-----Original Message----- From: djgoku
To automate ghosting in Linux, try making a shell script that runs dd based on entries read in from a table (call it something like ghost.conf). Then take that script and a boot floppy and make an entry in your boot floppy's boot process to call your ghosting script on boot. Tada, instant
automated ghosting
on a disk. It also has the added bonus of being totally configurable by editing the ghost.conf file in any text editor.
I want the whole process to be separate of the cdrom/floppy way, I want full automation. I want to do like I said create another boot partition and boot to it, or something to that effect. I could also possible create the ghost files on the local hard drive and then copy to the server, since compressing and send is very slow ~22Mbps or less for one transfer, but regular file transfer are well above 22Mbps. For about 300GB of data that is being compressed then sent to server would take about 30 hour to transfer.
Simple, create a new run level (let's say 7) and make the linux_ghost script an entry in that run level. Then you could schedule "telinit 7" on any machine that needs to be ghosted, and the last thing that the ghost script does is init to the standard run level. This could also be controlled from a central server that connects automatically to the various machines needing ghosting and running "telinit 7". The ghost script would have to be installed every machine you are ghosting. The added bonus here is each machine would have it's own "ghost.conf".