HP Insight Control for Linux 6.0 User Guide

7 Installing operating systems on managed systems
This chapter addresses the following topics:
• “Linux OS installation overview” (page 81)
• “Using Kickstart or AutoYaST files for unattended installations” (page 82)
• “Prerequisites to OS installations on managed systems” (page 87)
• “Installing RHEL on managed systems” (page 89)
• “Installing SLES on managed systems” (page 91)
• “Installing VMware ESX and VMware ESXi operating systems” (page 91)
• “Installing another variant of Linux on managed systems” (page 95)
• “Generic procedure for installing an OS on one or more managed systems” (page 95)
7.1 Linux OS installation overview
The HP Insight Control for Linux installation tools enable you to install a Linux OS to one or
more target managed systems. The process for installing a Linux OS on one server is the same as
the process for ten servers or a hundred servers.
All Linux OS installation tasks are launched from the following HP SIM menu:
Deploy→Operating System
IMPORTANT: Installing a Linux OS on a managed system erases any pre-existing data on the
managed system. Before you begin, be sure that you have captured or backed up any data you
want to retain before you begin. Preserving user data on volumes other than the principle target
volume is not guaranteed. Presume that existing data on primary and secondary volumes is
erased.
HP Insight Control for Linux uses the task scheduling features of HP SIM so that you can run
software installation operations immediately or run the operation at a user-defined scheduled
date and time. See Chapter 11 (page 125) for information about understanding task results.
For DL100 Series servers, you can observe the installation through a serial console connection.
For more information, see Section 18.4 (page 194). For iLO based servers, you can observe the
installation through a remote console.
7.1.1 Interactive versus unattended installations
HP Insight Control for Linux OS installation tools give you the option to launch the following
types installation sessions:
Red Hat Interactive
Red Hat (Kickstart)
SLES Interactive
SLES (AutoYaST)
Custom or Other
VMware ESX Interactive
VMware ESX (Kickstart)
VMware ESXi Interactive
• An interactive installation method means that the HP Insight Control for Linux OS
installation tools reboot the selected target server or servers into the native installation
application of the OS, which requires step-by-step user interaction to provide responses to
the OS installation process.
7.1 Linux OS installation overview 81