Installing Ubuntu on a ONIE System

This example demonstrates how to create an ONIE compatible installer image from a Ubuntu Bionic .ISO file. This README covers:

• Building the ONIE installer
• Using a Ubuntu preseed.cfg file to automate installation in an ONIE environment

Building the Ubuntu ONIE installer

Before building the installer make sure you have wget and xorriso installed on your system. On a Ubuntu based system the following is sufficient:

build-host:~$ sudo apt-get update
build-host:~$ sudo apt-get install wget xorriso

To build the Ubuntu ONIE installer change directories to ubuntu-iso and type the following:

build-host:~$ cd /ubuntu-iso
build-host:~/ubuntu-iso$ ./cook-bits.sh
Downloading Ubuntu Bionic mini.iso ...
...
Saving to: `./input/ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini.iso'

100%[==================================================================================================>] 29,360,128  3.11M/s   in 8.6s    

2015-10-09 10:15:12 (3.25 MB/s) - `./input/ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini.iso' saved [29360128/29360128]

Creating ./output/ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini-ONIE.bin: .xorriso 1.2.2 : RockRidge filesystem manipulator, libburnia project.

xorriso : NOTE : Loading ISO image tree from LBA 0
xorriso : UPDATE : 280 nodes read in 1 seconds
xorriso : NOTE : Detected El-Torito boot information which currently is set to be discarded
Drive current: -indev './input/ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini.iso'
Media current: stdio file, overwriteable
Media status : is written , is appendable
Boot record  : El Torito , ISOLINUX boot image capable of isohybrid
Media summary: 1 session, 11098 data blocks, 21.7m data, 1210g free
Volume id    : 'ISOIMAGE'
Copying of file objects from ISO image to disk filesystem is: Enabled
xorriso : UPDATE : 280 files restored ( 21495k) in 1 seconds = 15.9xD
..... Done.

The resulting ONIE installer file is available in the output directory:

build-host:~/ubuntu-iso$ ls -l output/
total 17812
-rw-r--r-- 1 user user 18238940 Oct  9 10:15 ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini-ONIE.bin

Preparing the HTTP image server

The example assumes you are running an HTTP server on the same machine as the virtual machine. Using local qemu networking the HTTP server will be availabe within the VM using IP address 10.0.2.2.

Put the ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini-ONIE.bin file and ubuntu-preseed.txt file into the document root of the HTTP server:

build-host:~/ubuntu-iso$ sudo cp output/ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini-ONIE.bin ubuntu-preseed.cfg /var/www/html/

Installing the Ubuntu installer from ONIE

Back in ONIE. First double check that the network is working correctly:

ONIE:/ # ping 10.0.2.2
PING 10.0.2.2 (10.0.2.2): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 10.0.2.2: seq=0 ttl=255 time=0.237 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.2.2: seq=1 ttl=255 time=0.179 ms
^C
--- 10.0.2.2 ping statistics ---
2 packets transmitted, 2 packets received, 0% packet loss

Next verify the HTTP server is accessible:

ONIE:/ # wget http://10.0.2.2/ubuntu-preseed.txt

If either of those is not working figure out why before proceeding.

Now proceed with installing the ONIE compatible Ubuntu installer:

ONIE:/ # onie-nos-install http://10.0.2.2/ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini-ONIE.bin
discover: Rescue mode detected. No discover stopped.
Info: Fetching http://10.0.2.2/ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini-ONIE.bin ...
Connecting to 10.0.2.2 (10.0.2.2:80)
installer            100% |*******************************| 17811k  0:00:00 ETA
ONIE: Executing installer: http://10.0.2.2/ubuntu-bionic-amd64-mini-ONIE.bin
Verifying image checksum ... OK.
Preparing image archive ... OK.
Loading new kernel ...
kexec: Starting new kernel
...

The Ubuntu installer kernel will now kexec and you are off to the races. The Ubuntu installer will pull down the preseed.cfg file and continue the install process.

Poking around Ubuntu after the install

When complete the Ubuntu system will have the following:

• a sudo-enabled user called ubuntu with the login password of ubuntu
• GRUB menu entries for ONIE, from /etc/grub.d/50_onie_grub

The GRUB menu looks like:

                        GNU GRUB  version 2.02~beta2-22
                                                       
 +----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
 | Ubuntu GNU/Linux                                                           | 
 |*Advanced options for Ubuntu GNU/Linux                                      |
 | ONIE                                                                       |
 |                                                                            |