CentOS installation on VMware esxi

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Notes concernant l'installation et la configuration de CentOS sur une machine virtuelle sur VMware esxi.
La machine virtuelle est d'abord créée à la main en fonction de paramètres pré-définis.
Ensuite l'OS est installé sur la machine virtuelle avec des options de base et afin de pouvoir recevoir un datadisk externe et de permettre plus tard l'installation d'application specifiques...
(ce type d'installation peut être fait sur un autre type de machine virtuelle en adaptant les premières instructions)

Preparation

create virtual machine on ESXi

start the vSphere client and connect to the target ESXi server
create new VM with typical settings, 2GB ram, 5GB disk, 2 cpu, RHEL5 64
remove floppy disk
add second disk for swap (2048MB)
use thin disks

install Centos 5.x or 6.x on VM

attach CentOs CD 1 iso (should be enough with most versions) and make available at boot
boot the VM and start installation (BIOS of VM may need to be updated to boot on CD)
create custom layout for disks: 1st disk: OS, 2nd disk: SWAP
force all partitions to be primary
for /dev/sda:
create partition 1 for /boot (100 MB, ext3, force primary)
create partition 2 as LVM physical (fill to max size, force primary)
create LVM layout (volume group name "lg0", add logical volume name "lv0" using max space, ext3)
for /dev/sdb:
use as swap partition (use a separate disk to be able to exclude from virtual disk later and exclude from backups)

edit network device: disable ipv6 support
set the hostname
disable Desktop-Gnome
select "customize now" and unselect all packages except "base"

Configuration

login as root
save list of installed rpms

rpm -qa >allrpminit.log

install useful packages

yum install tcsh slocate logrotate man vim-enhanced which telnet wget mc sudo system-config-firewall-tui bind-utils traceroute

create first user

adduser alreg passwd alreg   => enter password

add this user to sudo file (after line starting with 'root')

visudo     alreg ALL=(ALL) ALL

update shell for new user (replace bash with tcsh)

vim /etc/passwd     ...:/bin/tcsh

specific for centos6

yum install openssh-clients mlocate

disable ipv6 the official way

vi /etc/sysctl.conf     net.ipv6.conf.all.disable_ipv6 = 1

login as new user
retrieve .tcshrc from known server

scp alreg@XXXXX.com:/home/alreg/.tcshrc .

login as root
update computer name

vim /etc/sysconfig/network     HOSTNAME=<full qualified hostname>

update selinux configuration to be nicer

vim /etc/selinux/config     SELINUX=permissive

or even better disable it

vim /etc/selinux/config     SELINUX=disabled

Centos 6 special steps

after cloning a VM, the new network interface may be named eth1 as interfaces name increases if the mac address change
verify new mac address in VM configuration or using ifconfig

ifconfig -a

update udev rule by setting eth0 as the name for the corresponding mac address and removing other entries

vi /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules     SUBSYSTEM==”net”, ACTION==”add”, DRIVERS==”?*”, ATTR{address}==”00:0C:29:11:22:33", ATTR{type}==”1", KERNEL==”eth*”, NAME=”eth0"

update network configuration and verify mac address in that file

vi /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0

reboot

Cleanup

disable services that are not useful
apmd: replaced by acpid
avahi: mdns support
bluetooth: hidd for bluetooth
cups: for printing support
mdmonitord: only if software raid
pcscd: for smartcard support
portmap rpcgssd rpcidmapd : for NIS or NFS (RPC)

chkconfig --level 2345 apmd off chkconfig --level 2345 avahi-daemon off chkconfig --level 2345 bluetooth off chkconfig --level 2345 hidd off chkconfig --level 2345 cups off chkconfig --level 2345 mdmonitor off chkconfig --level 2345 pcscd off chkconfig --level 2345 sendmail off

also if needed

chkconfig --level 2345 portmap off chkconfig --level 2345 rpcgssd off chkconfig --level 2345 rpcidmapd off

how to check what service is running?

chkconfig --list |grep "3:on" |awk '{print $1}' |sort

how to uninstall non necessary packages?

yum remove apmd* samba* cups* nfs* yum remove gnome* bluez* avahi*

how to check the current levels of a service? : 'chkconfig --list <servicename>'

chkconfig --list apmd

how to start a service?

service <servicename> start

how to stop a service?

