Title: Plan Services for Automated Installations
Course: CIS 208: Linux/UNIX III: Intermediate System Administration, Networking, and Security ~ For IGNITE Review > Section: Learning Modules

In the enterprise environment, the ability to deploy new servers on a moment's notice is in demand.  Automation is the key to quick deployment and it provides consistency within the datacenter.  Even for smaller environments it is good to have the tools in place to allow network booting, since they can support a preboot menu for maintenance and disaster recovery.

A fully automated installation requires a set of services including DHCP, TFTP, HTTP and possibly NFS.  In addition, DNS servers need to be configured to properly resolve both hostnames and IP addresses.  While not a requirement, it is often preferred to have a local mirror of some or all of the repositories in use by the organization.  This will greatly increase the speed and efficiency of both installations and security updates.

One or more rescue images can be selected.  Knoppix is the original live cd image for Linux and it can be set for use with a PXE server.  The System Rescue CD is a great choice, since it includes utilities designed for maintenance on both Linux and Windows computers.  Also distributions often provide live cd images and recovery tools are usually provided with the installation cd images.

These services can be run on a single server or they can be distributed across multiple servers.  Plan a single server to run dhcpd, since only one dhcp server should run on a physical network.  If repositories need to be mirrored, verify how much disk space will be needed, and plan room for future growth.