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Debian Local Area Network
Debian - the universal operating system - runs on small embedded devices, on desktops and in environments composed of dozens or hundreds of machines with centralized administration. Whereas the installation and configuration of a single, individual desktop has been made easy by the Debian-Installer, the deployment of a whole system environment is more involved. This is where the Debian Local Area Network Project comes in.
Goal of the Project
The goal of the "Debian Local Area Network"-project is to make setting up a local network with centralized user and machine management, intranet, etc. as easy as possible in Debian.
To do that, the project aims to provide anything needed for such systems: Documentation, Code, whatever. Currently, the best way to do that seems the FAI framework (but the project is in no way limited to FAI). A set of FAI classes and the corresponding config space has been prepared to implement a Debian-LAN:
- A mainserver with Kerberos KDC and LDAP including a FAI-server to install clients.
- Clients installed over the network from the mainserver, automounting their kerberized home directories.
- Diskless clients: A machine booted over the network may be used without installation on the local disk.
- Roaming machines that can be used within the Debian-LAN but also off-line.
The system is comparable to the debian-edu network and can be used for schools, small enterprises, associations, (university) work groups or to install complex test environments. It provides the Xfce4, Gnome and LXDE desktop environment by default on the clients. Depending on your needs, you can easily add a customized package selection. For example the metapackages of a Debian Blend.
Details: Description of the system.
Quickstart: Go right to the bootstrap page.
Infrastructure
Alioth Project: https://alioth.debian.org/projects/debian-lan/
Mailing List: http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-lan-devel/
Public IRC Channel: #debian-lan on irc.debian.org
Debian Package: http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/debian-lan-config.html
Git-Repository: We use collab-maint on Alioth: http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/debian-lan.git
To clone the repository use: git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/debian-lan
Before you commit code, please take a look at our development guidelines.
How it works
It's recommended to get some familiarity with FAI: FAI-Guide: http://fai-project.org/fai-guide/, read at least "Introduction" (chapter 1) and "Quickstart" (chapter 2). After that, start the deployment of the Debian-LAN system:
Install the FAI-server of the system to be deployed. This can be done by preparing/downloading a CD image or by converting an existing minimal Debian installation. See the bootstrap page for instructions.
- As soon as the FAI-server of the system is set up, all following installations will be accomplished by that server over the network.
- Depending on the environment and use case, add a FAI class which contains additional package selections.