Kickstart

Kickstart is a automation tool for system installation. It can use FTP, HTTP or NFS.

🔧 1. Prerequisites

• RHEL/CentOS/AlmaLinux server (e.g., 192.168.1.10)

• A client device that can PXE boot

• DHCP server (can be on the same or different machine)

• TFTP server

• HTTP server (e.g., httpd or nginx)

• Kickstart file (e.g., ks.cfg)

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⚙️ 2. Install required packages

sudo dnf install dhcp-server tftp-server syslinux httpd

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🗂 3. Configure the Kickstart file

Create a minimal Kickstart config (/var/www/html/ks.cfg): (better use system-config-kickstart)

cat > /var/www/html/ks.cfg <<EOF
#version=RHEL9
install
url --url=http://192.168.1.10/rhel/
lang en_US.UTF-8
keyboard us
timezone UTC
rootpw redhat
bootloader --location=mbr
clearpart --all --initlabel
autopart
reboot
%packages
@core
%end
EOF

🌐 4. Set up HTTP server to host OS files & Kickstart

mkdir -p /var/www/html/rhel
mount /path/to/RHEL.iso /mnt
cp -r /mnt/* /var/www/html/rhel/

Make sure httpd is started:

sudo systemctl enable --now httpd

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📡 5. Configure TFTP and PXE boot

Copy PXE boot files:

mkdir -p /var/lib/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg
cp /usr/share/syslinux/pxelinux.0 /var/lib/tftpboot/
cp /mnt/images/pxeboot/{vmlinuz,initrd.img} /var/lib/tftpboot/

Create PXE config (/var/lib/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default):

cat > /var/lib/tftpboot/pxelinux.cfg/default <<EOF
default linux
label linux
  kernel vmlinuz
  append initrd=initrd.img inst.ks=http://192.168.1.10/ks.cfg
EOF

Enable TFTP server in /etc/xinetd.d/tftp (if using xinetd) or via tftp.socket (systemd):

sudo systemctl enable --now tftp.socket systemctl restart xinetd

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📦 6. Configure DHCP server (or modify existing)

Sample /etc/dhcp/dhcpd.conf:

subnet 192.168.1.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 {
  range 192.168.1.100 192.168.1.200;
  option routers 192.168.1.1;
  filename "pxelinux.0";
  next-server 192.168.1.10; # kickstart server IP
}

Start DHCP server:

sudo systemctl enable --now dhcpd

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🚀 7. PXE Boot the Client

1. Enable PXE/Network boot in the BIOS.

2. Client gets IP via DHCP, downloads PXE boot files via TFTP.

3. PXE loads kernel/initrd and uses inst.ks= to fetch Kickstart file.

4. Fully automated OS installation begins.

Kickstart Config File Creation

1. Download system-config-kickstart from dnf, and use GUI to create file
2. Use RedHat’s website
3. Change anaconda-ks.cfg file
4. Read manually