The following options can be placed in a kickstart file. If you prefer
to use a graphical interface for creating your kickstart file,
use the Kickstart Configurator application. Refer to
Chapter 2 Kickstart Configurator for details.
Note
If the option is followed by an equals mark (=), a value must be
specified after it. In the example commands, options in brackets ([])
are optional arguments for the command.
autopart (optional)
Automatically create partitions — 1 GB or more root
(/) partition, a swap partition, and an
appropriate boot partition for the architecture. One or more of the
default partition sizes can be redefined with the
part directive.
autostep (optional)
Similar to interactive except it goes to the
next screen for you. It is used mostly for debugging.
auth or authconfig (required)
Sets up the authentication options for the system. It is similar
to the authconfig command, which can be run
after the install. By default, passwords are normally encrypted
and are not shadowed.
--enablemd5
Use md5 encryption for user passwords.
--enablenis
Turns on NIS support. By default,
--enablenis uses whatever domain it
finds on the network. A domain should almost always be
set by hand with the --nisdomain= option.
--nisdomain=
NIS domain name to use for NIS services.
--nisserver=
Server to use for NIS services (broadcasts by default).
--useshadow or --enableshadow
Use shadow passwords.
--enableldap
Turns on LDAP support in
/etc/nsswitch.conf, allowing your
system to retrieve information about users (UIDs, home
directories, shells, etc.) from an LDAP directory. To use
this option, you must install the
nss_ldap package. You must also
specify a server and a base DN (distinguished name) with
--ldapserver= and
--ldapbasedn=.
--enableldapauth
Use LDAP as an authentication method. This enables the
pam_ldap module for authentication
and changing passwords, using an LDAP directory. To use
this option, you must have the
nss_ldap package installed. You
must also specify a server and a base DN with
--ldapserver= and
--ldapbasedn=.
--ldapserver=
If you specified either --enableldap
or --enableldapauth, use this option to
specify the name of the
LDAP server to use. This option is set in the
/etc/ldap.conf file.
--ldapbasedn=
If you specified either --enableldap
or --enableldapauth, use this option to
specify the DN in your LDAP directory tree
under which user information is stored. This option is
set in the /etc/ldap.conf file.
--enableldaptls
Use TLS (Transport Layer Security) lookups. This option
allows LDAP to send encrypted usernames and passwords
to an LDAP server before authentication.
--enablekrb5
Use Kerberos 5 for authenticating users. Kerberos
itself does not know about home directories, UIDs, or
shells. If you enable Kerberos, you must
make users' accounts known to this workstation by
enabling LDAP, NIS, or Hesiod or by using
the /usr/sbin/useradd command
to make their accounts known to this workstation. If
you use this option, you must have the
pam_krb5 package installed.
--krb5realm=
The Kerberos 5 realm to which your workstation belongs.
--krb5kdc=
The KDC (or KDCs) that serve requests for the realm. If
you have multiple KDCs in your realm, separate their
names with commas (,).
--krb5adminserver=
The KDC in your realm that is also running kadmind.
This server handles password changing and other
administrative requests. This server must be run on the
master KDC if you have more than one KDC.
--enablehesiod
Enable Hesiod support for looking up user home
directories, UIDs, and shells. More information on
setting up and using Hesiod on your network is in
/usr/share/doc/glibc-2.x.x/README.hesiod,
which is included in the glibc
package. Hesiod is an extension of DNS that uses DNS
records to store information about users, groups, and
various other items.
--hesiodlhs
The Hesiod LHS ("left-hand side") option, set in
/etc/hesiod.conf. This option is
used by the Hesiod library to determine the name to
search DNS for when looking up information, similar to
LDAP's use of a base DN.
--hesiodrhs
The Hesiod RHS ("right-hand side") option, set in
/etc/hesiod.conf. This option is
used by the Hesiod library to determine the name to
search DNS for when looking up information, similar to
LDAP's use of a base DN.
