Imaging a dual boot drive??
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This is a pre-deployment question.
I have a Win machine which I’m planning to turn dual boot (adding LinuxMint).
(I have not yet deployed Fog, nor changed that machine to dual boot)My first question is how/whether fog works with dual boot machines?
And then if it does play nice, can I still install my Linux on a separate partition of the same HDD, or would I need a completely separate HDD?Thanks-a-bunch!
Oh! also, I was wondering about updates/upgrades/new-installs.
If I installations or updates from within and OS instance which has been imaged, how does the image get sync’d?
Is it automagic, or is there something I will need to do?
[COLOR=#808080](I checked the wiki. Didn’t see anything. If I just overlooked it, please just shoot me the link.)[/COLOR] -
Welcome to FOG!
The good news is, FOG can work with machines that have multiple OS’s on them. Unfortunately I have not ventured into the realm yet, so I can’t offer any expertise as of moment. I just wanted to let you know that others on the forum have accomplished the task.
Some linux revisions that use Grub2 will not be entirely happy, a work around for this is to downgrade the GRUB utility. But I don’t know if this information holds true to the FOG 0.33b currently in development. That is a question we need to reserve for Tom Elliot.
FOG has the ability to work with multiple disks, and multiple partitions, you have to tell the FOG server how to expect the image to come, such as: Single Partition, Multi-Partition Single Disk (I would use this option if I were to dual boot and use a single hard drive), Multi-Partition All Disks, and RAW.
Raw takes a copy of the drive exactly how it sits with no compression, it has been useful in the past for others but should be a lst ditch effort.
My recommendation for you is… Set up a virtualized FOG server, that way you can become familiar with the Web GUI and the server itself. You can begin troubleshooting your environment and fine tune the settings so that machines can PXE boot the FOG Server. After you are comfortable with the server, I would do a basic install on a hard drive with Windows and Linux as a Dual boot. Register the machine to the FOG Server and test an upload and deploy. If you have issues we can help you to troubleshoot them to get your image working as expected. After you spend sometime and feel comfortable using FOG as an imaging solution, I would build my image for my machines install all updates and then push the image to the server and test a deploy. Personally I use Virtualized machines to build my images on, as I can set up an image that is not dependent on drivers and I inject them later, but I would begin thinking about how you will build your images now.
Any changes you make to your image will not be affected on the server until you update the image store on the server with a current back up by choosing to “Upload” your image to the server. Nothing done to images, updates or installations, will be consider “automatically” by FOG. FOG doesn’t have the ability to look at raw images, determine the differences, and toss out an old image for a new one.
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Thanks for the good info and good advice.
Before I pull any triggers, please confirm whether I’m interpreting correctly.
It sounds like the flexibility is there to work with whatever type of hdd arrangement I want, which is super cool.So, if I start off by just configuring my Linux env in a VM (as suggested) so that I can get back to getting [B][I]something[/I][/B][I] [/I]done, I’d be able to image that when I get the FOG server deployed and then cast that image onto the physical HDD for my dual boot?
If so, then I’m off to the races
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[quote=“mOrloff, post: 23798, member: 22660”]Before I pull any triggers, please confirm whether I’m interpreting correctly.
It sounds like the flexibility is there to work with whatever type of hdd arrangement I want, which is super cool.[/quote]ABSOLUTELY!!! FOG is very flexible. Currently it doesn’t exactly LIKE to image windows 8 but we have it working so all in due time
As far as building your image… I would build a dualboot machine in a Virtual format and use that to deploy. Imaging is like taking a snapshot of the hard drive and copying it over. I like FOG because I can set up my machines so that after I install FOG it names my machines conventionally, activates windows, and installs my drivers all without my attention. (Of course it took a LOT of attention to get it to this point)
If you were using a live CD to install linux on the same hard drive as a Windows installation I would say that method is plausible. However given the nature of FOG and how others like the “zero touch” method of installation, I would not expect to image this way as you are talking about installing an image on a hard drive that is already in use and doing so will ruin the data currently installed on it and it would leave a linux install.
If you can automate the installation process of linux and tweak it to your standards, you can include an iso image as a bootable option that would allow you to install the linux distribution after the windows imaging process.
If I were going to try this in my environment, I would set up a machine exactly how I want it to be after imaging and I would upload that entire hard drive image to my FOG server.
If you want to just TEST linux deployment with FOG, then creating an image and pushing it to a machine would allow you to troubleshoot errors you may encounter with the Linux portion, but the end result will be a hard drive with ONLY linux installed.
I hope this helps I would be more than happy to explain more!
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Hello. I know this is quite an old Post but it is quite close to my issue. I managed to deploy a dualbootloader (grub legacy) with a Ubuntu and a Windows 7 OS. Now i just wanna replace the Windows 7 with another Image but i wanna keep the existing Bootloader and all other OS in it. Is there a way to deploy a single OS into this bootloader or do i have to deploy the whole thing again (Grub+Ubuntu+ Windows 7)? Also is it possible to deploy an OS and then integrate it into the original FOG Bootmenu (Not just an iso i mean the native os)?
