Posts made by TRex

I had a similar issue, but (dumb) lucked into a solution.

Dell Optiplex 3040, BIOS set for UEFI: Onboard NIC (IPv4) first, Windows Boot Manager second.

Installed Win10 Enterprise from USB. After the install and first time on the desktop, before installing anything else, a reboot would come out of the UEFI network boot with Preparing for Automatic Repair. (I gave it plenty of time — about 14 hours! — never got past that screen.) I installed again and got the same results.

I made one change in the BIOS: added a check to ‘Enable Attempt Legacy Boot’ and then installed again. This time, at the first reboot, the screen went dark and … nothing. Manually powered off and back on and was able to log into Windows. But the next reboot, again the screen went dark and stayed that way. So I removed the check from ‘Enable Attempt Legacy Boot’ and now Win10 is working fine, normal reboots, exiting from the UEFI network boot into Windows.

Hope that might be helpful to someone.

Thought I’d add a follow-up.
@Wayne-Workman - many thanks for the recommendation of Debian and for the https://wiki.fogproject.org/wiki/index.php?title=Debian_8 link.

I’m back to two working FOG servers (one for each domain/subnet) and got a nice bonus: With the Ubuntu servers, Veeam Backup and Replication wouldn’t do a VeeamZIP job on the server, only on its replica (which made backups on the host with the replicas much longer than the host to the FOG servers. But the Debian servers can have a VeeamZIP job done on them, so now my nightly backups are much more balanced.

Thanks, again to @Tom-Elliott and @Wayne-Workman for the help. I really appreciate it. You guys rock.

@tom-elliott
Thanks. For the record the option is --no-check-certificate

Followed directions at https://wiki.fogproject.org/wiki/index.php?title=Debian_8 for configuring Debian 9.3 (stable), but don’t have enough space to clone the FOG project, so quit before installing git.

Used wget https://github.com/FOGProject/fogproject/releases/download/1.4.4/fog_1.4.4.tar.gz (which used to work with Ubuntu Server) but received
ERROR: The certificate of ‘github.com’ is not trusted.
ERROR: The certificate of ‘github.com’ hasn’t got a known issuer.

What’s the next step?

@wayne-workman
Debian (stable), here we come…

@wayne-workman - current: 1.4.4 (which is still – for now – working on the Ubuntu 16.04 server for patrons) it was the server for staff that got clobbered (I run IT for a public library and have two networks on separate VLANs.)

@tom-elliott - just read through and am wondering if I’d be better installing a different distro? Opinion?

This morning, PCs were stuck in a reboot loop because they couldn’t get to the FOG server. After bypassing PXE, I started repairing FOG server with re-install. This has worked in the past, but not today: at http://<ip address>/fog/management there was only a blank page.

Wiped the root partition (left /images) and reinstalled Ubuntu 16.04. Ran apt-get dist-upgrade (lots of updates), configured IP address, rebooted and then tried to install FOG.

I have tried installation multiple times. I get Failed! (Will try later) on the following packages one or more times (apache2 every time):
apache2
libapache2-mod-php7.1
php7.1
php7.1-cli
php7.1-gd
php7.1-mbstring
php-gettext

(One installation attempt failed at ‘Adding needed repository’.)

When it gets to the part of checking packages, I get OK for everything. But when prompted to use a web browser to do the Database Install/Upgrade, the page is blank.

The blank page’s source has html tags, head tags, and body tags. Nothing more.

Not sure of next step. Log files (where?) Suggestions?

@Tom-Elliott
Just installed version 1.3.3 / SVN Revision: 6061 — installed without a hitch.

@Tom-Elliott
Using the instructions at https://wiki.fogproject.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation#Current_development_version I ran the installation. The only problem I noted during installation was a failure of backing up database. There was no prompt for ‘Press [Enter] key when database is updated/installed.’ I still get a blank page when trying to go to http://<ipaddress>/fog/management and mysql still shows the same four databases (none for FOG).

