Chapter 7. Configuring the Discovery Service

Procedure

1. Enter the following commands on Capsule Server:

   # satellite-maintain packages install foreman-discovery-image rubygem-smart_proxy_discovery

2. Restart the satellite-maintain services:

   # satellite-maintain service restart

3. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Infrastructure > Capsule.
4. Click the Capsule Server and select Refresh from the Actions list. Locate Discovery in the list of features to confirm the Discovery service is now running.

1. If a discovered host uses a subnet defined in Satellite, the host uses the first organization and location associated with the subnet.
2. If the discovery_organization or discovery_location fact values are set, the discovered host uses these fact values as an organization and location. To set these fact values, navigate to Administer > Settings > Discovered, and add these facts to the Default organization and Default location fields. Ensure that the discovered host’s subnet also belongs to the organization and location set by the fact, otherwise Satellite refuses to set it for security reasons.
3. If none of the previous conditions exists, Satellite assigns the first Organization and Location ordered by name.

1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Administer > Settings and click the Provisioning tab.
2. For the Default PXE global template entry, in the Value column, enter discovery.

1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Hosts > Discovered host. Select the host you want to use and click Provision to the right of the list.

2. Select from one of the two following options:

   • To provision a host from a host group, select a host group, organization, and location, and then click Create Host.
   • To provision a host with further customization, click Customize Host and enter the additional details you want to specify for the new host.

3. Verify that the fields are populated with values. Note in particular:

   • The Name from the Host tab becomes the DNS name.
   • Satellite Server automatically assigns an IP address for the new host.
   • Satellite Server automatically populates the MAC address from the Discovery results.
4. Ensure that Satellite Server automatically selects the Managed, Primary, and Provision options for the first interface on the host. If not, select them.
5. Click the Operating System tab, and verify that all fields contain values. Confirm each aspect of the operating system.

6. Click Resolve in Provisioning template to check the new host can identify the right provisioning templates to use. The host must resolve to the following provisioning templates:

   • kexec Template: Discovery Red Hat kexec

   • provision Template: Satellite Kickstart Default

     For more information about associating provisioning templates, see Section 2.11, “Provisioning Templates”.

7. Click Submit to save the host details.

For CLI Users

1. Identify the discovered host to use for provisioning:

   # hammer discovery list

2. Select a host and provision it using a host group. Set a new host name with the --new-name option:

   # hammer discovery provision --name "host_name" \
   --new-name "new_host_name" --organization "My_Organization" \
   --location "My_Location" --hostgroup "My_Host_Group" --build true \
   --enabled true --managed true

   This removes the host from the discovered host listing and creates a host entry with the provisioning settings. The Discovery image automatically resets the host so that it can boot to PXE. The host detects the DHCP service on Satellite Server’s integrated Capsule and starts installing the operating system. The rest of the process is identical to normal PXE workflow described in Section 6.3, “Creating Hosts with Unattended Provisioning”.

1. In the Satellite web UI, navigate to Configure > Discovery rules, and select Create Rule.
2. In the Name field, enter a name for the rule.
3. In the Search field, enter the rules to determine whether to provision a host. This field provides suggestions for values you enter and allows operators for multiple rules. For example: cpu_count > 8.
4. From the Host Group list, select the host group to use as a template for this host.

5. In the Hostname field, enter the pattern to determine host names for multiple hosts. This uses the same ERB syntax that provisioning templates use. The host name can use the @host attribute for host-specific values and the rand function for a random number. For more information about provisioning templates, see Section 2.11, “Provisioning Templates”.

   • myhost-<%= rand(99999) %>
   • abc-<%= @host.facts['bios_vendor'] %>-<%= rand(99999) %>
   • xyz-<%= @host.hostgroup.name %>
   • srv-<%= @host.discovery_rule.name %>

   • server-<%= @host.ip.gsub('.','-') + '-' + @host.hostgroup.subnet.name %>

     When creating host name patterns, ensure that the resulting host names are unique, do not start with numbers, and do not contain underscores or dots. A good approach is to use unique information provided by Facter, such as the MAC address, BIOS, or serial ID.

6. In the Hosts limit field, enter the maximum number of hosts that you can provision with the rule. Enter 0 for unlimited.
7. In the Priority field, enter a number to set the precedence the rule has over other rules. Rules with lower values have a higher priority.
8. From the Enabled list, select whether you want to enable the rule.
9. To set a different provisioning context for the rule, click the Organizations and Locations tabs and select the contexts you want to use.
10. Click Submit to save your rule.

11. Navigate to Hosts > Discovered Host and select one of the following two options:

    • From the Discovered hosts list on the right, select Auto-Provision to automatically provisions a single host.
    • On the upper right of the window, click Auto-Provision All to automatically provisions all hosts.

