> > > You can go further, and mount everything by NFS - I set up a boot disk
> > > here that would run Linux on any machine on my network. I could have spent
> > > some money and bought boot roms; then I'd not have needed the floppy.
> > >
> > > The beowulf and netboot howtos are good starting-points. I used DHCP do
> > > issue IP addresses; the kernel can be configured to issue a bootp request.
> > >
> > > You need some directories particular to each machine: /var (stuff it
> > > writes on), /etc (host-specific configurations).
> >
> >
> >
> > Well, I did all that before on other systems.
> > But I'm talking of hundreds of computers with
> > particular needs (ie. /etc and /var should be read-write) and which I
>
> /etc can be ro (for the most-part), but of course /var has to be
> read/write.
Yes, but that's really a pain ... I even found it more convenient keeping
/etc and /var in memory (ramdisk) ...
> Remember that /etc has to be kept in step with /usr - for example, if you
> upgrade sendmail to 8.10, then everyone has to reconfigure it at the same
> time. Even if sendmail 8.10 works with 8.9 config files (they do look
> pretty similar) you can be sure some things will not.
>
> If you control it on one machine, then you can cut individuals over to the
> updated /usr as you get their /etc fixed up. Assuming you have a
> mistake-proof way of doing it;-)
Well, that's why rpm is so nice ... install them on the central system
(only /usr). Then make the clients update it too (autorpm ; excluding /usr).
If you really install everything (the machines have the same set of rpms,
so no dependeny problems should occur) autorpm is rather save ...
The only problem is that new config files might get installed, but that's
a general rpm prob.
_______________________________________
Michael Redinger
Computer Centre University of Innsbruck
--
To unsubscribe:
mail -s unsubscribe [EMAIL PROTECTED] < /dev/null
