Chapter 2. Installing SystemImager

2.1. How Does it Work?

The SystemImager concept is that an image server retrieves a golden client's entire system image and deploys it to any number of client systems. A golden client is a system you have customized to work exactly the way you want. You can re-compile the kernel, install custom software, and do any configuration file tweaking you like. The getimage command pulls the golden image to the image server for deployment to other systems.

Once you have deployed the initial image to your client systems, you can update/upgrade the client systems by syncing them to an updated image on the image server. Only the modified parts of files are pulled to the client for a fast, efficient, and accurate mass update/upgrade.

Note

Tools other than SystemImager are available for doing automatic installations, such as Red Hat's Kickstart, which installs systems based on a list of pre-defined packages. However, such package-based installs can be very limiting because they don't have an automated way to deal with non-packaged files. If you re-compile your kernel, add a piece of non-packaged software, or modify certain configuration files, package-based installation methods usually require you to do some sort of scripting or programming to deal with these "special cases."