PXE-boot Knoppix (from a non-knoppix server)

[victorj]

I wanted to PXE-boot knoppix without having a knoppix-server to boot from, this is my solution:

Step 1.
Boot up from the knoppix-image you want to netboot later, run these commands:
Start the Terminal Server..

  rsync -axv /lib/modules/2.6.12 user@server:~/knoppix-2.6.12
  rsync -axv /tftpboot user@server:~/knoppix-tftproot

Then edit MODULES, cd to ~/knoppix-tftproot and run this script:

#!/bin/bash

MODULES=/home/victor/knoppixdev-v2/knoppix-2.6.12
gunzip -c miniroot.gz > miniroot
mkdir miniroot-temp newroot-temp
mount -o loop miniroot miniroot-temp
totalsize=$(du -csm miniroot $MODULES/kernel/drivers/net|awk '/total/ { print $1; }')
dd if=/dev/zero of=newroot bs=1M count=$(($totalsize+3))
mkfs.ext2 -F newroot
mount -o loop newroot newroot-temp
rsync -axv miniroot-temp/ newroot-temp
rsync -axv $MODULES/kernel/drivers/net/ newroot-temp/modules/net
umount newroot-temp
umount miniroot-temp
rmdir newroot-temp miniroot-temp
gzip newroot
rm miniroot

Voilá, you now have a bloated initrd called newroot,gz which you can use with ~/knoppix-tftproot/vmlinuz to netboot.

[mcreel]

I use PXE to boot slave nodes with ParallelKnoppix (http://pareto.uab.es/mcreel/ParallelKnoppix). I think I could possibly use this to boot a set of slave nodes from a computer that's not running Knoppix, correct? Where do the computers that are PXE booted get their filesystem from, from /cdrom, on the computer you use as the server, no? The knoppix CD must be mounted on that computer no? Or one could use a poor man's install?

Can you please explain this in more detail? Exactly what steps do I need to follow to PXE boot Knoppix over the net, from a computer running some arbitrary (assume Debian-based, if that helps) Linux distro? I'd really appreciate as much detail as you're willing to provide.

Thanks, Michael