Novell LINUX ENTERPRISE SERVER 11 - DEPLOYMENT Quick reference guide

SUSE Linux Enterprise
Server
www.novell.com11
March23,2009 Deployment Guide

Deployment Guide
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Contents
About This Guide ix
1Planning for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 1
1.1 Considerations for Deployment of a SUSE Linux Enterprise Server . . . . . 2
1.2 Deployment of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.3 Running SUSE Linux Enterprise Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Part I Architecture Specic Installation Considerations 5
2Installation on x86, AMD64, Intel 64, and Itanium 7
2.1 Required Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.2 System Requirements for Operating Linux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2.3 Installation Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.4 Boot and Installation Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.5 Installation Procedure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
2.6 Controlling the Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2.7 Dealing with Boot and Installation Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
3Installation on IBM POWER 21
3.1 Requirements .......................... 21
3.2 Preparation ........................... 23
4Installation on IBM System z 39
4.1 General Information and Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
4.2 Preparing for Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
4.3 Network Connection Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

4.4 The parmle—Automating the System Conguration . . . . . . . . . . 67
4.5 Using the vt220 Terminal Emulator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
4.6 Further In-Depth Information about IBM System z . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Part II Manual Deployment 77
5Deployment Strategies 79
5.1 Deploying up to 10 Workstations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
5.2 Deploying up to 100 Workstations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
5.3 Deploying More than 100 Workstations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
6Installation with YaST 89
6.1 Choosing the Installation Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
6.2 The Installation Workow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
6.3 IBM POWER: System Start-Up for Network Installation . . . . . . . . . 92
6.4 IBM System z: System Start-Up for Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
6.5 System Start-Up for Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
6.6 TheBootScreen......................... 93
6.7 Welcome ............................ 98
6.8 IBM System z: Hard Disk Conguration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
6.9 Installation Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
6.10 Clock and Time Zone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
6.11 Server Base Scenario . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
6.12 Installation Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
6.13 Performing the Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
6.14 Conguration of the Installed System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
6.15 GraphicalLogin......................... 124
7Updating SUSE Linux Enterprise 125
7.1 Updating SUSE Linux Enterprise . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
7.2 Installing Service Packs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
7.3 Software Changes from Version 10 to Version 11 . . . . . . . . . . . 128
8Setting Up Hardware Components with YaST 129
8.1 Probing Your Hardware . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
8.2 Setting Up Graphics Card and Monitor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
8.3 Setting Up Keyboard and Mouse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
8.4 Setting Up Sound Cards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
8.5 Setting Up a Printer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

9Installing or Removing Software 141
9.1 Denition of Terms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
9.2 Using the Qt Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
9.3 Managing Software Repositories and Services . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
9.4 Keeping the System Up-to-date . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
10 Installing Add-On Products 157
10.1 Add-Ons............................ 157
10.2 BinaryDrivers.......................... 158
10.3 SUSE Software Development Kit (SDK) 10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
11 Accessing the Internet 159
11.1 Direct Internet Connection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
11.2 Internet Connection Via Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
12 Managing Users with YaST 163
12.1 User and Group Administration Dialog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
12.2 Managing User Accounts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
12.3 Additional Options for User Accounts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
12.4 Changing Default Settings for Local Users . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
12.5 Assigning Users to Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
12.6 ManagingGroups........................ 176
12.7 Changing the User Authentication Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
13 Changing Language and Country Settings with YaST 181
13.1 Changing the System Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
13.2 Changing the Country and Time Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
14 Remote Installation 189
14.1 Installation Scenarios for Remote Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
14.2 Setting Up the Server Holding the Installation Sources . . . . . . . . . 198
14.3 Preparing the Boot of the Target System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
14.4 Booting the Target System for Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218
14.5 Monitoring the Installation Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
15 Advanced Disk Setup 227
15.1 Using the YaST Partitioner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
15.2 LVM Conguration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235