service <servicename> stop

update kernel to latest available version

yum update kernel*

(don't worry about possible "end_request: I/O error, dev fd0, sector 0"
it just means that you don't have a floppy attached)

reboot

shutdown -r now

update packages

yum update

update search database

updatedb

backup vm

using the vSphere client, connect to the local datastore on the ESXi server
create a backup folder under "bu/centos_64_orig")
enter the VM folder, then press refresh to update the list of files
select all the files and right-click "copy"
go inside the new backup folder and right-click "paste"
the status of the files copy can be seen at the bottom of the vSphere client screen
wait until all copies have reached 100% before doing anything else

copy vmdk files using vmkfstools.pl from administration virtual appliance (specify -d "" for thick because of a bug in the script)

vmkfstools.pl -i /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/centos_64/centos_64.vmdk /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/bu/centos_64_orig/centos_64.vmdk -d "" -a lsiLogic

install VMWare tools (rpm VERSION)

from vSphere client, right-click VM and select install/upgrade tools (tools iso will then be attached as /dev/cdrom)

retrieve VMWare tools rpm

cd /mnt mkdir cdrom mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom cd /mnt/cdrom cp VMwareTools*.rpm /tmp umount /mnt/cdrom

install rpm

cd /tmp rpm -Uvh VMwareTools*.rpm

configure VMWare tools

vmware-config-tools.pl

install VMWare tools (tar.gz VERSION)

from vSphere client, right-click VM and select install/upgrade tools (tools iso will then be attached as /dev/cdrom)

retrieve VMWare tools tar.gz

cd /mnt mkdir cdrom mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom cd /mount/cdrom cp VMwareTools*.gz /tmp umount /mnt/cdrom

install rpm

cd /tmp tar xvfz VMwareTools*.gz cd vmware-tools-distrib/ ./vmware-install.pl

accept everything

install extra repositories

install yum-priorities

yum install yum-priorities

check that it's activated

vim /etc/yum/pluginconf.d/priorities.conf     [main]     enabled=1

update repository files with the following settings
(in each section, add a line "priority=n" with n the value)
[base], [updates], [addons], [extras] ... priority=1
[centosplus], [contrib] ... priority=2
third party repositories such as rpmforge ... priority=N (with N > 10 based on your preferences)

cd /etc/yum.repos.d vim CentOS-Base.repo

add a priority line as defined above in each section

install rpmforge repository (based on architecture)

mkdir /goinfre cd /goinfre wget http://apt.sw.be/redhat/el5/en/x86_64/RPMS.dag/rpmforge-release-0.3.6-1.el5.rf.x86_64.rpm

or

wget http://apt.sw.be/redhat/el5/en/x86_64/rpmforge/RPMS/rpmforge-release-0.5.2-2.el5.rf.x86_64.rpm

install key

rpm --import http://dag.wieers.com/rpm/packages/RPM-GPG-KEY.dag.txt

verify package

rpm -K rpmforge-release-0.3.6-1.el5.rf.*.rpm

install the package

rpm -ivh rpmforge-release-0.3.6-1.el5.rf.*.rpm

update priority for rpmforge repository

vim /etc/yum.repos.d/rpmforge.repo     priority=20

check priorities are working
(should say "Loading "priorities" and give a number of packages "excluded due tu repository priority")

yum check-update

install fluxbox and vncserver

(optional)

update list of packages we want to retrieve from rpmforge

vim /etc/yum.repos.d/rpmforge.repo     includepkgs= fluxbox* artwiz* imlib2* iftop* libid3tag* python-xdg* clam* rrdtool perl-rrdtool

install vnc server

yum install vnc-server xorg-x11-twm xterm

install fluxbox

yum install fluxbox

as alreg, start vncserver (always run vnc as a regular user)

vncserver -depth 16 -geometry 1280x1024 :9

stop vncserver

vncserver -kill :9

update vnc configuration to use fluxbox

vim /home/alreg/.vnc/xstartup     #twm &     fluxbox &

as root, add firewall entry to let vnc traffic go through (click customize and add port 5909 to other ports: "tcp:5909")

system-config-securitylevel-tui

fixed IP

it is probably better to have a fixed ip address

vim /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0     BROADCAST=216.XXX.XXX.191     NETWORK=216.XXX.XXX.160     DEVICE=eth0     ONBOOT=yes     HWADDR=00:0c:29:11:22:33     IPADDR=172.30.4.8     NETMASK=255.255.255.0     GATEWAY=172.30.4.1     Type=Ethernet

ATTENTION: once you do that you will most likely lose network access

service network restart

update nameserver

vim /etc/resolv.conf     nameserver <<<nameserverip>>>

BIND - as caching nameserver

install named for faster local query: first chrooted named, then caching nameserver

yum install bind-chroot bind-utils yum install caching-nameserver service named start chkconfig --levels 2345 named on

update resolv.conf to use local nameserver as first choice (insert at top)

vim /etc/resolv.conf     nameserver 127.0.0.1

OK

October 23, 2011
1200 words

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Categories

• Note Technique

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Tags
centos esxi vmware