[MacTUG] My Deploy Studio notes, for what it is worth!

[Steve Hellyer]

Ah Grasshopper you have learned the ways of the Ninja DeployStudio Administrator well...

Sending to /dev/awesome :-)

Steve

On 2010-01-06, at 9:13 AM, Donald Duff-McCracken wrote:

> As the only person in MAD that does the Mac rebuilds, I am trying to document things a wee bit better. I won’t curse myself by saying that it is in case I get run over by a bus, so I will say that it is in case I am heir to some rich uncle I never knew, and my coworkers suddenly have to rebuild the labs ;-) As this was the first time I used DeployStudio, these notes are also to remind me of what I did, come next term. I am sure these notes are not perfect as it is my first time using DeployStudio and they not written for broad public viewing. At any rate, in case there are others that have not made the jump from NetRestore to DeployStudio, here are my notes for what they are worth. Smarty boots comments on my prose style, grammar, etc will be sent to /dev/null ;-P 
> 
> There may be some MAD specific naming conventions/assumptions in here, so please ignore...
> 
> A brief note about some major differences between DeployStudio and NetRestore (to which I was more familiar till 2010):
> With both of them you create 2 images, a boot image and a restore image. DeployStudio calls the boot image a “DeployStudio Netboot Set”. With NetRestore, the boot image (called a “NetInstall-Restore Set”) was not as flexible as it contains info about the name and location of the restore image. DeployStudio does not confine the boot image to a particular restore image (this is done using DeployStudio Admin and detailed below). DeployStudio has a much more flexible framework — information on the server tells DeployStudio what restore image should be deployed onto which machines and this info is easy to change.
> With NetRestore, the NetInstall-Restore Set is only used to boot the clients from when you are restoring an image. With DeployStudio, the DeployStudio Netboot Set is used for (at least) two purposes: a) You obviously use it to boot from when you are restoring an image, but b) you also use it to create your restore image. You do this by setting your model client up exactly the way you want and then boot using the DeployStudio Netboot Set. At this point you then make the restore image and it is automatically copied to the correct spot on your server! (Further info is below.)
> Lastly, and this is something that I have not yet used, DeployStudio can be used for deploying packages to machines. 
> 
> Installing DeployStudio on the Server and setting things up:
> There needs to be a place for DeployStudio to save stuff – a Repository Share, and an account to access this share. Create a folder with a logical name and ensure that it is being shared and also create a user that has access to it. This is done using the typical OS X server ways to create a user and give sharing permissions.
> In addition to making sure that File Sharing Services are running and that the above folder is being shared, also make sure other services, like Netboot are running.
> If DeployStudio is not installed, install it on the server. It is pretty straightforward. For example http://adamac.org/deploystudio-101  is a good spot to start, or the manual at http://www.deploystudio.com/Doc/Entrees/2009/10/10_Quick_Install_Guide.html  is another good place to start. This is also pretty good: http://web.me.com/johnd/JohnDs_Site/Tips_%26_Tricks/Entries/2009/4/29_Sys_Mgmt_Add-ons_files/DeployStudio.pdf 
> 
> Creating your DeployStudio Netboot Set (the Netboot image):
> Open System Preferences and click on DeployStudio. Click on Launch Assistant and click on “Create a DeployStudio Netboot Set”
> A “Deploy Studio Netboot Set” is the Netboot image that the client uses to boot up from to run DeployStudio tasks from. It is akin to NetRestore’s “NetInstall-Restore Set”. It is not the image that contains the apps and stuff you eventually want on the machine. If your server happens to be the ‘latest and greatest’ Mac then you can perform this task from the server as follows: 
> From the DeployStudio Assistant (from the System Preference Panel) click on the Create a Netboot set.
> Give is a descriptive name
> Make sure your Unique Identifier is a number that a unique index number in your Netboot images on your server.
> Click the ‘Connect to a specific server’ button and you should see the server name in the popup with the port 60080 after it. Eg: http://myserver.uwaterloo.ca:60080
> For the default login and password, give it ones that have access rights to the DeployStudio repository network share (as discussed above under “Installing DeployStudio on the Server”). While could use a regular admin username/password, but it is better to use a username/password that is just for DeployStudio so you could disable things when you are not building machines.
> You may wish to set a VNC password. This is so you can remotely connect to the client machine whilst it is netbooted from the DeployStudio Netboot Set.
> It will ask you the destination for this image. You should be able to choose the default location of /Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0 
> If the server is not the latest and greatest, you will need to create this DeployStudio Netboot Set on the Mac client that is the latest and greatest: 
