thin client -- plz asap

[Maaz]

Server OS: rhel 4 Update 2
lan phisycal topology: 100BaseTx

I have to deploy/install/implement a network,.. in which all the machines(client) will be a thin client(diskless).
All these thin client will be pc-based(cheap) hardware... i.e no speciall harwdare for thin clients.
Now plz let me know
0) what I have to do on Server(rhel 4)
1) Any speciall hardware required on server
2) what type of NIC should I use on thin client computers(pc)
Any help/suggesstion/url will be highly appreciated

Regards
Maaz

[Stuart Browne]

PXE & DHCPd are your friends!

Have the 'diskless' machines boot via PXE off a central server, loading a simple OS off it using NFS.

As the thin machines are pretty simple, you'll probably also want to set up XDMCP/XDM to allow remote X logins, so the server will do all the work, and only throw images back to the PC's.

A good start would be http://www.kegel.com/linux/pxe.html I guess.

[Maaz]

Thanks Stuart Browne for reply/help.
I found a good tutorial at:
http://www.linuxdevices.com/files/misc/pxe_boot_stb-howto.html

here at this tutorial under "Moving Kernel and Root FS Images"
Excerpt:
"I have a 2.4 kernel named bzImage and a compressed ext2 root filesystem named rootfs.gz. I use them as images to make bootdisks. Now, I'm going to copy both of them to the tftpboot directory.

$ ls
bzImage rootfs.gz
$ cp bzImage /var/tftpboot
$ cp rootfs.gz /var/tftpboot

****
I didnt understand that from where and how can I get the "rootfs.gz" file ?
And second should I use the kernel from a running rhel 4 machine(/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.9-22.EL)
i.e
cp /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.9-22.EL /var/tftpboot/bzImage

I attached my dhcpd.conf file here for the experts to inspect

Regards
Maaz

[Stuart Browne]

That's literally a copy of the root filesystem of a system.

Generally it's a cut-down filesystem with only the parts that are needed for the thin client.

To make it, you need to create a loop filesystem (a file with a filesystem in it), and copy the bits and pieces you want into it (i.e. libs, binaries, etc. etc.).

This process can take some time to set up precisely as you want.