Installing FreeBSD remotely.

[Glaanieboy]

I just aquired a new computer for me to use as a server. I want to install FreeBSD 4.9 on it, I don't have a monitor to spare, so instead I thought of making a local FTP installation. I want to know if it's possible to:
- make a floppy with support for installation from a FTP server
- To enable SSH/Telnet support for that floppy
- To Telnet/SSH from my main computer (with the FTP share) to the computer to be installed and execute the commands from there.

I know it must be possible somehow, and when googling I get 1001 (read, far too many) results and I want to have a solution that works out of the box, preferably a downloadable image of some sort.

 

[Geffy]

could do what I did and use the monitor from your main machine while you are installing BSD, I have never tried it any other way than that though.

 

[Glaanieboy]

Yeah, I will be doing that then. It's too much trouble otherwise. I currently have Windows 98 installed, to testdrive if everything works. When that's done, I will be FTP installing BSD.

 

[Glaanieboy]

Alright, I need some help. I set up a FTP on my Windows machine, which is in the THUISNET domain. I defined an username and password, and that the installation files are located in the root.
On the BSD machine, I used floppies to boot it up (kern.flp and mfsroot.flp images from the FreeBSD CD). In the installation options, I set up the FTP user/pass, enabled DHCP and chose the installation type. Of course I selected FTP, typed in the computer's name (which I branded Server1) and the domain (THUISNET), and the rest was already filled in, thanks to the DHCP. Now, it cant connect, instead it gives this error:

Could Not open a connection to 192.168.0.2:
No Route To Host

According to my firewall and FTP server, there wasn't even made an attempt to make a connection, so it wasn't blocked, or otherwise rejected.

I use Kerio Personal Firewall 4, and Bulletproof FTP server.

 

[Glaanieboy]

You know what, **** it. I am gonna install it with a cd-rom.

 

[Geffy]

tis the easiest way 😛

the no route to host thing could be the network card not doing something properly, or if its trying to use domain names to resolve then the dhclient might not have made the /etc/resolv.conf file

 

[Glaanieboy]

Another thing: I just installed FreeBSD 4.9 with CD and everything works fine. Now, when I SSH to the server from my Windows machine (using Putty), I can't login as a root, why is that? It's saying that access is denied.
Also I can't use that tab-key for word completion, instead, it's just tabbing (lots of spaces). How can I change that?

 

[Geffy]

did you add your username to the wheel group??
check /etc/group

for the tab thinger, I would compile and install bash2
then chsh -s /usr/local/bin/bash

 

[Xie]

I think 99% of the time root is denied remotely do to it being a HUGE security issue 🙂 Login as a regular user and "su" to root. 😉

 

[Geffy]

oh yeah you mean ssh login as root, thats disallowed, you have to create a user for yourself which has the permission to su to root, you do this by adding that user to the wheel group

 

[Glaanieboy]

Already done that 🙂 One more question: If I open a SSH session with Putty, and accidentely close the remote window (Windows crashing, Putty crashing etc), how can I reopen the running session on the BSD box?
Example:
I want to update the ports-collection and I know from experience, it takes a long time. My server is running 24/7, but my client (workstation) is not. The update is going just fine, but I want to shutdown my workstation, because I go to bed, but while leaving the server continue to update it's ports collection. The next day, I fire up my workstation, I want to reopen the session, but how?

 

[Geffy]

compile screen
/usr/ports/misc/screen

then when you want to do that type
screen cvsup -g -L2 /path/to/supfile

then Ctrl+A then press D

disconnect your ssh session

reconnect via ssh, type screen -r

if its still running (cvsup) then it will show you where you are in the process, if its done there will be no screen processes to reconnect to

 

[Glaanieboy]

Just what the doctor prescribed 🙂 Thanks Geffy, works like a charm.

 

[Glaanieboy]

Problem:
I can't find portsdb and portversion. Where can I find those files?

 

[j79zlr]

install /usr/ports/sysutils/portupgrade

 

[Glaanieboy]

WHoops, forgot to install the portupgrade package, everything is fine now.

 

[Glaanieboy]

install /usr/ports/sysutils/portupgrade

Yeah, got that.