> Install DeployStudio on the non-server machine that is your latest and greatest Mac.
> Choose DeployStudio from the control panel but don’t start the service (and pass on prompts to start it later on as we are not using this as a server, just using it to build the DeployStudio Netboot Sets.
> Click on “Launch Assistant” Button and choose ‘Create a DeployStudio Netboot Set’. You will then follow the same procedures listed above for creating a DeployStudio Netboot Set. The only difference is that you cannot obviously choose the proper final destination path of /Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0 because that is located on the server and you are on another machine. So just choose the desktop as your destination, and then you can manually copy it to /Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0 by mounting the server, using an external disk or whatever. (Note, you may need to start and stop the Netboot services on the server to get it to recognize this Netboot set when you copy it to the correct spot. 
> You have finally completed the task of creating the required DeployStudio Netboot Set. 
> 
> Creating the DeployStudio Master image (the image you will be Restoring to the client computers):
> You then need to create the image you will actually want to restore to the lab computers. Find the latest and greatest lab computer and install the OS, Apps and updates on it and set everything up nice and dandy. I turn on Remote Management so that ARD can access it. (This, in conjunction with setting a VNC password for DeployStudio in the above steps, allows you to do most of this remotely. 
> 
> The next task it to reboot the machine with the DeployStudio Netboot Set. But before doing so, we should check to make sure that DeployStudio is not automatically set up to perform some workflow on the machine that may be inappropriate (like performing a restore). On the server start up DeployStudio Admin and click on the Computers link. If it is empty, there are no default workflows associated with any computers. If you can find the name of your ‘latest and greatest’ Mac, ensure that there is no default workflow associated with the machine, or you can choose the one called “Create a Master”. This can be set under the Automation Tab when you have clicked on the machine.
> Log on to the client Mac as admin, go to Startup Disk and choose the DeployStudio Netboot Set that you created and reboot. (Or you can do this in ARD.) When you reboot this machine, you will then use DeployStudio to create your final build image. It will build it and automatically copy it to the right spot on the server. (Neat, eh?)
> If you did not already choose “Create a Master” as the default workflow in a previous step, you will see it. Click on this Workflow.
> It will ask for a name of this master.
> Click on the Play button. It will process through and create the new Master and save it where we specified when we set up DeployStudio
> We have set up VNC to the DeployStudio Netboot Set, so we can VNC to the machine.
> It will grind away and in a half hour to an hour it will reboot.
> There is some post processing that occurs on the server so don’t freak if the image does not show up for an hour or so. If you run Top in the terminal on the server you will notice the ASR is running like crazy doing some post processing. I believe it is compressing it etc.
> After this processing is done you will notice the image will appear within the HFS folder (in the Repository share) If you start up DeployStudio Admin (in the Apps folder) you will also see this restore image in the Masters section. 
> 
> Setting up the restore process to work automatically
> As mentioned above (unlike NetRestore), DeployStudio does not confine a DeployStudio Netboot Set to a specific Deploy Studio Master image. This is done by creating a Workflow, setting it to it Automate, and populating a Computers list with computers you wish to deploy to, and telling these computers to automatically start a specific workflow.  This is detailed as follows:
> In DeployStudio Admin, go to Workflows. Choose “Restore Labs” (a copy of the default restore which I have set up for automatic deployment) and make sure that the image it is wanting to restore to is the one we just created. If it is not, choose it from the popup list.
> So far we are not playing with multicast, so skip this for now.
> Make sure that the Automate button is turned on and click Save.
> We have imported in the ARD list of machines we are using, so you should see them in the Computers section. If they are not there, delete them all and re-import them from ARD. (Export the list from ARD and import it into DeployStudio).
> We have now associated Workflows to a Master. We need to now associate Computers to the Workflow, so click on each computer and click on the automation tab and pick the “Restore Labs” workflow. 
> 
> To start the restore process
> In ARD, go to Set Startup Disk for all the machines (or perhaps the first dozen — I like to do them in groups) and pick the DeployStudio Netboot Set we created. Tell them to restart once the change is made.
> They will then boot with this DeployStudio Netboot Set and everything should work restore magically! 
> 
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