Camara PXE Server: Adding packages

[Alex Bacik]

All,

I've been playing with the PXE server, trying to get a handle on the
best way to add a package to the standard build; specifically
OpenOffice Base for the Uganda Hub. They're currently having to
install Base from a CD, and they'd prefer to include it during the PXE
install.

On the PXE server I've placed the .deb files in
/srv/install/aptpack/packages/ - how are these files installed and
where are the scripts to do it?

thanks,

Alex

[Alex Bacik]

Think I've almost got this cracked... but any steers appreciated!

A

[Rana Das]

Hi Alex,

A tiny suggestion if I may...

You know the way schools in Africa use only a set of preinstalled applications. OpenOffice, moodle etc.

I was wondering if its possible to configure so that those applications that schools in are hardly ever gonna use aren't installed. Like Apache. For PCs running on 256/512 memory this could freeup something.

Also, it would be great if help files for software are installed by fdefault.

Thanks


> Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2010 11:05:49 +0100
> Subject: Re: Camara PXE Server: Adding packages
> From: al...@bacik.ie
> To: li...@camara.ie; camara...@googlegroups.com

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> http://groups.google.ie/group/camaradublin?hl=en

[Ciarán Casey]

This thread always makes me feel thick.  Thanks a lot lads

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[Paul O'Rourke]

Hi Alex,

 

On the PXE server there will be a folder /var/www/cam904a/.  This is where the install controls are for the standard 32 bit camarabuntu 9.04 desktop installation.  The main file you might be interested in is named "late-cmd"  In there you can write commands that get executed after the initial install has completed but before the final reboot.  This is where the wallpaper is changed and additional user accounts set up.

 

There is an application called aptoncd that can take downloaded repository files (from when you install software over the internet) and stick them on to a CD.

 

There is another folder on the server /srv/install/aptpack/.  This is the contents of a CD that was created by the aptoncd application.  This miniature repository is called by the late-cmd script (an entry is put in to /etc/apt/sources.list)

 

If you have put additional deb packages into /srv/install/aptpack/packages/ the problem is that the apt-install command won't know about them.  You would have two choices:

either write commands that will dpkg install the individual packages manually in the right order - this isn't easy.

or else rebuild the miniature repository using aptoncd so that the index files (packages.bz and packages.gz) are rebuilt to include your new packages.  Then you can write simple apt-get install commands.

 

By the way, as far as I know, our install does not include Apache or Moodle by default, but it does include the camara edu-pack.  To be honest, a job needs to be done on that edu pack.  We need to bring in the more recent Wikipedia, and someone needs to look at the additional learning material.  Space on the cloud might be useful for this.  And I'm not sure what ever happened to the Respect Software.

 

I think the problem with the help files not installing has to do with that we set the original region settings to English/Ireland/Dublin.  This works fine for MS Office and MS Windows.  Unfortunately most of the OpenSource software provider (especially OpenOffice) didn't bother with making help or spell check work for Ireland.  Next time we do a build we'll know to set the regional settings to English/GreatBritain/London.  We already do this with the Windows build.

 

Regards,

 

Paul

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