Acronis Storage 2.0 Installation Using PXE 2 En

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Acronis Storage 2.0

Installation Using PXE

March 11, 2017

”Acronis” and ”Acronis Secure Zone” are registered trademarks of Acronis International GmbH.

”Acronis Compute with Conﬁdence”, ”Acronis Startup Recovery Manager”, ”Acronis Active Restore”,

”Acronis Instant Restore” and the Acronis logo are trademarks of Acronis International GmbH.

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WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR NON-INFRINGEMENT, ARE DISCLAIMED, EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT THAT

SUCH DISCLAIMERS ARE HELD TO BE LEGALLY INVALID.

Third party code may be provided with the Software and/or Service. The license terms for such third parties are detailed in the license.txt ﬁle located

in the root installation directory. You can always ﬁnd the latest up-to-date list of the third party code and the associated license terms used with the

Software and/or Service at http://kb.acronis.com/content/7696

Acronis patented technologies

Technologies, used in this product, are covered and protected by one or more U.S. Patent Numbers: 7,047,380; 7,275,139; 7,281,104; 7,318,135;

7,353,355; 7,366,859; 7,475,282; 7,603,533; 7,636,824; 7,650,473; 7,721,138; 7,779,221; 7,831,789; 7,886,120; 7,895,403; 7,934,064; 7,937,612; 7,949,635;

7,953,948; 7,979,690; 8,005,797; 8,051,044; 8,069,320; 8,073,815; 8,074,035; 8,145,607; 8,180,984; 8,225,133; 8,261,035; 8,296,264; 8,312,259; 8,347,137;

8,484,427; 8,645,748; 8,732,121 and patent pending applications.

Contents

1. Introduction ..................................................... 1

2. Preparing for PXE Installation .......................................... 2

2.1 Choosing Servers ................................................ 2

2.2 Installing Software on the PXE Server .................................... 3

2.3 Conﬁguring the TFTP Server .......................................... 3

2.4 Setting Up a DHCP Server ........................................... 5

2.5 Setting Up an HTTP Server ........................................... 5

2.6 Conﬁguring the Acronis Storage ....................................... 6

3. Installing Acronis Storage 2.0 ........................................... 7

4. Creating a Kickstart File .............................................. 8

4.1 Standard Kickstart Options .......................................... 8

4.2 Acronis Storage Kickstart Options ...................................... 9

4.3 Standard Kickstart Scripts ........................................... 10

4.3.1 Packages Script ............................................. 10

4.3.2 Post-Installation Script ......................................... 10

4.3.3 Add-on Script .............................................. 11

4.4 Specifying Acronis Storage Components to Install ............................. 11

4.4.1 Installing Management Panel with or without Storage ...................... 11

4.4.2 Installing Storage Component Only ................................. 12

4.5 Kickstart File Example ............................................. 13

4.6 Copying the Kickstart File ........................................... 15

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

This guide explains how to install Acronis Storage over network using a preboot execution environment (PXE)

server.

To install Acronis Storage 2.0 over a network, you need to complete the following steps:

1. Prepare for installation from a PXE server.

2. Create a kickstart ﬁle.

3. Install Acronis Storage.

4. Optionally, conﬁgure the management panel node or register storage nodes in the management panel.

These steps are explained in the following chapters in detail.

CHAPTER 2

Preparing for PXE Installation

The process of preparing for installation over network with a PXE server includes multiple steps described

below in detail.

2.1 Choosing Servers

First, you should decide on the servers to participate in the PXE installation. You need these servers:

• PXE server. This is a server allowing your servers to boot and install Acronis Storage over the network.

Any server capable of running a Linux operating system and having a network interface card (NIC) can

play the role of a PXE server.

• DHCP server. This is a standard DHCP server serving computers on your network with the necessary

TCP/IP settings. You can use an existing DHCP server, if you have one, or set up a DHCP server from

scratch. In the latter case, you can install it on the PXE server or use a dedicated server.

• Acronis Storage server. This is a server running Acronis Storage. The server must meet the requirements

described in the Preparing for Installation chapter of the Acronis Storage 2.0 Installation Guide. In addi-

tion to the requirements listed in this chapter, the server must have a NIC with PXE support to be able to

boot from the PXE server.

• HTTP server. This is a server storing the Acronis Storage installation ﬁles. You can use an existing HTTP

server, if you have one, or set up an HTTP server from scratch. In the latter case, you can install it on the

PXE server or use a dedicated server.