15.3 Soft RAID Conguration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
16 Subscription Management 247
16.1 Using Kernel Parameters to Access an SMT Server . . . . . . . . . . . 248
16.2 Conguring Clients Using AutoYaST Prole . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
16.3 Conguring Clients Using the clientSetup4SMT.sh Script . . . . . . . . 251
16.4 Registering Clients Against SMT Test Environment . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Part III Imaging and Creating Products 253
17 KIWI 255
17.1 Prerequisites for KIWI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
17.2 Knowing KIWI’s Build Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
17.3 Image Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
17.4 Creating Appliances with KIWI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 260
17.5 For More Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
18 Creating Add-On Products With Add-on Creator 263
18.1 CreatingImages......................... 263
18.2 Add-On Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264
18.3 For More Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
19 Creating Images with YaST Product Creator 267
19.1 Prerequisites for Product Creator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
19.2 CreatingImages......................... 267
19.3 For More Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
20 Deploying Customized Preinstallations 271
20.1 Preparing the Master Machine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272
20.2 Customizing the Firstboot Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272
20.3 Cloning the Master Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
20.4 Personalizing the Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Part IV Automated Installations 283
21 Automated Installation 285
21.1 Simple Mass Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
21.2 Rule-Based Autoinstallation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297

21.3 For More Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302
22 Automated Deployment of Preload Images 303
22.1 Deploying system manually from rescue image . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
22.2 Automated Deployment with PXE Boot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305

About This Guide
Installations of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server are possible in many different ways. It
is impossible to cover all combinations of boot, or installation server, automated instal-
lations or deploying images. This manual should help with selecting the appropriate
method of deployment for your installation.
Part I, “Architecture Specic Installation Considerations” (page 5)
The standard deployment instructions differ depending on the architecture used.
For differences and requirements regarding the architecture, see this part.
Part II, “Manual Deployment” (page 77)
Most tasks that are needed during installations are described here. This includes
the manual setup of your computer as well as additional software and remote instal-
lations.
Part III, “Imaging and Creating Products” (page 253)
Mass installations often require to prepare images or products furnished with the
features that are needed in this special case. Several options are described that allow
the administrator to prepare this deployment methods.
Part IV, “Automated Installations” (page 283)
To do unattended installations, either use the installation with AutoYaST or prepare
an image with kiwi or rstboot. This part describes methods to deploy these instal-
lations with a minimum of user interaction.
Many chapters in this manual contain links to additional documentation resources. This
includes additional documentation that is available on the system as well as documen-
tation available on the Internet.
For an overview of the documentation available for your product and the latest docu-
mentation updates, refer to http://www.novell.com/documentation or to
the following section.
1 Available Documentation
We provide HTML and PDF versions of our books in different languages. The following
manuals for users and administrators are available on this product:

Deployment Guide (page 1)
Shows how to install single or multiple systems and how to exploit the product
inherent capabilities for a deployment infrastructure. Choose from various approach-
es, ranging from a local installation or a network installation server to a mass de-
ployment using a remote-controlled, highly-customized, and automated installation
technique.
Administration Guide (↑Administration Guide)
Covers system administration tasks like maintaining, monitoring and customizing
an initially installed system.
Security Guide (↑Security Guide)
Introduces basic concepts of system security, covering both local and network se-
curity aspects. Shows how to make use of the product inherent security software
like Novell AppArmor (which lets you specify per program which les the program
may read, write, and execute) or the auditing system that reliably collects informa-
tion about any security-relevant events.
Virtualization with Xen (↑Virtualization with Xen)
Offers an introduction to virtualization technology of your product. It features an
overview of the various elds of application and installation types of each of the
platforms supported by SUSE Linux Enterprise Server as well as a short description
of the installation procedure.
Storage Administration Guide
Provides information about how to manage storage devices on a SUSE Linux En-
terprise Server.
In addition to the comprehensive manuals, several quick start guides are available:
Installation Quick Start (↑Installation Quick Start)
Lists the system requirements and guides you step-by-step through the installation
of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server from DVD, or from an ISO image.
xDeployment Guide