Bootptab format

[Jay LaBonte]

I am having a bit of a dibate with a fellow Unix admin regarding white space in the bootptab file.

One group of entries in out bootptab looks like this:

desk_1:ht=ether:ha=008064422e24:ip=10.253.164.129:tc=net-10
reception:ht=ether:ha=008064442fe3:ip=10.253.164.130:tc=net-10
fileroom:ht=ether:ha=008064423412:ip=10.253.164.131:tc=net-10

His claim is that we can make the bootptab more readable by inserting white space in front and behind the hostname so these entries would look like this:

desk_1 :ht=ether:ha=008064422e24:ip=10.253.164.129:tc=net-10
reception :ht=ether:ha=008064442fe3:ip=10.253.164.130:tc=net-10
fileroom :ht=ether:ha=008064423412:ip=10.253.164.131:tc=net-10

Is this permitted? I have read that spaces are not permitted in the host name. I under stand that these spaces are at the end of the hostname, but wont this be interpreted as part of the hostname, because of the parsing on the ":".?

Regards,
Jay LaBonte

[Bharat Katkar]

Hi,
I have not tested it but i guess it may give you problem. Well as far as readability is concerned i have managed to achieve it like this:

vcshp9:\
ht=ethernet:\
ha=00306EEA82B5:\
ip=:\
hn:\
bf=/opt/ignite/boot/nbp.efi:\
sm=

You also can follow the same. Actually this is how they have given in Example also.

Hope that helps.
Regards,

[Cheryl Griffin]

According to the documentation, white spaces are permitted entries. Every example includes white spaces between all entries.

If white spaces were illegal, I would suspect that page not to include such examples or to state explicitly that it was illegal.

Configuring the BOOTP Server
http://www.docs.hp.com/hpux/onlinedocs/B2355-90147/00/00/49-con.html

See Understanding Boot File Configurations
"IP addresses listed for a single tag must be separated by a space."