This guide assumes that you will store the installation ﬁles on an HTTP server and use HTTP as the installation

protocol.

2.2. Installing Software on the PXE Server

2.2 Installing Software on the PXE Server

Next, you are supposed to install the necessary software on the PXE server. First of all, you need to install a

Linux operating system on the server. There are no speciﬁc requirements for which operating system to use,

so you can choose any (e.g., CentOS 6 or Fedora 17).

Once your system is up and running, install the following packages:

•tftp-server

•httpd (Install this package only if you plan to deploy the PXE and HTTP servers on the same physical server.)

•syslinux

•dhcp (Install this package only if you plan to deploy the PXE and DHCP servers on the same physical server.)

Assuming that your PXE server is running an RHEL-like operating system, you can use the yum utility to install

the packages:

# yum install tftp-server dhcp httpd syslinux

2.3 Conﬁguring the TFTP Server

In the next step, you need to conﬁgure the TFTP server that you installed in the previous step. This sec-

tion describes the process of conﬁguring the TFTP server for BIOS-based systems. For information on

how to conﬁgure the TFTP server for installing Acronis Storage on EFI-based systems, see Conﬁguring

for EFI in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Installation Guide at https://access.redhat.com/knowledge/docs/en-

US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/6/html/Installation_Guide/s1-netboot-pxe-conﬁg-eﬁ.html.

To conﬁgure the TFTP server:

1. On the PXE server, open the /etc/xinetd.d/tftp ﬁle, and edit it as follows:

service tftp

{

disable = no

socket_type = dgram

protocol = udp

wait = yes

Chapter 2. Preparing for PXE Installation

user = root

server = /usr/sbin/in.tftpd

server_args = -v -s /tftpboot

per_source = 11

cps = 100 2

flags = IPv4

}

Once you are done, save the ﬁle.

2. Copy the following ﬁles to the /tftpboot directory (if this directory does not exist, create it under the root

(/) directory):

•vmlinuz

•initrd.img

•menu.c32

•pxelinux.0

These ﬁles are necessary to start the installation of Acronis Storage. You can ﬁnd the ﬁrst two ﬁles in the

/images/pxeboot directory of the Acronis Storage distribution. The menu.c32 and pxelinux.0 ﬁles are located in

the syslinux installation directory on the PXE server (usually, this is the /usr/share/syslinux or /usr/lib/syslinux

directory).

3. Create the /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg directory, and inside this directory, make the default ﬁle.

4. Open the default ﬁle for editing, and add the following strings to it:

default menu.c32

prompt 0

timeout 100

ontimeout VZ

menu title Acronis Storage Boot Menu

label VZ

menu label Install Acronis Storage

kernel vmlinuz

append initrd=initrd.img ip=dhcp

For detailed information on the parameters you can specify in the /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default ﬁle and their

conﬁguration, see the documentation for syslinux and its man pages.

2.4. Setting Up a DHCP Server

5. Restart the xinetd service:

# /etc/init.d/xinetd restart

6. If necessary, conﬁgure your ﬁrewall on the PXE server to allow access to the TFTP server.

Note: When running the TFTP server, you might get the “Permission denied” error. In this case, you

may try to ﬁx the problem by running the following command on the server: # restorecon -Rv /tftboot/.

2.4 Setting Up a DHCP Server

Now you can proceed with conﬁguring a DHCP server. To conﬁgure the DHCP server for installing Acronis

Storage over the network, open the dhcpd.conf ﬁle (usually, it is located in the /etc or /etc/dhcp directory) for

editing and add the following strings to this ﬁle:

next-server <PXE_server_IP_address>;

filename ”/pxelinux.0”;

Note: To conﬁgure a DHCP server for installation on EFI-based systems, specify filename ”/bootx64.efi”

instead of filename ”/pxelinux.0” in the dhcpd.conf ﬁle (where /bootx64.efi is the directory to which you copied

the EFI boot images when setting up the TFTP server).

2.5 Setting Up an HTTP Server

Now that you have set up the TFTP and DHCP servers, you need to make the Acronis Storage distribution ﬁles

available for installation over the network. To do this:

1. Set up an HTTP server. You can also use an existing HTTP server, if you have one.

2. Copy the contents of your Acronis Storage installation DVD to some directory on the HTTP server (e.g.,

/var/www/html/astor).

