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2. General Overview

An NFS-mounted root filesystem is typically most useful in two situations:

(In this document we'll use the terms client and workstation interchangeably.)

However, there are two small problems from the client's perspective:

The current implementation of NFSROOT in the Linux kernel (as of 2.4.x) allows for several approaches, including:

Since the most common dynamic-address protocol these days is DHCP, its addition as an option in kernels 2.2.19 and 2.4.x (3 < x <= 14) is particularly welcome.

Before starting to set up a diskless environment, you should decide if you will be booting via LILO, LOADLIN, or a custom, embedded bootloader. The advantage of using something like LILO is flexibility; the disadvantage is speed--booting a Linux kernel without LILO is faster. This may or may not be a consideration.


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