Installing system software from a remote file: help.

[Vernon Schryver]

"No server" messages mean no server answered the client.  Common causes are:
    -wrong IP address in NVRAM   (use `printenv` etc in the PROM, to ensure
	the target machine knows its address even without a disk.  Yes, you
	could use /etc/ethers, bootparam, and the rest, but this is easier.)
    -gateway not forwarding bootp/RFC-951 requests (check messages in
	SYSLOG on the gateways, maybe turn on some debugging on bootp in
	inetd.conf.  If you have non-IRIS gateways, see if they forward
	bootp.  CISCO had a bug & by now should have new firmware.)

I never remember, but don't think tftp/inetd.conf permission switches/problems
give that message.  It might be handy to open tftp wide open.

NOTE:  Tftp is a small security hole even if opened all of the way, compared
    to the holes created by human acts (sometimes unintentionally) on
    almost all machines.  The worst tftp can do is get to a file anyone on
    the target machine can get.  It's no worse than an open guest account.
    (Any other access by tftp would be a newly discovered bug.)  We have to
    ship tftp maximally safe to protect customers who care.

Essentially all software inside SGI is installed from disk copies of the
tapes.  There are hundreds of us who are supposed to install each of the
many dozens of builds of each release.  The median engineer probably
installs at least 3 times/month.  If you have any lab machines to play
with, you can easily install all of IRIX more than a hundred times/year,
year in and year out.  IRIX TCP/IP has gotten reasonably fast partly just
to support this fun activity.


Vernon Schryver,   vjs at sgi.com