[Beowulf] Re: cloning issue, hidden module dependency

[David Mathog]

Finally wrote a working image on the one node with a different mobo, it
was a minor mess doing so.  In order to figure out the values for
modprobe.conf:

alias eth0 8139too
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe uhci_hcd; /bin/true
install ide-controller /sbin/modprobe via82cxxx; /sbin/modprobe
ide_generic; /bin/true
alias pci:v000010ECd00008139sv000010ECsd00008139bc02sc00i00 8139too

I still had to to do a basic install on that node  The first 3 lines
I could probably have figured out eventually from the modprobe.conf from
the previous release, but that last line, no way.

For future reference:

1.  write / and /boot from an image made from an S2466 system using
a boel3 script (this also wrote all known node specific files)
2.  ^C to break to boel shell
3.  
mkdir /a
mount /dev/hda3 /a
mount /dev/hda1 /a/boot
chroot /a
  # file name will change for each release!!!
  rm -f /boot/initrd-2.6.24.7-desktop-2mnb.img
  # expect and ignore warnings
  mkinitrd /boot/initrd-2.6.24.7-desktop-2mnb.img 2.6.24.7-desktop-2mnb
  # the preceding stomped our custom inittab, put it back
  cp -f /etc/inittab.saf /etc/inittab
  exit
reboot

4. Need to run lilo now or at reboot it STILL comes up using the wrong
modules.  You can guess how I found that out.  Lilo won't work reliably
chroot from boel3 with this Mandriva distro, and boel3 has no lilo
of its own.  So pxe boot the node with PLD 2.01, then at the prompt:  

mkdir /a
mount /dev/hda3 /a
mount /dev/hda1 /boot
lilo -C /a/etc/lilo.conf
#reset dhcpd on the master so this node will boot from internal disk
reboot

At least reinstalling on this node would now be less painful, since the
new initrd has been stored on the SI server, and could be put in place
by just copying it in the installation script.

All and all though, this isn't a very elegant way to install a system
image on a different type of machine.  

Regards,

David Mathog
mathog at caltech.edu
Manager, Sequence Analysis Facility, Biology Division, Caltech