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Two-stage installation

With version 5, the developers of LTSP have simplified installation. A distribution such as Edubuntu, which contains a complete LTSP server in its standard configuration, can be used, or the packages can be installed on top of an existing distribution with relatively little effort. Version 5 has instructions and packages for Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Gentoo and OpenSuse available on the project home page. A manual basic installation involves just a few steps.

sudo apt-get install ltsp-server-standalone openssh-server 

installs the LTSP server under Ubuntu and Debian, as well as an SSH server for secure communications between client and server. Calling sudo ltsp-build-client then creates the thin client environment on the server. To finish off, /etc/ltsp/dhcpd.conf of the DHCP server has to be configured, since the standard settings relate to a 192.168.0.0 network. After the IP addresses have been changed, calling sudo ltsp-update-sshkeys updates the list of SSH keys on the server.

A graphical administration tool now under development: LTSP Manager (Fig. 1). This minimal configuration is sufficient for an initial start with a remotely bootable PC or thin client. It should be emphasised at this point that the Ubuntu implementation of LTSP 5.0 takes all connections between X Server and server through an SSH tunnel in order to meet tighter security requirements than are required by the more usual XDMCP (X Display Manager Control Protocol). But this does not apply to data transmitted via NFS, which continue to travel over the network unencrypted.

After the server has been set up, the workstations can be run either from a boot diskette or remotely (PXE, Etherboot). The procedure is not in principle new: the system loads the boot code into memory, recognizes and initializes the network card, following up with a DHCP query. The DHCP server responds, then the client loads its kernel from the server by TFTP (trivial file transport protocol) and runs it. The filing system is then mounted from the server via NFS (network file system) and the workstation's system environment is initialised. Last of all, an X Window or shell session begins and the user can log in.

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