HPC/Xen

How to setup Xen in ALT Linux HPC

Install ALT Linux HPC

Install ALT Linux HPC using ISO-image from ftp://ftp.altlinux.org/pub/people/inger/hpc/hpc-cd.iso. Unfortunatly our first boot screen is in Russian only. Select a second boot menu item to start installation and then select POSIX language on the first installer screen.

Enable two repositories: stable branch 4.1 and special i586 repository by adding three lines to /etc/apt/sources.list:

 rpm http://ftp.altlinux.org/pub/distributions/ALTLinux/4.1/branch x86_64 classic
 rpm http://ftp.altlinux.org/pub/distributions/ALTLinux/4.1/branch noarch classic
 rpm http://ftp.altlinux.org/pub/people/inger/hpc/biarch-repo i586 classic

Update apt indices:

# apt-get update

Install grub

ALT Linux uses lilo as a default boot loader. You should replace lilo with grub.

Install grub package

  # apt-get install grub

Edit /boot/grub/menu.lst (Use can use for sample /usr/share/doc/grub-0.97/menu.lst)

#
# Sample boot menu configuration file
#

# Boot automatically after 5 secs.
timeout 5

# By default, boot the first entry.
default 0

title ALT Linux
kernel /boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/sda2
initrd /boot/initrd.img

(replace /dev/sda2 with your root partition name)

Install loader to MBR

 # grub-install /dev/sda

reboot system to check that bootloader works properly

Install Xen

Install xen and kernel packages

  # apt-get install kernel-image-xen-dom0 xen-hypervisor xen

Add xen to boot menu (file /boot/grub/menu.lst)

#
# Sample boot menu configuration file
#

# Boot automatically after 5 secs.
timeout 5

# By default, boot the first entry.
default 0

title ALT Linux
kernel /boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/sda2
initrd /boot/initrd.img

title ALT Linux XEN
kernel /boot/xen.gz dom0_mem=512M
module /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.18-xen-dom0-alt10.M41 root=/dev/sda2
module /boot/initrd-2.6.18-xen-dom0-alt10.M41.img

reboot system to Xen kernel