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ZENworks 7 imaging September 23, 2005

Posted by evilzenscientist in : Linux, ZENworks, evilzenscientist , trackback

ZENworks OS imaging has always been based on the Linux kernel - it’s fast, efficient, has a great networking stack and is also extensible. None of the problems of DOS and getting NDIS drivers etc.

Earlier versions of ZENworks - (ZfD 3.x, ZfD 4.0, ZENworks 6, ZENworks 6.5) - spawned a slew of sites dedicated to tweaking this Linux environment. Notable is the Novell Forge Project zfdimgdrv. The imaging environment has also been extended by the likes of ENGL.

ZENworks 7 changed to a SLES 9 SP2-based kernel; this provides extensive hardware support (and real support; things that have been tested).

For unsupported hardware - or to add updated drivers - life is now a lot simpler.

Matt Misbach - one of the ZENworks engineers - passed on this tip:

  1. Obtain the binary driver file, it has the extension of “.ko”, (If no binary driver is available, then the source needs to be obtained and built on a sles9 sp2 machine.)
  2. On your ZENworks server mount the /srv/tftp/boot/initrd file using a similar command:
    mount -o loop /srv/tftp/boot/initrd /mnt
  3. copy the new .ko file into the /mnt/lib/modules/2.6.5-override-default/initrd
  4. umount /mnt

Comments»

1. Ron van Herk - September 25, 2005

Hi Martin

Just a small note, the initrd is a compressed filesystem file so you need to gunzip the file before you can mount it. After adding the driver, zip the file again and rename to initrd.