Attended Use

1. Copy this media to either a CD, DVD, or a USB stick. For example, to copy to a USB stick at /dev/sdb:

   # dd bs=4M \
   if=/usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image-3.4.4-5.iso \
   of=/dev/sdb

2. Insert the Discovery boot media into a bare metal host, start the host, and boot from the media. The Discovery Image displays an option for either Manual network setup or Discovery with DHCP:

   If you select Manual network setup, the Discovery image requests a set of network options. This includes the primary network interface that connects to Satellite Server. This Discovery image also asks for network interface configuration options, such as an IPv4 Address, IPv4 Gateway, and an IPv4 DNS server.

3. After entering these details, select Next.
4. If you select Discovery with DHCP, the Discovery image requests only the primary network interface that connects to Satellite Server. It attempts to automatically configure the network interface using a DHCP server, such as one that a Capsule Server provides.

5. After the primary interface configuration, the Discovery image requests the Server URL, which is the URL of Satellite Server or Capsule Server offering the Discovery service. For example, to use the integrated Capsule on Satellite Server, use the following URL:

   https://satellite.example.com:9090

6. Set the Connection type to Proxy, then select Next.
7. Optional: The Discovery image also provides a set of fields to input Custom facts for the Facter tool to relay back to Satellite Server. These are entered in a name-value format. Provide any custom facts you require and select Confirm to continue.

1. Open the /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image.ks file for editing:

   # vim /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image.ks

2. Replace the repo lines in the kickstart file with the repository URLs:

   repo --name=rhel --baseurl=file:///var/lib/pulp/published/yum/https/repos/Default_Organization/Library/content/dist/rhel/server/7/7.7/x86_64
   repo --name=sat --baseurl=file:///var/lib/pulp/published/yum/https/repos/Default_Organization/Library/content/dist/rhel/server/7/7Server/x86_64/sat-capsule/6.7/os

3. Run the livecd-creator tool:

   # livecd-creator --title="Discovery-Image" \
   --compression-type=xz \
   --cache=var/cache/build-fdi \
   --config /usr/share/foreman-discovery-image/foreman-discovery-image.ks \
   --fslabel fdi \
   --tmpdir /var/tmp

   If you change fdi in the --fslabel option, you must also change the root label on the kernel command line when loading the image. fdi or the alternative name is appended to the .iso file that is created as part of this procedure. The PXE Discovery tool uses this name when converting from .iso to PXE.

   Use /var/tmp because this process requires close to 3GB of space and /tmp might have problems if the system is low on swap space.

4. Verify that your fdi.iso file is created:

   # ls *.iso -h

To boot the iso file over a network:

1. To extract the initial ramdisk and kernel files from the .iso file over a network, enter the following command:

   # discovery-iso-to-pxe fdi.iso

2. Create a directory to store your boot files:

   # mkdir /var/lib/tftpboot/boot/myimage

3. Copy the initrd0.img and vmlinuz0 files to your new directory.
4. Edit the KERNEL and APPEND entries in the /var/lib/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg file to add the information about your own initial ramdisk and kernel files.

1. To convert the .iso file to an .iso hybrid file for PXE provisioning, enter the following command:

   # isohybrid --partok fdi.iso

   If you have grub2 packages installed, you can also use the following command to install a grub2 bootloader:

   # isohybrid --partok --uefi fdi.iso

2. To add md5 checksum to the .iso file so it can pass installation media validation tests in Satellite, enter the following command:

   # implantisomd5 fdi.iso

Procedure

1. Create the following directory structure:

   .
   ├── autostart.d
   │   └── 01_zip.sh
   ├── bin
   │   └── ntpdate
   ├── facts
   │   └── test.rb
   └── lib
       ├── libcrypto.so.1.0.0
       └── ruby
           └── test.rb

   • The autostart.d directory contains scripts that are executed in POSIX order by the image when it starts, but before the host is registered to Satellite.
   • The bin directory is added to the $PATH variable; you can place binary files in this directory and use them in the autostart scripts.
   • The facts directory is added to the FACTERLIB variable so that custom facts can be configured and sent to Satellite.
   • The lib directory is added to the LD_LIBRARY_PATH variable and lib/ruby is added to the RUBYLIB variable, so that binary files in /bin can be executed correctly.

2. After creating the directory structure, create a .zip file archive with the following command:

   zip -r my_extension.zip .

3. To inform the Discovery image of the extensions it must use, place your zip files on your TFTP server with the Discovery image, and then update the APPEND line of the PXELinux template with the fdi.zips option where the paths are relative to the TFTP root. For example, if you have two archives at $TFTP/zip1.zip and $TFTP/boot/zip2.zip, use the following syntax:

   fdi.zips=zip1.zip,boot/zip2.zip