Matching Clients With Installation and Configuration Instructions

When you use AI, you first set up an install server. The install server has at least one AI boot image and an AI install service that is associated with that boot image. When a client boots over the network, it uses an install service from the install server.

The client uses the default install service for that client architecture or an assigned install service. The install service uses the methods described in this chapter to match the client with the correct installation and configuration instructions to use.

To define installations that use different boot images (a SPARC image and an x86 image, or different Oracle Solaris versions), create a separate service for each image.

To assign a client to a specific install service, add that client to the install service (see Chapter 14, Installing Client Systems). Specify the MAC address of the client and the name of the install service for this client to use. When the client with this MAC address boots, the client is directed to the install server and uses the specified install service. To find the MAC address of a system, use the dladm command as described in Oracle Solaris Administration: Network Interfaces and Network Virtualization and in the dladm(1M) man page.

To define more than one type of installation for one net image, create additional AI manifests and create system configuration profiles. Add the new AI manifests and configuration profiles to the AI install service for that net image. Specify criteria that define which clients should use which AI manifest and which system configuration profiles. See Associating Client-Specific Installation Instructions With Install Services.

For information about how to create custom AI manifests, see Chapter 10, Provisioning the Client System. For information about how to create system configuration profiles, see Chapter 11, Configuring the Client System.

Selecting the AI Manifest

Each client uses one and only one AI manifest to complete its installation. The AI manifest is selected for a client according to the following algorithm:

• If no custom AI manifests are defined for this install service, the default AI manifest is used. The default AI manifest is not associated with any client criteria. See Default AI Manifest for an example of a default AI manifest.

• If custom AI manifests are defined for this install service but the client does not match criteria for any custom AI manifest, then the client uses the default AI manifest.

• If the client matches criteria that have been specified for a custom AI manifest, the client uses that custom manifest.

  If client characteristics match criteria for multiple AI manifests, the client characteristics are evaluated in the order shown in Table 9-1 to select the manifest for the installation. The installadm tool verifies that criteria of the same type do not overlap. For more information, see Adding an AI Manifest to an Install Service.

  Multiple non-overlapping criteria are used in the order specified in the table below. For example, if one criteria specification matches the client's MAC address and another criteria specification matches the same client's IP address, the manifest associated with the MAC address criteria specification is used, because mac is higher priority for selection than ipv4.

Example 9-1 Matching Clients With AI Manifests

In the following example, two custom AI manifests have been added to the same install service. The client criteria associated with those manifests are as shown. The manifest_x86.xml AI manifest was added to the service with the following criteria file that specifies client architecture:

<ai_criteria_manifest>
    <ai_criteria name="arch">
        <value>i86pc</value>
    </ai_criteria>
</ai_criteria_manifest>

The manifest_mac1.xml AI manifest was added to the service with the following criteria file that specifies a client MAC address:

<ai_criteria_manifest>
    <ai_criteria name="mac">
        <value>00:14:4f:a7:65:70</value>
    </ai_criteria>
</ai_criteria_manifest>

If an x86 client is being installed, it is assigned manifest_x86.xml.

If a SPARC client with MAC address 00:14:4f:a7:65:70 is being installed, it is assigned manifest_mac1.xml.

If a SPARC system with some other MAC address is being installed, it is assigned the default AI manifest.

Selecting System Configuration Profiles

The same criteria keywords are used for selecting system configuration profiles for a client as are used for selecting an AI manifest. See Table 9-1.

More than one system configuration profile can be selected for any particular client. No algorithm is needed to narrow the selection to one profile.

If client characteristics match criteria for multiple system configuration profiles, all matching configuration profiles are applied to configure the system. For example, if one criteria specification matches the client's host name and another criteria specification matches the same client's memory size, both configuration profiles are used to configure that client.

Selection Criteria

Table 9-1 shows the criteria keywords that can be used to indicate which clients should use a particular AI manifest or system configuration profile. The Examples column shows some possible values. The criteria keywords and values can be used with the following installadm subcommands: create-manifest, create-profile, and set-criteria.

The ipv4, mac, mem, and network specifications can be expressed as ranged values separated by a hyphen (-). To specify no limit to one end of a range, use unbounded. See the mem example below.

The arch, cpu, hostname, platform, and zonename specifications can be expressed as a quoted list of values separated by white space. See the zonename example below.

Specify criteria keywords and values on the command line by using the -c option.

-c criteria=value|list|range
-c mac="aa:bb:cc:dd:ee:ff"
-c mem="2048-unbounded"
-c zonename="zone1 zone2"

Criteria can also be specified in ai_criteria elements in an XML file. The content of this file should be only criteria specifications. Use the -C option to name the criteria file on the command line. Examples are shown in the table.

Table 9-1 Criteria Keywords and Criteria Hierarchy

-c mac="0:14:4F:20:53:97"

-c mac=0:14:4F:20:53:94-0:14:4F:20:53:A0

<ai_criteria name="mac">
    <value>0:14:4F:20:53:97</value>
</ai_criteria>

<ai_criteria name="mac">
   <range>
       0:14:4F:20:53:94
       0:14:4F:20:53:A0
   </range>
</ai_criteria>

-c ipv4="10.6.68.127"

-c ipv4="10.6.68.1-10.6.68.200"

<ai_criteria name="ipv4">
    <value>10.6.68.127</value>
</ai_criteria>

<ai_criteria name="ipv4">
    <range>
        10.6.68.1
        10.6.68.200
    </range>
</ai_criteria>

-c platform="SUNW,Sun-Fire-T200"

<ai_criteria name="platform">
    <value>SUNW,Sun-Fire-T200</value>
</ai_criteria>

-c arch="i86pc"

<ai_criteria name="arch">
    <value>i86pc</value>
</ai_criteria>

-c cpu="sparc"

<ai_criteria name="cpu">
    <value>sparc</value>
</ai_criteria>

-c network="10.0.0.0"

-c network="11.0.0.0-12.0.0.0"

<ai_criteria name="network">
    <value>10.0.0.0</value>
</ai_criteria>

<ai_criteria name="network">
   <range>
       11.0.0.0
       12.0.0.0
   </range>
</ai_criteria>

-c mem="4096"

-c mem="2048-unbounded"

<ai_criteria name="mem">
     <value>4096</value>
</ai_criteria>

<ai_criteria name="mem">
     <range>
        2048
        unbounded
     </range>
</ai_criteria>

-c zonename="myzone"

-c zonename="zoneA zoneB zoneC"

<ai_criteria name="zonename">
    <value>myzone</value>
</ai_criteria>

<ai_criteria name="zonename">
    <value>zoneA zoneB zoneC</value>
</ai_criteria>

-c hostname="host3"

-c hostname="host1 host2 host6"

<ai_criteria name="hostname">
   <value>host3</value>
</ai_criteria>

<ai_criteria name="hostname">
   <value>host1 host2 host6</value>
</ai_criteria>