3. On the PXE server, open the /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default ﬁle for editing, and specify the path to the Acronis

Storage installation ﬁles on the HTTP server.

Chapter 2. Preparing for PXE Installation

Note: For EFI-based systems, the ﬁle you need to edit has the name of /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/efidefault

or /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/<PXE_server_IP_address>.

Assuming that you have the installation ﬁles in the /var/www/html/astor directory on the HTTP server with the

IP address of 198.123.123.198 and the DocumentRoot directory is set to /var/www/html, you can add the following

option to the append line of the default ﬁle to make the Acronis Storage ﬁles accessible over HTTP:

inst.repo=http://198.123.123.198/astor

So your default ﬁle should look similar to the following:

default menu.c32

prompt 0

timeout 100

ontimeout ASTOR

menu title Acronis Storage Boot Menu

label ASTOR

menu label Install Acronis Storage

kernel vmlinuz

append initrd=initrd.img ip=dhcp inst.repo=http://198.123.123.198/astor

2.6 Conﬁguring the Acronis Storage

Before you can start the Acronis Storage installation, conﬁgure each server where you plan to install the prod-

uct to boot from the network. To do this:

1. Switch on the server.

2. Enter the BIOS setup.

3. Enable the network boot.

CHAPTER 3

Installing Acronis Storage 2.0

Now that you have prepared all the servers, you can start the Acronis Storage installation:

1. Restart the Acronis Storage server after conﬁguring its BIOS settings to boot from the network.

Note: If you plan to perform an unattended installation of Acronis Storage, you need to additionally

create a kickstart ﬁle. For more details, see Creating a Kickstart File on page 8.

2. Once the server boots, you will see a dialog box asking you to select the system to install. Select the entry

for Acronis Storage (e.g., Install Acronis Storage), and press Enter.

3. Follow the on-screen instructions to install Acronis Storage. For details, consult the Acronis Storage 2.0

Installation Guide.

CHAPTER 4

Creating a Kickstart File

If you plan to perform an unattended installation of Acronis Storage, you can use a kickstart ﬁle. A kickstart

ﬁle is a simple text ﬁle containing the information used by the Acronis Storage installer to install and conﬁgure

your physical server. The format of kickstart ﬁles used in Acronis Storage installations is similar to that used

to perform unattended installations of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL).

You can include in your Acronis Storage kickstart ﬁle two groups of options:

• The ﬁrst group comprises the same options that you use when installing any RHEL-like distribution.

• The second group comprises the options speciﬁc to Acronis Storage.

Both groups of options are described in the following sections in detail.

4.1 Standard Kickstart Options

Your kickstart ﬁle may include any of the standard Linux options used in kickstart ﬁles for installing Linux

operating systems. For the full list of these options and their explanations, consult the respective Linux docu-

mentation (e.g., the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Installation Guide).

Listed below are the mandatory options and commands that you must include in each kickstart ﬁle.

Option Description

auth

--enableshadow

--passalgo=sha512

Speciﬁes authentication options for the Acronis Storage physical

server.

cdrom Install the product from the ﬁrst optical drive.

cmdline Perform the installation in the unattended mode.

4.2. Acronis Storage Kickstart Options

Option Description

firstboot --enable Starts the Setup Agent the ﬁrst time the system is booted.

keyboard Sets the system keyboard type.

lang Sets the language to use during installation and the default lan-

guage to use on the installed system.

rootpw --iscrypted <value> Sets the system’s root password.

selinux --disabled Disables SElinux.

services --enabled=”chronyd” Enables time synchronization via NTP.

timezone <zone> Sets the system time zone.

autopart --type=lvm Sets the partitioning type to LVM.

4.2 Acronis Storage Kickstart Options

Along with standard Linux options, Acronis Storage provides a number of speciﬁc parameters and keywords

that you need to add to your kickstart ﬁle.

The table below lists the parameters you can use.

Important: Acronis Storage must have only one disk dedicated for the system. Specify it in the <sys-

tem_disk> parameter.

Parameter Description

ignoredisk --only-use=<system_disk> The disk to install the product to. Other disks will be ignored.

bootloader

--append=” crashkernel=auto”

--location=mbr

--boot-drive=<system_disk>

Sets bootloader parameters.

Sets kernel parameters.

Sets the boot record location.

