pnp - automatic network installation

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PROTOCOL

AVAILABILITY

Available only on Sun 386i systems running a SunOS 4.0.x release or earlier. Not a SunOS 4.1 release feature.

DESCRIPTION

pnp() is used during unattended network installation, and routine booting, of Sun386i systems on a Sun386i network. Each network cable (subnetwork or full network) must have at least one pnpd.8c server running on it to support PNP.

PROGRAMMING

The following RPC calls are available in version 2 of the PNP protocol:

NULLPROC

Finds a PNP daemon on the local network. Used with clntudp_broadcast(), often to measure network overhead.

PNP_WHOAMI

Used early in the boot process to acquire network configuration information about a system, or to determine that a system is not known by the network.

PNP_ACQUIRE

Used to acquire a server willing to configure a new system after a PNP_WHOAMI request fails. This RPC is typically broadcast; any successful reply may be used.

PNP_SETUP

Requests a network configuration from a PNP daemon that has responded to a previous PNP_ACQUIRE RPC.

PNP_POLL

After a PNP_SETUP request, if the status is in_progress, the procedure is to wait 20 seconds, and issue a PNP_POLL request, and then check the status again. Once the status is success, the system will be configured for the network. Entries in the yp database may be added or old ones deleted, and file storage may be assigned, according to the architecture and boot type.

If the server misses 5 PNP_POLL requests, it will assume that the client system crashed and back out of the procedure. Similarly, if the client system does not receive responses from the server for PNP_MISSEDPOLLS consecutive requests, it should assume the server crashed and begin its PNP sequence again.

SEE ALSO

Created by unroff & hp-tools. © somebody (See intro for details). All Rights Reserved. Last modified 11/5/97