PXE Boot Server Installation Steps in Ubuntu Server VM

Solution 1:

PXE (Preboot eXecution Environment, pronounced pixie)‬

See Wikipedia: PXE

How it works?

This is my understanding!

Client machine is powered on. BIOS scans for devices. Then it follows by trying to load boot-loader from required device as listed in Boot Order/Sequence. It loads PXE from network card ROM.
PXE (client side) broadcast a request for an IP. DHCP server reply with the required information: IP, Next Server IP (TFTP server IP), pxelinux.0 (PXE bootstrap loader file name), ...etc
PXE (client side) requests pxelinux.0 file from TFTP server, loads it to RAM then passes control to pxelinux.0.

pxelinux.0 gets boot configuration file from TFTP server with name as:
(if it doesn't exist it tries with the next)
- UUID
- MAC
- IP in Capital Hex
- A portion of the IP
- Drops to default file
Either user choice or default menu entry. pxelinux.0 requests the corresponding kernel and RAMDisk from the TFTP server and loads them to RAM.

Then passes boot parameters and control to the loaded kernel.
Kernel loads the remaining parts from TFTP server or any other protocol server depending its features/properties.

Server Setup

There are many ways to setup PXE server, this is one of them.

These instructions were tested on Ubuntu 9.10 & Ubuntu 10.04 on a real machine. They should be still valid with only few changes may be. (Updated & Tested for Ubuntu 14.04 on VirtualBox , check edit revisions for old releases)

My target was PartedMagic 4.5, it should be similar to Ubuntu or any Linux distribution.

Install DHCP & TFTP packages

    sudo apt-get install isc-dhcp-server openbsd-inetd lftp tftpd-hpa syslinux

DHCP Setup

Edit /etc/default/isc-dhcp-server, Ethernet interface for DHCP service
```
INTERFACES="eth0"
```

Edit /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf‬ or /etc/ltsp/dhcpd.conf it does exist, DHCP service configuration

PXE specific configurations: filename & next-server

default-lease-time 600;
max-lease-time 7200;
subnet 192.168.10.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {
    range 192.168.10.50 192.168.10.100;
    option subnet-mask 255.255.255.0;
    option routers 192.168.10.123;
    option broadcast-address 192.168.10.255;
    filename "pxelinux.0";
    next-server 192.168.10.123;
}

Setup a static IP for eth0, 192.168.10.123 in my case using network manager for Desktop edition or /etc/network/interfaces for Server edition.
```
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 192.168.10.123
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 192.168.10.0
broadcast 192.168.10.255
```
Reinitialize the network interface:
```
sudo ifdown eth0
sudo ifup eth0
```

Re-start service

sudo service isc-dhcp-server restart

Check status

netstat -lu

Output

Proto Recv-Q Send-Q Local Address           Foreign Address         State      
udp        0      0 *:bootpc                *:*

TFTP Setup

Edit ‪/etc/inetd.conf, remove #<off># from the beginning of tftp line or add if it not there under #:BOOT: comment. (Skip this with systemd, 15.10 and later)
```
tftp    dgram   udp wait    root    /usr/sbin/in.tftpd  /usr/sbin/in.tftpd -s /var/lib/tftpboot
```
Enable boot service for inetd
```
sudo update-inetd --enable BOOT
```

Start service

sudo service openbsd-inetd restart
sudo service tftpd-hpa restart

Check status

netstat -lu

Output

Proto Recv-Q Send-Q Local Address           Foreign Address         State 
udp        0      0 *:tftp                  *:*

PXE boot files setup

Unzip pmagic-pxe-4.5.zip. If pxelinux.0 is not there, get it from sysliux-common package installed at /usr/lib/syslinux/pxelinux.0, Syslinux Project or Ubuntu Netboot Image.

Put them in similar structure.
```
/var/lib/tftpboot/
 |-- pxelinux.0
 |-- pxelinux.cfg/
 |   `-- default
 `-- pmagic/
     |-- bzimage
     `-- initramfs
```

Edit /var/lib/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default, if needed example paths: pmagic/bzimage & pmagic/initramfs

DEFAULT partmagic 

LABEL partmagic 
    MENU LABEL PartMagic 4.5 
    KERNEL pmagic/bzimage 
    APPEND initrd=pmagic/initramfs edd=off noapic load_ramdisk=1 prompt_ramdisk=0 rw vga=791 sleep=10 loglevel=0 keymap=us livemedia

Setup correct permissions

sudo find /var/lib/tftpboot -type f -exec chmod 644 {} \;
sudo find /var/lib/tftpboot -type d -exec chmod 755 {} \;

Client Setup

Change BIOS boot order for one time using F9 or F12, for permanent setup from BIOS configuration DEL,F2 or F12. (Depending on machine brand)

Move to the top: [PXE | NIC | LAN | Ethernet | Network].

Notes

inetutils-inetd or xinetd can be used instead of openbsd-inetd, some inetd steps are different.
TFTP root directory could be change from /etc/default/tftpd-hpa. Remember to update ‪/etc/inetd.conf too.
Many distribution support loading RAMDisk through many protocols: SSH(SFTP), SMB, NFS ... Example Ubuntu support NFS.
Some old network cards do not support PXE, iPXE (Ex. gPXE or Etherboot) can be used, either on floppy disk, USB drive, Harddisk (/boot partition) or even flash it to ROM (only few NIC supported). GRUB2 has module to support booting using PXE.

See also Wikipedia: gPXE and ROM-O-matic.
Ubuntu Netboot Image from cdimage.ubuntu.com/netboot/ provides installing Ubuntu from network and it will ask to download all required packages from the official mirror or a local one if you have one.

Most users are looking for booting live image through PXE. This question was only to setup a PXE server. See Ubuntu Wiki: Installation - LocalNet
PXE Menu can be customized, best template to learn from is Ubuntu NetBoot. See Pxeboot Multiple image

memdisk can be used to load directly the ISO or floppy disk images through PXE. syslinux-common package has a copy. Client should have enough RAM to hold the image plus a portion for running the loaded OS.

Configuration example:

/var/lib/tftpboot/
|-- FDSTD.144
|-- memdisk
|-- pxelinux.0
|-- slitaz-cooking.iso
|-- pxelinux.cfg
|   `-- default
`-- pmagic/
    |-- bzimage
    `-- initramfs

/pxelinux.cfg/default

DEFAULT partmagic

LABEL partmagic
    MENU LABEL PartMagic 4.5
    KERNEL pmagic/bzimage
    APPEND initrd=pmagic/initramfs edd=off noapic load_ramdisk=1 prompt_ramdisk=0 rw vga=791 sleep=10 loglevel=0 keymap=us livemedia

LABEL slitaz
    MENU LABEL ^Slitaz.iso
    TEXT HELP
Testing boot from iso.
    ENDTEXT 
    KERNEL memdisk
    APPEND initrd=slitaz-cooking.iso

LABEL freedos_std
    MENU LABEL ^FreeDOS STD
    TEXT HELP
Testing boot from Floppy IMG.
    ENDTEXT 
    KERNEL memdisk
    APPEND initrd=FDSTD.144

PartedMagic packages were dropped from the official site after original developer decided to make it commercial, some releases could be found through torrent network. My answer here is a resume of first PXE setup that worked for me. Ubuntu Netboot Image should work with same instructions.