Ubuntu Cloud Portal: Oneiric server, Deploy Server fleets p2

Welcome to the second installment of this article series. In the first part of this article we installed an Ubuntu server instance, made sure it became an orchestra installation server. If this is new to you, Orchestra is a new Oneiric server feature that enables admins to very easily deploy fleets of Ubuntu servers. Let's pick up where the first article stopped

First, let's check where we are. You see installing the orchestra server, it automatically downloads and imports various Ubuntu server ISOs and creates all the needed structure (distros, profiles ...etc) in the underlying cobbler system. Let's see what have we

$ sudo cobbler list
distros:
   hardy-i386
   hardy-x86_64  
   lucid-i386
   lucid-x86_64  
   maverick-i386 
   maverick-x86_64
   natty-i386
   natty-x86_64  
   oneiric-i386  
   oneiric-x86_64

profiles:
   hardy-i386
   hardy-i386-juju
   hardy-x86_64
   hardy-x86_64-juju
   lucid-i386
   lucid-i386-juju
   lucid-x86_64
   lucid-x86_64-juju
   maverick-i386
   maverick-i386-juju
   maverick-x86_64
   maverick-x86_64-juju
   natty-i386
   natty-i386-juju
   natty-x86_64
   natty-x86_64-juju
   oneiric-i386
   oneiric-i386-juju
   oneiric-x86_64
   oneiric-x86_64-juju

systems:

repos:
   hardy-i386
   hardy-i386-security
   hardy-x86_64
   hardy-x86_64-security
   lucid-i386
   lucid-i386-security
   lucid-x86_64
   lucid-x86_64-security
   maverick-i386
   maverick-i386-security
   maverick-x86_64
   maverick-x86_64-security
   natty-i386
   natty-i386-security
   natty-x86_64
   natty-x86_64-security
   oneiric-i386
   oneiric-i386-security
   oneiric-x86_64
   oneiric-x86_64-security

images:

mgmtclasses:
   orchestra-juju-acquired
   orchestra-juju-available

woah! that sure makes my life easier. If you're interested to see where the isos were downloaded (like I was) here you are

ls /var/lib/cobbler/isos/
hardy-i386-mini.iso    lucid-i386-mini.iso    maverick-i386-mini.iso    natty-i386-mini.iso    oneiric-i386-mini.iso
hardy-x86_64-mini.iso  lucid-x86_64-mini.iso  maverick-x86_64-mini.iso  natty-x86_64-mini.iso  oneiric-x86_64-mini.iso

Let's create a new virtual box VM, to serve as our new "server" that needs to be installed. Here's how it looks for me


One thing is worth noting however, it's that the NIC is placed on the "intnet" network, which has the IP range 192.168.77.0/24 that we configured in the first part of this article


now the only "real" thing you have to do, is to add a profile on the orchestra server for your new bare server. The profile binds its mac address, to a name and an installation profile (think OS to install, kickstart ..etc)

sudo cobbler system add --name="oneiric01.ubuntu.lan" --mac-address="08:00:27:B7:76:2A" --ip-address="192.168.77.33" --dns-name="oneiric01.ubuntu.lan" --hostname="oneiric01.ubuntu.lan" --profile="oneiric-x86_64-juju" --mgmt-classes="orchestra-juju-available" --kopts=" DEBCONF_DEBUG=developer netcfg/dhcp_timeout=120 netcfg/choose_interface=eth0"

Boot the server, choose PXE (For vbox that's F12 then "l" that's an L)



Watch the installer fly by (look ma hands free)



and your box is ready!


That's how easy it is to install a fresh server off your orchestra box! So basically the only thing you need to do per server, is to attach it to a profile and that's it. Boot it and it installs whatever you provisioned for it. Of course any good admin already did that manually before, but it took effort and it wasn't standardized. Now you can count on Ubuntu server covering your back when you're tasked with installing a hundred servers

How cool was that! Got thoughts, comments or rotten tomatoes ? Shoot me a comment