Sets the drive to boot from.

clearpart --all --initlabel

--drives=<system_disk>

--disklabel=gpt

Removes all partitions from the system disk and initializes invalid par-

tition tables.

The system drive to clear partitions from.

Sets the system disk’s label to gpt.

Chapter 4. Creating a Kickstart File

Parameter Description

network --bootproto=dhcp

--device=<device_name>

--ipv6=auto --activate

Speciﬁes the method to obtain network conﬁguration with.

Speciﬁes the network adapter to conﬁgure.

Sets the network adapter’s IPv6 address and activates the adapter in

the installer environment.

4.3 Standard Kickstart Scripts

After setting the standard parameters, you add a number of scripts that will do the following:

• install the minimal mandatory package group;

• add the public keys to the RPM database and reinstall the Virtuozzo Linux release;

• enable kernel crash dumping.

To perform the above steps, add the following scripts to the kickstart ﬁle: %packages,%post,%addon. These scripts

start with their respective names along with a %preﬁx and end with the %end command.

4.3.1 Packages Script

In the body of the %packages script, specify the minimal mandatory package group to install on the server:

%packages

@^minimal

%end

4.3.2 Post-Installation Script

In the post-installation script, you add the public keys to the RPM database and reinstall the Virtuozzo Linux

release:

%post

# Add public keys to rpm database

rpmkeys --import /etc/pki/rpm-gpg/*

# Reinstall vzlinux release

4.4. Specifying Acronis Storage Components to Install

yum reinstall vzlinux-release -y

%end

4.3.3 Add-on Script

To enable kernel crash dumping during the installation, add the following lines to the end of the kickstart ﬁle:

%addon com_redhat_kdump --enable --reserve-mb=’auto’

%end

4.4 Specifying Acronis Storage Components to

Install

Finally, you need to specify which Acronis Storage components you need to install on the node:

• management panel with or without storage,

• storage.

You can install the components in two ways:

• (Recommended) Do not specify the tokens for storage and superadmin password for the management

panel in the kickstart ﬁle. In this case, you will need to manually run additional scripts after the installa-

tion.

• Specify the tokens and superadmin password in the kickstart ﬁle. In this case, you will not need to man-

ually run additional scripts after the installation.

4.4.1 Installing Management Panel with or without Storage

To install both the management panel and storage components on the node without exposing the superadmin

password and storage token in the kickstart ﬁle, do the following:

1. Add the % addon com_vstorage script to the end of the kickstart ﬁle:

Chapter 4. Creating a Kickstart File

%addon com_vstorage --management --storage --bare

%end

If you do not want to install the storage component on the same node, omit the --storage option.

2. Once the installation is complete, execute the following command on the node to conﬁgure the manage-

ment panel component:

echo <superadmin_password> | /usr/libexec/vstorage-ui-backend/bin/configure-backend.sh \

-x <public_ip_address> -i <internal_ip_address>

where

•<superadmin_password> is the password of the superadmin account of management panel,

•<public_ip_address> is the IP address of the management panel for the public network interface,

•<internal_ip_address> is the IP address for private network interface.

3. If you also installed the storage component on the node, execute the following command:

echo | /usr/libexec/vstorage-ui-agent/bin/configure-agent.sh -x 127.0.0.1

To install the components without running scripts afterwards, specify the IP addresses for the public (external)

and private (internal) network interfaces and the password for the superadmin account of the management

panel in the end of the kickstart ﬁle. For example:

%addon com_vstorage --external-iface=<public_IP_address> --internal-iface=<private_IP_address> \

--password=<password> --management --storage

%end

If you do not want to install the storage component on the same node, omit the --storage option.

4.4.2 Installing Storage Component Only

The storage component alone, without the management panel, is installed by default and does not require

any scripts in the kickstart ﬁle unless you want to specify the token.

If you do not want to expose the token in the kickstart ﬁle, run the following command on the node after the

installation to register the node in the management panel:

echo <token> | /usr/libexec/vstorage-ui-agent/bin/configure-agent.sh -x <MN_IP_address>

where

4.5. Kickstart File Example

•<token> is the token that can be obtained in the management panel,

•<MN_IP_address> is the IP address of the private network interface on the node with the management panel.