Tip
To look up user information for "jim", the Hesiod
library looks up
jim.passwd<LHS><RHS>,
which should resolve to a TXT record that looks like
what his passwd entry would look like
(jim:*:501:501:Jungle
Jim:/home/jim:/bin/bash). For
groups, the situation is identical, except
jim.group<LHS><RHS>
would be used.
Looking up users and groups by number is handled by
making "501.uid" a CNAME for "jim.passwd", and
"501.gid" a CNAME for "jim.group". Note that the LHS
and RHS do not have periods [.] put in
front of them when the library determines the name for
which to search, so the LHS and RHS usually begin with
periods.
--enablesmbauth
Enables authentication of users against an SMB server
(typically a Samba or Windows server). SMB authentication
support does not know about home directories, UIDs, or
shells. If you enable SMB, you must make users' accounts
known to the workstation by enabling LDAP, NIS, or Hesiod or
by using the /usr/sbin/useradd command to
make their accounts known to the workstation. To use this
option, you must have the pam_smb
package installed.
--smbservers=
The name of the server(s) to use for SMB
authentication. To specify more than one server, separate
the names with commas (,).
--smbworkgroup=
The name of the workgroup for the SMB servers.
--enablecache
Enables the nscd service. The
nscd service caches information about
users, groups, and various other types of information.
Caching is especially helpful if you choose to
distribute information about users and groups over your
network using NIS, LDAP, or hesiod.
bootloader (required)
Specifies how the GRUB boot loader should be installed. This
option is required for both installations and upgrades. For
upgrades, if GRUB is not the current boot loader, the boot loader
is changed to GRUB. To preserve other boot loaders, use
bootloader --upgrade.
--append=
Specifies kernel parameters. To specify multiple
parameters, separate them with spaces. For example:
Specify which drive is first in the BIOS boot
order. For example:
bootloader --driveorder=sda,hda
--location=
Specifies where the boot record is written. Valid
values are the following: mbr
(the default), partition
(installs the boot loader on the first sector of the
partition containing the kernel), or
none (do not install the boot
loader).
--password=
Sets the GRUB boot loader password to the
one specified with this option. This should be
used to restrict access to the GRUB shell, where
arbitrary kernel options can be passed.
--md5pass=
Similar to --password=
except the password should already be encrypted.
--upgrade
Upgrade the existing boot loader configuration,
preserving the old entries. This option is only available
for upgrades.
clearpart (optional)
Removes partitions from the system, prior to creation of new
partitions. By default, no partitions are removed.
Note
If the clearpart command is used, then the
--onpart command cannot be used on a logical
partition.
--all
Erases all partitions from the system.
--drives=
Specifies which drives to clear partitions from. For
example, the following clears all the partitions on the first two
drives on the primary IDE controller:
clearpart --drives=hda,hdb --all
--initlabel
Initializes the disk label to the default for your
architecture (for example msdos for x86
and gpt for Itanium). It is useful so
that the installation program does not ask if it should
initialize the disk label if installing to a brand new hard
drive.
--linux
Erases all Linux partitions.
--none (default)
Do not remove any partitions.
cmdline (optional)
Perform the installation in a completely non-interactive
command line mode. Any prompts for interaction halts the
install. This mode is useful on S/390 systems with the x3270
console.
device (optional)
On most PCI systems, the installation program autoprobes for
Ethernet and SCSI cards properly. On older systems and some PCI
systems, however, kickstart needs a hint to find the proper
devices. The device command, which tells
the installation program to install extra modules, is
in this format:
device <type><moduleName> --opts=<options>
<type>
Replace with either scsi or
eth
<moduleName>
Replace with the name of the kernel module which should
be installed.
