Manage Boot Clients

The Manage Boot Clients (MBC) option provides several services. You can:

• Remotely boot a server. You do not need console access to the server.
• Pre-create server records.
• Create custom attributes that set server configuration during OS Provisioning.
• Reconfigure services like DHCP when new servers are provisioned.
• Initiate OS Provisioning with either an OS Build Plan or an OS Sequence from a portal or an automated script where, typically, the user will not be available for interactive responses.

For example, you can change the default PXE image that a server uses to boot, change whether a server is assigned a DHCP lease, or specify the DHCP IP that is assigned to the server. You can also change a server’s behavior when it enters the server pool, such as automatically invoking an OS Sequence.

If the server is an HPE ProLiant server with iLO 3 or 4 enabled, and you know its iLO information, MBC can also remotely power on the server.

Any user, such as a system administrator who performs OS Provisioning and who is responsible for the base operating system, system utilities, patching, and the hand off of servers to internal business units, will find MBC quite useful.

You can access MBC functionality:

• From the SA Client
• From the Global File System command line
• From a script
• From a browser/portal form

Requirements

• The OS Provisioning infrastructure relies on SA Boot Server services for the MBC extensions.
• The OS Provisioning boot images must be served by the TFTP server that is shipped with SA.
• In order to take advantage of the DHCP reconfiguration feature, you must use the SA DHCP server.
• On a newly installed SA Core, a new user prior to running the MBC Web APX must first be granted Launch Global Shell permissions and must log in to the OGSH at least once in order to initialize the user environment (so that MBC can write temporary files to the user’s home directories during use).

Required permissions

In order to execute MBC, a user must have the Allow Execute OS Build Plan or Allow Execute OS Sequence, Managed Server and Groups, Manage Customers, Server Pool, Read & Write permission to customer Not Assigned and Allow Configuration of Network Booting permissions, write access to all pre-existing servers they will act on, and permissions to run the MBC APXs (thus, they need execute access on the /Opsware/Tools/OS Provisioning/Manage Boot Clients folder).

For iLO 3 or 4 integration, the user must have Manage iLo and Execute iLo operations permissions.

Installation

The SA Installer creates the MBC APXs during the SA Core installation. The installer creates a folder containing the MBC APXs in the SA Client Library, and adds an MBC Configuration Software Policy as part of the baseline data.

The following four APXs are installed for MBC:

• Program APX
• Web APX
• Integration Hook APX
• DHCP Cleanup Web APX