To install the storage component without running scripts afterwards, specify the token and the IP address of

the node with the management panel in the kickstart ﬁle. For example:

%addon com_vstorage --storage --token=<token> --mgmt-node-addr=<IP_address>

%end

4.5 Kickstart File Example

Below is an example of kickstart ﬁle that you can use to install and conﬁgure Acronis Storage in the unattended

mode. You can use this ﬁle as the basis for creating your own kickstart ﬁles.

# Use the SHA-512 encryption for user passwords and enable shadow passwords.

auth --enableshadow --passalgo=sha512

# Use CDROM as the installation media.

cdrom

# Install in a completely unattended mode.

cmdline

# Run the Setup Agent on first boot.

firstboot --enable

# Set the target device for the system here!

ignoredisk --only-use=sdc

# Use the English keyboard type.

keyboard --vckeymap=us --xlayouts=’us’

# Use English as the language during the installation and as the default system

# language.

lang en_US.UTF-8

# If you intend to run configuration scripts after installation,

# uncomment the following and specify a network device to configure network.

#network --bootproto=dhcp --device=<network_device> --ipv6=auto --activate

#network --bootproto=dhcp --hostname=localhost.localdomain

Chapter 4. Creating a Kickstart File

# Set the encrypted root password for the server.

rootpw --iscrypted xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

# Disable SELinux.

selinux --disabled

# Enable time synchronization via NTP.

services --enabled=”chronyd”

# Set the system time zone.

timezone America/New_York

# Configure the bootloader. Set the target device for the system as the first

# drive in the BIOS boot order and write the boot record to mbr.

bootloader --append=” crashkernel=auto” --location=mbr --boot-drive=sdc

# Set the partition type to LVM.

autopart --type=lvm

# Configure the partition removal for the system drive.

# Set the target device for the system here!

clearpart --all --initlabel --drives=sdc --disklabel=gpt

# Make the installation program run the post-installation script and configure

# it to add keys to RPM database and reinstall the vzlinux release.

%post

rpmkeys --import /etc/pki/rpm-gpg/*

yum reinstall vzlinux-release -y

# Uncomment to install the trial license.

#vzlicupdate -a trial

# Uncomment to configure SElinux.

#yes | fixfiles -f -F relabel /

%end

# Install the packages on the node.

%packages

@^minimal

%end

# Enable kernel crash dumping during the installation.

%addon com_redhat_kdump --enable --reserve-mb=’auto’

4.6. Copying the Kickstart File

%end

# Uncomment to install the management panel and storage components without

# running scripts on the node after installation. If you do not intend to

# install the storage component, remove the --storage parameter.

# Specify the external and internal IP addresses for the management panel.

#%addon com_vstorage --external-iface=10.0.2.15 --internal-iface=10.0.2.15 --password=xxxxxxxxx \

--management --storage

#%end

# Uncomment to install the management panel and storage. Running configuration

# scripts required after the installation. If you do not intend to install the

# storage component, remove the --storage parameter.

#%addon com_vstorage --management --storage --bare

#%end

# Uncomment to install the storage component without running scripts on the

# node after installation. Specify a token and the IP address of the management

# panel node to register the current node.

#%addon com_vstorage --storage --token=xxxxxxxxx --mgmt-node-addr=10.0.15.7

#%end

4.6 Copying the Kickstart File

To install Acronis Storage using a kickstart ﬁle, you ﬁrst need to make the kickstart ﬁle accessible over the

network. To do this:

1. Copy the kickstart ﬁle to the same directory on the HTTP server where the Acronis Storage installation

ﬁles are stored (e.g., to /var/www/html/astor).

2. Add the following string to the /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default ﬁle on the PXE server:

ks=<HTTP_server_address>/<path_to_kickstart_file>

Chapter 4. Creating a Kickstart File

Note: For EFI-based systems, the ﬁle you need to edit has the name of /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/efidefault

or /tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/<PXE_server_IP_address>.

Assuming that the HTTP server has the IP address of 198.123.123.198, the DocumentRoot directory is set to

/var/www/html and the full path to your kickstart ﬁle on this server is /var/www/html/astor/ks.cfg, your default ﬁle may

look like the following:

default menu.c32

prompt 0

timeout 100

ontimeout ASTOR

menu title Acronis Storage Boot Menu

label ASTOR

menu label Install Acronis Storage

kernel vmlinuz

append initrd=initrd.img ks=http://198.123.123.198/astor/ks.cfg \

ip=dhcp inst.repo=http://198.123.123.198/astor

Acronis Storage 2.0 Installation Using PXE 2 En

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