems are to be installed identically, you can use the same profile for all of them.

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