Posts made by Fog_Rookie

did you do updates on ubuntu before you installed fog?
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade

try this command sudo /etc/init.d/atftpd restart

[quote=“flex, post: 4691, member: 1530”]Hi

Thanks for the speedy reply.

Technically, it freezes at about 60mb on the 2nd partition.

I have a static ip on “wired connection 1”

I have set the address, netmask, gateway and dns server (theres only 1)

Cheers[/quote]
It makes it through the initial 100Mb windows partition then croaks on the second one. You had no problems uploading the image though?

[quote=“Phillip, post: 4625, member: 1479”]I was actually trying to just do a basic “inventory” on a VirtualBox image of Windows XP SP3, just for starters.[/quote]
Phillip,
When you do your quick inventory of your Virtual Machine, fog will use the MAC address for the name of the host and store the MAC address of the host. Go to your web GUI and log in then go to Host management, then list all hosts, you should see entries for your new hosts with a MAC address for a computer name. I havent had much luck working in VirtualBox, but have had great luck with VMware player.
I am setting up a new fog server right now, in a VMware environment, and will play around with a VirtualBox machine to see if I can get it to do quick registration for me.

Flex,
I am curious about where “It” keeps crashing during image deployment. Does it start to image the machine and then stop or do you have issues before that?

As far as your tftp error goes most errors I have encountered are IP address related. Did you give your Ubuntu Desktop a static IP before you installed fog?

[quote=“Charles Warner, post: 4658, member: 1520”]Well, for whatever reason, I can’t seem to see the example attachment above, but I’m getting the same problem. If the NIC or chipset is not supported, how do we continue?

Charles[/quote]
Charles,
You will need to try different kernels to find out which ones will work for your specific systems. You can check the list here to see if someone has posted a solution for your specific machine. [url]http://www.fogproject.org/wiki/index.php/WorkingDevices[/url]
Or you can log into your FOG web GUI and click on the blue circle with the question mark in it (Other Information) and select Kernel Updates from the menu on the left hand side of the screen. This should open a page with a whole bunch of kernels and a download button for each of them. You didn’t list which version of FOG you are using so I am not sure what version kernel it is using, so I would suggest backing up the bzImage file located in the tftpboot/fog/kernel directory before trying new kernels.

The fog boot menu only uses the default bzImage kernel, therefore any new kernel must retain the name bzImage to be used during the registration process

you could create groups of 3-5 computers and schedule CRON to jobs run after each group finishes. if I image 1 computer in my lab I get data transfer rates of 1.2 GB/min, two computers cuts that down to 650 MB/min and four computers gets me down to 325 MB/min. These numbers give me a rough idea how long it will take to push a 11Gb image.

Since you are running through more switches than I use, your times may differ.

I have spent the summer playing around with a new fog_0.32 server and getting my timings figured out for when I push my full 60 GB image to one of the labs that uses two different computer systems. I will have to push 14 images then schedule the other 11 to follow. I will want this whole process to happen in one night, as I have 2 more labs to get imaged in the same weekend.

In the /tftpboot/fog/kernel folder resides the default kernel, it is called bzImage, this is the kernel the fog boot menu uses as I think that is hard coded in fog. If you cannot get your computers to register you will need to replace the current bzImage kernel, which according to Google is kernel version 3.2.4, with a kernel that allows you to complete the registration process. In order for your new kernel to work for the registration process it will have to be named bzImage.
So you will need to replace the default kernel with the kernel that works.
My suggestion is to use the GUI interface and find the kernel you need and download and install from there. Its the quickest and easiest way for me to do it.

That is a wee bit of trial and error there, I have a lab that has 14 740’s and 11 330’s I have found several kernels that work with the 330’s but only one that works with the 740’s. the 740’s seem to work pretty well using the 2.6.33.3 PS kernel. you might try that as a starting point then work your way forward or backward in the kernel list from there.

You will want to rename the new kernel to bzImage, so that it becomes the default kernel if you are having issues during the registration process.

Once your systems are imaged, you could go in and shut down the service so that it is no longer running

your kernel should reside in the /tftpboot/fog/kernel directory.

I am not sure if you are using a custom kernel or one that has been downloaded from the kernel repository. From the FOG web interface you can go to the other information screen and select Kernel Updates from the list on the left side and it will bring up a list of all available kernels, and when you click the download ICON for a specific kernel it will ask if you want to change its name from the default kernel image of bzImage to something else and download the kernel to the proper directory.

If you name it something different you can add that kernel name to your host profile and have specific hosts boot from that kernel.

[quote=“afmrick, post: 4631, member: 417”]We had a problem with some Dell Optiplex 780’s that would hand at the following message after imaging:
[code]* Task complete, the computer will now restart
Restarting system[/code]
we fixed it by adding “[B]reboot=bios[/B]” as a kernel option in [B]Other Information -> FOG Settings -> General Settings -> FOG_KERNEL_ARGS[/B]
…If that’s the same issue you are having.[/quote]

Sounds exactly like the problem I am having with my 330 and 740 OptiPlexes I will try it tomorrow when I am at work

I am imaging 25 computers in a lab environment. I have 2 distinctly different models of Dell Desktops. I have been doing some testing during the summer and have found a kernel that video works on. However when the machines finish either an upload or deploy of a system image, they hang in the shut down stage.

My question is, do I build my own kernel to fix this, or is it part of the init.gz file that needs modified?

I need the machines to shut down when the image process is complete.

Any help with this would be fantastic
Thanks in advance!

