Storageip parameter in pxe menu

[Mikael]

Hi
First of all THANK YOU for an exellent deployment system! it really works.

I have a question regarding the advanced PXE Menu, I would like to boot from an DOS image located on the storage node. How can I point to the active node to which the host pc is connected to? Let’s say in the following menu item I would like a parameter named $storageip just like in the postdownloadscripts.

:MENU
menu
item --gap -- ---------------- iPXE boot menu ----------------
item bios1                    Update BIOS on E6320 to version A08
item shell          ipxe shell
item return        return to previous menu
choose --default return --timeout 5000 target && goto ${target}

:bios1
initrd http://{$storageip}/fog/service/ipxe/bios/usb1.ima
chain memdisk ||
goto MENU

[Wayne Workman]

Glad you like fog.

Why DOS?
Windows PE was developed to replace DOS for troubleshooting, and there so happens to be great instructions for adding Windows PE into iPXE.
http://ipxe.org/howto/winpe
I am going to be creating a tutorial on this - with Win7 installation media included in the build - in the near future.

So, unless there is a specific program you need to run via a preconfigured DOS environment, I’d really urge you to use Windows PE for troubleshooting purposes. Not saying you shouldn’t know some good’ole DOS (it’s very handy), but it’s limited in the troubleshooting tools it can run.

Let us know your thoughts, we are here to help.

[Mikael]

This was originally a simple question about the presence of a parameter that point to the storage node IP. Is there any such parameter available when in the PXE Menu?

About DOS, it is for firmware update, then it is faster better in all aspects than WinPE

[Tom Elliott]

@Mikael I believe the ip variable you’re looking for is: fog-ip

[Tom Elliott]

@Mikael said:

initrd http://{$storageip}/fog/service/ipxe/bios/usb1.ima

In essence, the quoted line would become:
initrd http://${fog-ip}/fog/service/ipxe/bios/usb1.ima

I have not created an element that gets the nodes IP address directly, fog-ip is simply the FOG_WEB_HOST parameter.

[Mikael]

So fog-ip does not work for me. Atleast I now know that the parameter does not exist.
I am asking because it exists when the client run the postdownloadscripts!

[Sebastian Roth]

Make sure you got the braces right! {$fog-ip} will not work IMO. But ${fog-ip} should.

Otherwise you could try using ipxe’s variable set, see here: http://ipxe.org/cfg

Maybe ${next-server} is working for you?!

[Mikael]

@Uncle-Frank I mean that i know how fog-ip works, but I need a parameter that point to the current TFTP-server(could be on of five storage nodes or the master fog-server) that the PC boots from. let’s say that in my branch office in Tokyo, I want the PC to look at the local fog storage node in Tokyo rather than the master fog server located in sweden.
We use the same menu file for all offices.

[Sebastian Roth]

Did you read the second part of my message? I just tried this: booted up one of my clients into a ipxe shell and typed:

iPXE> echo ${next-server}
141.62.66.236
iPXE>

This is the IP of my TFTP server. So I guess this could also work in your way more complicated setup with different locations…

[Mikael]

@Uncle-Frank Excellent! I tried that and it worked! Thanx so much.