PXE Netboot

Which platform and version are you trying to upgrade to? If you have an SCCP and are running 9.0.5 or higher, you can do the upgrade from the SCCP reading the ISO from an HTTP or FTP server.

 

 

I don't think this process is officially supported by F5, but I've used it several times to perform installations on remote lab units. It's described in an internal AskF5 solution. If you think it would be helpful for F5 to provide official support for the process, you could open a case with F5 Support requesting this.

 

 

I didn't come up with either of these methods, but they're very handy, so I'm passing them on.

 

 

Aaron

 

 

As a disclaimer, F5 doesn't officially support these steps. You should try the upgrade process on a test unit before considering using it on a live unit.

 

 

Using the SCCP to perform an installation

 

 

 

As of 9.0.5 the SCCP can act as a PXE server for installation of BIG-IP. You use the following steps to serve the installation files via an FTP or HTTP server and download the files via the SCCP. The server needs to be reachable from the the SCCP via the management interface.

 

 

0. If you want to roll forward an existing configuration, save the config to /config.ucs:

 

b config save /config.ucs

 

 

1. Copy the contents of the BIG-IP installation CD to an FTP or HTTP server (including SSL).

 

 

The server may be ftpd on a Unix box, Apache httpd, any of various FTP servers for Windows, or the IIS web server included in Windows. Arbitrary usernames and passwords may be used.

 

 

If you only have an ISO file you will need to either burn it to a CD or mount it so the file contents of the CD are available via the server.

 

 

The instructions assume you have a directory named BIGIP9 where you copied ISO files to the server.

 

 

2. Log into the SCCP as root using ESC + shift + 9

 

 

3. Make sure the SCCP network interface is configured, Use the SCCP menu (N) to do this. (N is only available from the serial console.) Check the second section for details on configuring the SCCP network from a remote connection.

 

 

You must be able to access the HTTP of FTP server from this network. Test this before you continue.

 

 

4. Run the installbigip script, passing it a URL pointing to the BIG/IP installation files:

 

 

sccp installbigip

 

 

may take the following forms (all of these examples assume the contents of the BIG-IP installation CD have been copied to a subdirectory named "BIGIP9"):

 

 

Anonymous FTP server:

 

ftp://ftp.example.com/BIGIP9

 

 

Regular FTP server requiring user and password:

 

ftp://user:password@ftp.example.com/BIGIP9

 

 

Regular FTP server with BIGIP9 outside the user's home directory (note the two slashes before tmp):

 

ftp://user:password@ftp.example.com/tmp/BIGIP9

 

 

Anonymous HTTP server:

 

http://www.example.com/BIGIP9

 

 

Password protected HTTP server:

 

http://user:password@www.example.com/BIGIP9

 

 

Password protected secure HTTP server:

 

https://user:password@www.example.com/BIGIP9

 

 

5. The installbigip script downloads the boot images for the host processor and forces it (the host) to reboot from them. It takes you directly into the BIG/IP installer where you only need to say "YES" several times.

 

 

 

 

================================================================

 

 

Setting the SCCP network configuration from a remote host.

 

 

 

The hostconsh menu system only gives you the “N” option to set the SCCP network if you’re connected on the console. I always felt this was a bit of a pain, especially when the equipment was located somewhere else. So for those cases where I had SSH access to a machine, but no console access, there really wasn’t a good way to get the sccp network configured.

 

 

I finally solved that problem and figured out the steps necessary to manually set and enable the SCCP network via an SSH connection to BIG-IP.

 

 

SSH into the BigIP as root. Then SSH into the SCCP.

 

 

config ssh sccp

 

sccp cd /etc * The /etc directory contains all the key networking stuff for the SCCP

 

sccp netconfig * This runs the same utility as the “N” option in the hostconsh menu

 

 

Follow the prompts, as you normally would.

 

 

After completing the netconfig utility:

 

 

sccp cat /etc/eth0.conf

 

The config file for the sccp network is /etc/eth0.conf

 

 

A proper eth0.conf file looks something like this:

 

------------------------------------------------------------------

 

 

Generated automatically by netconfig

 

dhcp=no

 

address=192.168.0.200

 

netmask=255.255.255.0

 

broadcast=192.168.0.255

 

gateway=192.168.0.1

 

------------------------------------------------------------------

 

 

If you don’t want to do a reboot to initialize the changes, activate the configuration including the bridge between the sccp and the host by running the network configuration script.

 

 

sccp /etc/rc.network

 

 

 

Before running netconfig and rc.network, ifconfig has no address for bridge interface 0, br0:

 

 

sccp ifconfig br0

 

 

br0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:01:D7:36:DB:40

 

UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1

 

RX packets:683134 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0

 

TX packets:674289 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0

 

collisions:0 txqueuelen:0

 

RX bytes:65759042 (62.7 Mb) TX bytes:57113684 (54.4 Mb)

 

 

After running netconfig and rc.network, ifconfig br0 reports the IP address:

 

 

sccp ifconfig br0

 

br0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:01:D7:36:DB:40

 

inet addr:192.168.0.200 Bcast:192.168.0.255 Mask:255.255.255.0

 

UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1

 

RX packets:686869 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0

 

TX packets:677881 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0

 

collisions:0 txqueuelen:0

 

RX bytes:66102141 (63.0 Mb) TX bytes:57423852 (54.7 Mb)

 

 

 

You should now be able to ssh into the IP address for the sccp and run hostconsh to redirect the console.

 

 

Aaron,

 

I try to setup sccp, yes I can connect to sccp IP address. But I can't login, what user name and password I should use?

 

Thanks,

Hi Danny,

 

 

LTM's root account should be sync'd to the SCCP. It is the only account that is the same between LTM and the SCCP. If you cannot log in using the same root user/pass, you can reset the SCCP root account by SSH'ing from LTM to sccp and then resetting the password using passwd.

 

 

Aaron