Managing RPM-Based Systems with Kickstart and Yum
Copyright © 2007 O’Reilly Media, Inc.
Beijing • Cambridge • Farnham • Köln • Sebastopol • Tokyo
March 12, 2007
Abstract
Managing multiple Red Hat-based systems can be easy—with the right tools. The yum package manager and the Kickstart installation utility are full of power and potential for automatic installation, customization, and updates. Here’s what you need to know to take control of your systems.
Manual Versus Automated
Why Kickstart and Yum?
Kickstart and yum are tools to automate installation,
updates, and upgrades of Linux systems. Specifically, they operate on RPM-based Linux
variants, such as the Red Hat Linux line (including the Enterprise and Fedora branches) and
CentOS. Both tools have a learning curve and require some infrastructure for you to use them
to their fullest extent.
As with any tool, it’s fair to ask, “What can it do for me? Why would I take the time to learn it?” My inspiration was, well, installing Fedora Core several times. To see what I mean, consider some of the information you enter when you install a Red Hat operating system (OS) by hand:
Choose your install type (initial install or upgrade).
Carve out your disk structure.
Configure networking.
Define a basic firewall.
Choose time zone.
Set the root password.
Configure the boot loader.
Choose which software to install (use the predefined groups or ...
Get Managing RPM-Based Systems with Kickstart and Yum now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
