[et-mgmt-tools] Re: Cobbler 0.4.0 released

[Michael DeHaan]

Michael DeHaan wrote:
> Michael DeHaan wrote:
>> Cobbler 0.4.0 is out.   RPMs are already up on et.redhat.com and will 
>> be pushed out to the mirrors shortly.
>>
>> The main feature for this release is support for PXE menus.   For 
>> those wanting to use PXE menus, the best thing to do is set all 
>> machines in your datacenter/lab to "PXE first".    To access the PXE 
>> menu, type "menu" at the prompt, otherwise cobbler will fall through 
>> to local boot in 20 seconds.   If you have a cobbler definition made 
>> for a system, that system will bypass the PXE menu.   This is true 
>> whether you have a certain MAC set to a specific profile (ex:  
>> cobbler system add --name=AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF ...) or if you have a 
>> "default" system entry (cobbler system add --name=default 
>> --profile=blah).    If you have a default system entry and want to 
>> use the new menus, just run "cobbler system delete --name=default" 
>> and then "cobbler sync".   Presto, you've got PXE menus.   This is 
>> also documented in the manpage.
>>
>> As mentioned previously on the list, I'm also reinstating the usage 
>> of Cheetah for vastly improved kickstart templating.   See 
>> http://www.cheetahtemplate.org/learn for more information.   
>> Basically the existing kickstart templating is now improved with the 
>> ability to do if-statements and the like.  Cobbler will allow either 
>> TEMPLATE::foo or $foo for kickstart templating substitution.   The 
>> one thing I've found is that a macro such as $(list-hard-drives) does 
>> need to be escaped to \$(list-hard-drives) in kickstart files.   
>> Things like passwords (crypted passwords often contain "$") don't 
>> need to be escaped and are otherwise fine.  If you do escape them 
>> though, it won't hurt.   The new /etc/cobbler/kickstart* files have 
>> them escaped.   If you have your own kickstart files, it would be 
>> worth checking for any dollarsigns that were unescaped, or you might 
>> see an error next time you run "cobbler sync".
>>
>> This release also no longer requires running "cobbler sync" after 
>> "profile add" or "system add" commands as much as cobbler used to.    
>> Editing configuration files behind the scenes, or wanting to 
>> regenerate PXE menus will, however, still require running "cobbler 
>> sync".   The features made to minimize the need for sync were mainly 
>> done for applications using cobbler as a provisioning library and 
>> those users that occasionally forget to run sync and post questions 
>> to the list :) I've also incorporated some random minor bugfixes, 
>> including passing "--basedir" to createrepo and manpage fixes related 
>> to the "--local-filename" option as mentioned last week.
>>
>> Questions?  Comments?   Fire away.
>>
>> --Michael
>>
> RHEL4/Centos users:
>
> Apparently menu.c32 (required for PXE menus) isn't provided by the 
> syslinux package on RHEL4... I'll probably end up bundling it and 
> storing it in /var/lib/cobbler.  
> For now, you can copy it yourself to /usr/lib/syslinux/menu.c32 and 
> things will work fine.  I'll release a 0.4.1 fix that will bundle this 
> file shortly.
>
>

Apparently bundling Cheetah is causing some evil problems on older 
systems, I'm going to back that bit out and add it as a Requires: in the 
RPM.    This will be released shortly as 0.4.1.

RHEL4/Centos users ca get Cheetah here:  
http://www.python.org/pyvault/centos-4-i386/repodata/repoview/python-cheetah-0-0.9.18-1.el4.pyv.html 
.. actually I think Centos already has it in the default repo(s) ... 
correct me if I'm wrong.

--Michael