Re-Provisioning - Red Hat NETWORK SATELLITE 5.3.0 Deployment Manual

Chapter 5. Provisioning with Satellite
can be made without having to re-burn the CD. If you create a new kickstart profile and want to use it
via the cobbler boot ISO, you will need to recreate a fresh disc.
Note
Due to issues with the version of syslinux shipped with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4, this
command will not work unless the Satellite is running on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5. Also
since syslinux is not available for s390x, it is not possible to use this on a satellite running
on s390x.

5.8.2. Re-Provisioning

Re-provisioning is the act of reinstalling an existing system. It could be reinstalled to the same version
and release, or to a completely new version. When you re-provision through the Satellite web interface
your system will use the same system profile that it had before it was re-provisioned. This can be
useful as much of the information and settings about the system such as its history will be preserved.
You can schedule a re-provision from the provisioning tab while viewing a system. If you would like
to configure additional options click on the Advanced Options page. On this page you can configure
details such as kernel options, networking information, and package profile synchronizations. The
Kernel Options section pertains to kernel options used during kickstart. Post Kernel Options are the
kernel options that will be used after the kickstart is complete and the system is booting for the first
time.
For example:
• If you want to establish a VNC connection so you can monitor the kickstart remotely, include vnc
vncpassword=PASSWORD in the Kernel Options line
• If you want the kernel of the resulting system to boot with the noapic kernel option, add noapic to
the Post Kernel Options line
Note that this requires a system that is accessible over your network and already registered to
Satellite. If you are reinstalling a system that is not registered to Satellite, there are several options:
• PXE
• Use cobbler buildiso
• Install koan and spacewalk-koan on the system and use the koan command line tool, pointing at
the Satellite server, to install a named profile
Koan is covered in a later section.
5.8.2.1. File Preservation
If you would like to keep some files across a re-provision you can use Satellite's File Preservation
mechanism. This mechanism stores files temporarily during the kickstart and restores them at the end.
To create a file preservation list:
• Go to Systems => Kickstart => File Preservation Lists and create a list of files to preserve
• After creation, associate your list with a kickstart:
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