@Tom-Elliott
Would installing an earlier version (after re-installing OS) work? I’m not sure how I would install a RC, don’t even know if your addition has been added to RC.

Perhaps a factor:
/images
is mounted at /dev/sda6

FOG version: 1.3.4
OS: Ubuntu Server 16.04 (virtual under Hyper-V)

Clean install of Ubuntu Server (partitions formatted)
Clean install of FOG

The install process seems okay except for:

• Copying new files to web folder…OK
  find: `/home//fog_web_1.3.4.BACKUP/management/other/´: No such file or directory
• Creating config file…OK

But when I get to:

• You still need to install/update your database schema.
• This can be done by opening a web browser and going to:

http://IPaddress/fog/management

• Press [Enter] key when database is updated/installed.

I use a browser to go to the IP address and get the default Apache page, but if I add /fog/management I get a blank page with a 500 error.

Firewall is disabled.

The only databases listed in MySql are (1) information_schema, (2) mysql, (3) performance_schema, and (4) sys

I’ve used davido38’s suggestion re: cctk. I can even remove the pxe boot from the boot order. Now, any boot other than the HDD requires the BIOS password, but I can use psexec to set the next boot to pxe and then use psshutdown to reboot so the PCs can be imaged. Great work-around.

@Wayne-Workman Version 1.2.0, the menu says it is up to date.

@davido38 Since the PCs are on 24×7, I’m looking at your idea of using cctk to force a pxe boot only when I want to re-image.

Tried downgrading BIOS: versions A10, A09, A07, A05 all showed the USB with ‘*Admin Password Required’ on right side when boot menu invoked (F12). Version A03 did not display the USB in the boot menu. But all BIOS versions, coming out of the FOG menu, booted to a USB even though ‘USB Storage Device’ was not checked.

Obviously, I don’t know if an OptiPlex 390 which had never gone beyond version A03 would do this since I don’t have any in that condition.

BIOS settings: boot order is (1) NIC and (2) HDD. Other options are unchecked. If F12 is pressed, the boot menu appears. The boot menu has (1) NIC, (2) HDD, (3) CD/DVD, and then if a bootable USB is detected, the USB. Item(s) after the HDD entry have, on right side, ‘*Admin Password Required’ (there is a BIOS password). Earlier BIOS versions only displayed first two items (I’m not sure which version instituted the change; the current BIOS version is A11).

Using the boot menu via F12, blocks trying to boot to optical disc or USB (which is what I want). But if it goes to the FOG menu, it will try to boot to the USB (but not the CD/DVD).

Yes, if a (non-bootable) USB stick is left in, the PC will not boot. (This happened, which is what started this investigation.) If there is no USB stick, it will boot to hard drive.

With the exit type set to ‘sanboot’ or ‘Grub style’ (tried it, even though these are Windows boxes), the BIOS settings are bypassed and the PC boots to a USB stick. When set to ‘exit’, it won’t boot. The ‘No Menu’ and ‘Hide Menu’ don’t seem to have any effect.

(I can turn off the FOG server when we are open, but I’d only be able to create images during off hours.)

All my public PCs are Optiplex 390s, so it is happening on all one model.

The mention of the ‘Host Bios Exit Type’ led me to FOG PXE Boot Menu Configuration. It was set to ‘sanboot’. I’ll experiment with some different settings.

For public PCs
OptiPlex 390 - BIOS (latest version, A11) is password protected, boot order is NIC, HDD

If the F12 key is used to access the boot menu, items not in boot sequence (e.g. optical disc, USB drive) display as possibilities, but require BIOS password (earlier versions of BIOS hid these options)

If the network cable is disconnected, PC cannot PXE boot, and will boot to HDD. But, if it is connected and the FOG menu ‘Boot from hard disk’ is invoked, it will boot to a bootable USB drive (or fail to boot if non-bootable USB drive is in slot).

Is there any way to make changes in the FOG configuration which will cause the ‘Boot from hard disk’ to only boot from the HDD?