Troubleshooting

What is the "ETHER_SLEEP" variable, and when should I adjust it?

The ETHER_SLEEP variable specifies the number of seconds that your autoinstall client(s) should wait before trying to talk to the network. The default is zero (0), to make installs go faster, as a timeout is not normally needed.

Certain networking equipment, notable switches, may refuse to pass traffic from a new interface that has appeared on a switch port until after a 30+ second delay. This delay is usually a settable option (if your switch even has this capability). Whether or not it is set on your switches is vendor and/or site specific.

If you encounter problems during an autoinstall, such as your autoinstall client not recieving an IP address via DHCP: a) you find that when you ask for a DHCP address from the command line, you get one. b) you manually configure the network interface and can then contact the imageserver; then you may want to change the ETHER_SLEEP variable.

Both of these symptoms can often be explained by the 30+ second timeout passing prior to the manual intervention.

If you decide to change the ETHER_SLEEP variable, a value of 35 has been found to work in most cases (ETHER_SLEEP=35). ETHER_SLEEP can be set in a local.cfg file or by modifying the ./etc/init.d/rcS script in the BOEL source code.

NOTE: The 30+ second timeout at the switch begins with the interface on your autoinstall client is made active (Ie: driver loaded), and is not necessarily tied to when the interface is configured with an IP address.