Configure HP-UX bootp server to respond PXE request

[gandhikarthi]

Is it possible to configure my install server (ignite ux server) to respond the pxe boot request from proliant server ? I am trying to use already existing bootp server (hp-ux) to respond a pxe request to install a redhat linux machine? I copied pxelinux.0 and setup /etc/bootptab in hp-ux machine, but prolaint server is not getting any response from bootp server ? Is there any compatability issue ? Any suggestion? Any one tried ?

[Heironimus]

PXE uses DHCP, not bootp.

[gandhikarthi]

As of I know Itanium servers are sending PXE requests and bootp with ignite server responds the request. Kindly clarify if I am wrong ?

[Heironimus]

Now that I think about it, bootp alone should work for PXE, though it has a few limitations that DHCP doesn't. I've never tried network booting a Proliant so I don't know if the PXE boot firmware really works properly (some NIC vendors ship boot code that only partially works).

[gandhikarthi]

The experiment is successful. Proliant machine can able to pxe boot (pxelinux) from the bootp server running in HP-UX. There was a problem with tftp, It was getting time out. I included timeout value in /etc/inetd.conf like below.

tftp dgram udp wait root /usr/lbin/tftpd -T 999 tftpd\
/opt/ignite /var/opt/ignite /opt/ignite/boot

and tftp server needs PHNE_36217 patch to enable the tsize option.

Now a proliant machine can be installed with Redhat/suse linux using the bootp server running in HP-UX machine.

[Jon Ward_3]

Glad to hear you got it working. I assume you hardcoded the MAC address of the ProLiant and bootfile name into the bootptab file. In which case you are technically BOOTP-ing not PXE booting. Accomplishes the network based install but it is significantly less flexible than a full PXE implementation. BOOTP is the grandfather of PXE.