[mythtv-users] Best options/howto for diskless frontends

[Thomas Mashos]

On Wed, Oct 24, 2012 at 1:22 PM, Patrick Ouellette <pat at flying-gecko.net> wrote:
> On Wed, Oct 24, 2012 at 12:46:34PM -0700, Michael Drons wrote:
>> I had a backend crash and switched linux distro & upgraded mythtv in the process.  My backend is now running Ubuntu and mythtv .26.  I now need to upgrade my frontends, which are diskless.
>>
>> They are running gentoo, but was thinking of switching distros also.  Anyone have a recommendation on a distro that supports diskless mythtv frontends.
>>
>> I have been struggling now for 2 days trying to get LTSP working (following these instructions: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/MythTV/Install/Hardy/Diskless), but I seem to have many errors as it does not work.  Everything I find in google references onlder versions of Ubuntu (I am running 12.10) on the backend.
>
> I'm running LTSP frontends on Ubuntu 12.04 and can tell you the document you
> reference is not necessarily accurate.  At least for me the server
> configuration for the NBD service was incorrect.  NBD server changed the
> way it works and uses a name model as opposed to a network port
> model for the shares and the Mythbuntu LTSP scripts were not updated for that.
> I also have to make sure the NBD server's IP address is specified for the PXE
> boot on the client (use the -S <ip address> option on the ltsp-update-image
> command).
>
>>
>> My only requirement is that the frontends boot quickly.  The gentoo FE boot from power on to mythtv ready in about 45 seconds with no hibernation or sleep configured.
>
> Right now my LTSP config hangs a bit looking to configure the already
> configured network.  I haven't bothered fixing it yet.
>
>>
>> A nice to have would be for the frontends to share the nfs partition (currently have 3 diskless fe).  My current setup takes a lot of disk as each FE has its own root nfs mount point.
>
> The unionfs model in LTSP handles this well.  All your frontends can share
> a common NBD root, while individual customizations for each front end can
> reside on the NFS partition (all transparent to the end user).
>
> Pat
>
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Did you make the changes to the scripts or just do it manually? I
don't use LTSP, but we can fix the scripts if someone knows what the
issues are.

Thanks,

Thomas Mashos