[quote=“Darrell Lanson, post: 4322, member: 1392”]I know that because of FOG I am able to finally take a summer vacation for the first time in 8 years I can image all our computers in about a 2 week period or less if I want compared to taking almost the whole 2 months before.[/quote]
It is a great tool, we have been using fog_0.29 during the past 2 semesters that I have been a student worker. I am just now making the upgrade to fog_0.32 and learning all the new features that I can use to save even more time. The Student that just graduated had it setup pretty well, I am just trying to make some improvements over the summer. I have also been asked to give the IT department a little presentation on FOG as my 3 small labs in one building are a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the labs on campus.

[quote=“Darrell Lanson, post: 4319, member: 1392”]When using the PnpUtil I found that if you use just -a switch it wouldnt work I had to use -a and -i Add and Install you just point it to the inf driver file and it will add it to C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore that way one image should work on any computer We have laptops and desktops and there all working off of one image about 6 different models and haven’t had a problem yet.[/quote]
Sounds great, I was just reading up on the PnPUtility on the Vista support page at Microsoft. My computers all have the same NIC and video card so the main issue seems to be CPU. One has a dual core Intel Processor and the other has a triple core AMD. I am trying to keep all my images that I use for my 3 labs live and updating over the course of the semester in a virtual environment, that way I don’t have to fire up 4 different image machines and run updates on them. I’m learning as I go, with this whole process. I am patiently waiting for them to tell me we just got 12 new computers in and that I need to make the image work for that machine as well.

[quote=“Darrell Lanson, post: 4315, member: 1392”]Don’t know if this will help you I use one image at my college for all the different computers we have(running Windoiws 7). Before I sysprep the machine I run a utility call PnPUtil.exe this lets me add all the drivers for the different computers in the OS so USB3, NIC, Video, Accelometer, etc are loaded so when the computer restarts it has all the drivers it needs for that particular computer. My unattend file is basically to register windows and MS Office programs. FOG does the rest.[/quote]
I will look into this, thank you for giving me the info. I was wondering if I loaded windows onto one platform then use sysprep and pushed that image to the other platform if it would still retain the drivers from the first install. I was planning on testing my theory on Tuesday and will look into the PnPUtility.exe, as long as its free the college will pay for it.
The other thing I am running into is, if I use an individual image for my computers, they do not shut down after they have been imaged or when I upload an image. I think I may have to test out a few more kernels.

I am searching for a way to do unattended OS installs on a variety of hardware. Two of my labs have all identical equipment, but the one that has the biggest image has 2 differnt hardware platforms. Windows 7 is very good at having the proper drivers for most computers on the initial install. My problem is, my FOG servers are all hand me downs from the IT department with limited hard drive space. I have a 1TB external drive and will have to check and see if my old poweredge 1550 will even support this big of a drive, and possibly use it for image storage. I don’t think I can even fit 2 images on my server as the full image ends up at around 50GB. I guess I better start looking into ways to add storage to my old beater server.

Did you do a disk wipe before you did your install of windows 7?

I am a little confused about this part of your post, " I’m running Fogprep… I’m confirming that it’s removing the HKLM/System/MountedDevice registry entries. I then shut down and upload." After preping should you be restarting the OS?

[quote=“chad-bisd, post: 4226, member: 18”]I used sysprep on my Windows 7 laptops that will be frozen with DeepFreeze, but only so I could “copyprofile” some settings over from the administrator profile to the default profile. I did the windows setup, hit the hotkeys to reboot into audit mode, and load/setup the computer how I want. Then I sysprep + copyprofile to overwrite the default profile with my custom settings for background and some app options. Reboot after sysprep and finish installing.

Basically, I don’t sysprep right before uploading the image. With Windows 7 and Fog 0.32, it’s not necessary; Fog now takes care of the FogPrep steps to avoid boot up problems. You only have to sysprep to achieve a specific goal only attainable through sysprep. Booting a clean windows 7 image does not require sysprep/fogprep.

For my labs, which are currently running Windows XP, I do not sysprep. I load 1 machine up with all the software I need, join it to the domain and get the policies applied and all the updates ( have to join to domain to get windows update to work ). Once it’s complete, I remove it from the domain and shutdown. I register the device if not already registered and I schedule an upload task. Once it’s complete, I can use the image to push to the rest of the lab and Fog will rename each client based on the name it was registered with. If I have Active Directory integration enabled, it will join them back to the domain for me after they are renamed.

Once they show they are joined to the domain, I freeze them using deep freeze console or manually logging into each one if I don’t have access to the console.[/quote]

I went in and built a Virtual machine today to do some testing, I built a windows 7 VM in VMware player. I installed a AV on it and ran about 100 updates on it.
I thought I would follow the no need to sysprep as fog_0.32 would handle that. I fired up half of the lab as it gave me a variation of 7 Optiplex 740’s, 6 that run a dual monitor setup and one that runs a single monitor setup, and 5 Optiplex 330’s.
The Optiplex 330’s imaged just fine but the 740’s were an epic fail. The 330’s all imaged and renamed just fine though. I will play around with some variations of some images I have from my final image build process and see if I can find a combination that will work for both machines.

I am curious to try it and see if it does what you say it will. In the past we had issuses as one machine has an AMD processor and the other has an intel processor, but we were also not using fog_0.32 either. Our lab is not part of a domain so no need to do that as of yet, that is on my list of things I would like to do.

I played around in VMware player today and managed to figure out the fog services. I now have my (virtual) setup here at home renaming hosts.