Soto Systems LLC

by Ramses Soto-Navarro ramses@sotosystems.com, 9/12/2022

Overview
Download and Mount ISO
Mount ISO Repo
Copy ISO Files
Create Custom Mini ISO
Boot to the Upgrade

Overview

Brief notes on how to create a 130MB mini CD or ISO, in order to run a release upgrade, from SUSE 15 SP3 to SP4, via a custom web mounted repository. This is a much better alternative than using the 13GB DVD ISO for a release upgrade, especially for VM machines. All previous repositories will be deleted. This steps were created using a Debian workstation. Audience is experienced Linux administrators.

Download and Mount ISO

Download the latest SUSE 15 SP4 from https://www.suse.com/download/sles/ to /usr/src/suse/. NOTE: You will need to register first. Mount the ISO.

Mount ISO Repo

Mount the downloaded ISO to a repo as an index under the Apache web server’s default path:

# mkdir -p /var/www/html/sles15sp4/dvd1
# mount /usr/src/suse/SLE-15-SP4-Full-x86_64-GM-Media1.iso /var/www/html/sles15sp4/dvd1

Verify that the files can be accessed via http://repo.example.com/sles15sp4/dvd1

Copy ISO Files

# cp -a /var/www/html/sles15sp4/dvd1/boot/x86_64/loader/{initrd, isolinux.bin, isolinux.cfg, linux} /usr/src/suse/minicd

Create Custom Mini ISO

Modify the boot parameters and create the ISO.

# cd /usr/src/suse/minicd
# chmod 0644 isolinux.cfg
# vi isolinux.cfg

default harddisk
 say ============================================
 say SUSE 15 SP4 Custom Upgrade, source repo.example.com
 say Ramses Soto-Navarro 
 say choice: harddisk, install, upgrade, rescue
 say default: harddisk
 say ============================================

# hard disk
label harddisk
  localboot -2

# install
label linux
  kernel linux
  append initrd=initrd showopts

# upgrade
label upgrade
  kernel linux
  append initrd=initrd upgrade=1 install=http://repo.example.com/sles15sp4/dvd1 showopts

# rescue
label rescue
  kernel linux
  append initrd=initrd rescue=1 showopts

implicit        1
prompt          1
timeout         120

# dos2unix isolinux.cfg

# genisoimage -o ../suse15sp4-minicd.iso -b isolinux.bin -no-emul-boot -boot-load-size 4 -boot-info-table .

# ls -lh ../suse15sp4-minicd.iso
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 133M Sep 11 20:36 ../suse15sp4-minicd.iso

Boot to the Upgrade

The ISO will default to booting from the hard disk. In order to run the local web release upgrade, type "upgrade", then Enter, at the boot: prompt. Afterward, accept all wizard defaults, until the end. The system will reboot when it finishes the release update. Eject the ISO. Modify the boot parameters as needed.

Run rmt-client-setup afterward, in order to re-register the guest with the local repository.

The End.