[syslinux] chain to another pxelinux server?

Miguel mth at mth.com
Wed Mar 22 17:29:12 PST 2006


Q: Is it possible to 'chain' from one pxelinux on one TFTP server to
another pxelinux based on another TFTP server?


I would like to do the following:

globalTftpServer hosts a pxelinux menu system with lots of interesting
things, like diskless linux installs and memtest86. Let's say that
globalTftpServer is maintained by someone else.

localTftpServer is on a subnet that is used for development. It has a
pxelinux menu system for things we are developing.

localDhcpServer is on the same subnet. PXEClients boot pxelinux.0 off of
localTftpServer.

I would like to have an entry in the menu on localTftpServer that would
allow me to chain to the menu system on 'globalTftpServer'

I have experimented with the ALTERNATE TFTP SERVER mechanism described in
pxelinux.doc. I observe that it allows me to pull a bootstrap from another
tftp server. Using this mechanim, I can successfully load pxelinux.0 from
globalTftpServer. However, it does not have the desired results.

pxelinux uses PXE_GET_CACHED_INFO to get the DHCP packet to find out where
the tftp server is and what file to boot. So, I can load a new pxelinux.0
from globalTftpServer, but it still uses the pxelinux.cfg on
localTftpServer (since that is where I booted from).

Q: Is there any trick/mechanism to get around this and nudge my
'chainloaded' pxelinux.0 to look to globalTftpServer?


Thanks,
Miguel









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