OSIM Boot Server › Multiple Boot Servers › Use Boot Servers with or without MS Shares

Use Boot Servers with or without MS Shares

The setup of the scalability server provides a boot server property sheet where the user can enable share access. Shares are not created if share access is disabled.

The boot server setup installs a switch tool, “sdbsswitch,” that can be used to change the boot server access method later.

The sdbsswitch tool creates or removes the OSIM shares and adjusts the OS images in the image store according to the access method:

• sdbsswitch -t switches from share to tftp access.
• sdbsswitch -s switches from tftp to share access.
• sdbsswitch -l shows the current configuration of the boot server.

Note: All OSIM images (except Ghost and ImageX images) are prepared to work with both share and tftp access.

Note: OSIM LINUX images always use NFS shares. The NFS share must contain the LINUX CD image. For more information, see "Installing LINUX from a Central NFS Server". The sdbsswitch command does not remove or create NFS shares.

Summary

• Installing an OS on a target is faster from a share because the setup installs directly from the share.
• OSIM shares are read-only for a special OSIM user. If your enterprise policy does not allow shares, the tftp download method is required.
• OSIM has implemented a special extended tftp protocol controlled by the OSIM boot server. In the case of tftp, all needed data are downloaded to the target before the installation starts.
• Unless the boot server and the Image Prepare System are not on the same system, sdbsswitch -t creates one <image>.caz file for every image and removes the directory tree.

  sdbsswitch -s will create the directory tree and remove <image>.caz.