Back to the main page

Cobbler 2.6 Users' Guide

Distros

The first step is to have a distribution imported into the Cobbler, and the distro command have many sub-commands.

$ cobbler distro --help
usage
=====
cobbler distro add
cobbler distro copy
cobbler distro edit
cobbler distro find
cobbler distro list
cobbler distro remove
cobbler distro rename
cobbler distro report

I believe there is an issue importing distro via web interface, so for now it's safe doing it via CLI, especially because of first loop mount options that's not available over web interface.
The example of importing a distro:

# mount -o loop /import-iso/ubuntu-10.04.4-server-i386.iso /mnt 
# cobbler import --name=ubuntu-10.04.4-server --arch=i386 --path=/mnt 
# cobbler distro list 
# cobbler distro report

Distro Signatures

They are stored in the file /var/lib/cobbler/distro_signatures.json and they define breeds and OS versions. For example, breed can be "ol" and version can be 5.9 or 7.1.
After updating distro_signatures.json file, you need to run "reload" and restart cobblerd service, then run "report" to verify the change.

# cobbler signature --help
      usage
       =====
      cobbler signature reload
      cobbler signature report
      cobbler signature update

Note, the command "cobbler signature update" overwrites the file distro_signatures.json so "ol" and "ovs" breeds will be lost, so have them backed up somewhere else in order to insert them back into distro_signatures.json after update.

Profiles

A profile is basically a distro associated to additional options, most common is kickstart file.

$ cobbler profile --help
usage
=====
cobbler profile add
cobbler profile copy
cobbler profile dumpvars
cobbler profile edit
cobbler profile find
cobbler profile getks
cobbler profile list
cobbler profile remove
cobbler profile rename
cobbler profile report

The example of adding a profile via CLI:
# cobbler profile add --name=ol6u5_bios --distro=OL-R6-U5-i386 --kickstart=/var/lib/cobbler/kickstarts/ol-6.5.ks

... or using the web interface


Systems

System record map a piece of hardware with the cobbler profile to be assigned to run on it.

$ cobbler system --help
usage
=====
cobbler system add
cobbler system copy
cobbler system dumpvars
cobbler system edit
cobbler system find
cobbler system getks
cobbler system list
cobbler system poweroff
cobbler system poweron
cobbler system powerstatus
cobbler system reboot
cobbler system remove
cobbler system rename
cobbler system report

Example of adding a system via the CLI:
# cobbler system add --name=hostname --mac=00:21:f6:11:1e:ff --profile=OL-R6-U0-x86_64 --interface=eth0

Or via the web interface:


Kickstart

Kickstart files can be created via web interface or using vi editor and they are located in /var/lib/cobbler/kickstarts/


Snippets

Snippets are a way of reusing common blocks of code between kickstarts.



For example, create code to configure NTP for PL site.



Then to insert this code in a kickstart file, just add the line $SNIPPET('<snippet_name>').





Back to the main page