--opts=
Options to pass to the kernel module. Note that multiple
options may be passed if they are put in quotes. For
example:
--opts="aic152x=0x340 io=11"
driverdisk (optional)
Driver diskettes can be used during kickstart
installations. You must copy the driver diskettes's contents to
the root directory of a partition on the system's hard drive. Then
you must use the driverdisk command to tell
the installation program where to look for the driver disk.
driverdisk <partition> [--type=<fstype>]
Alternatively, a network location can be specified for the
driver diskette:
Reject incoming connections that are not in response to
outbound requests, such as DNS replies or DHCP requests. If
access to services running on this machine is needed, you
can choose to allow specific services through the
firewall.
--disabled
Do not configure any iptables rules.
--trust=
Listing a device here, such as eth0, allows all traffic coming
from that device to go through the firewall. To list more than
one device, use --trust eth0 --trust eth1. Do
NOT use a comma-separated format such as --trust eth0,
eth1.
<incoming>
Replace with one or more of the following to allow the
specified services through the firewall.
--ssh
--telnet
--smtp
--http
--ftp
--port=
You can specify that ports be allowed through the
firewall using the port:protocol format. For example, to
allow IMAP access through your firewall, specify
imap:tcp. Numeric ports can also
be specified explicitly; for example, to allow UDP packets
on port 1234 through, specify
1234:udp. To specify multiple ports,
separate them by commas.
firstboot (optional)
Determine whether the
Setup Agent starts the first time
the system is booted. If enabled, the firstboot
package must be installed. If not specified, this option is
disabled by default.
--enable
The Setup Agent is started
the first time the system boots.
--disable
The Setup Agent is not
started the first time the system boots.
--reconfig
Enable the Setup Agent to
start at boot time in reconfiguration mode. This mode enables
the language, mouse, keyboard, root password, security level,
time zone, and networking configuration options in addition to
the default ones.
halt (optional)
Halt the system after the installation has successfully
completed. This is similar to a manual installation, where
anaconda displays a message and waits for the user to press a key
before rebooting. During a kickstart installation, if no
completion method is specified, the reboot
option is used as default.
The halt option is roughly equivalent to
the shutdown -h command.
For other completion methods, refer to the poweroff,
reboot, and shutdown
kickstart options.
install (optional)
Tells the system to install a fresh system rather than upgrade
an existing system. This is the default mode. For installation,
you must specify the type of installation from
cdrom, harddrive,
nfs, or url (for FTP or HTTP
installations). The install command and the
installation method command must be on separate lines.
cdrom
Install from the first CD-ROM drive on the system.
harddrive
Install from a Red Hat installation tree on a local drive, which
must be either vfat or ext2.
--partition=
Partition to install from (such as, sdb2).
--dir=
Directory containing the RedHat
directory of the installation tree.
Uses the information provided in the kickstart file during the
installation, but allow for inspection and modification of the
values given. You are presented with each screen of the
installation program with the values from the kickstart
file. Either accept the values by clicking
Next or change the values and click
Next to continue. Refer to the
autostep command.
keyboard (required)
Sets system keyboard type. Here is the list of available
keyboards on i386, Itanium, and Alpha machines:
The file
/usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/rhpl/keyboard_models.py
also contains this list and is part of the
rhpl package.
lang (required)
Sets the language to use during installation. For example, to
set the language to English, the kickstart file should contain
the following line:
lang en_US
The file
/usr/share/system-config-language/locale-list
provides a list of the valid language codes in the first column of
each line and is part of the
system-config-language package.
langsupport (required)
Sets the language(s) to install on the system. The same
language codes used with lang can be used
with langsupport.
To install one language, specify it. For example, to install
and use the French language fr_FR:
langsupport fr_FR
--default=
If language support for more than one language is specified,
a default must be identified.
For example, to install English and French and use English as the
default language:
langsupport --default=en_US fr_FR
If you use --default with only one language,
all languages are installed with the specified language set
to the default.
logvol (optional)
Create a logical volume for Logical Volume Management
(LVM) with the syntax:
Configures the mouse for the system, both in GUI and text
modes. Options are:
--device=
Device the mouse is on (such as --device=ttyS0).
--emulthree
If present, simultaneous clicks on the left and right
mouse buttons are recognized as the middle mouse
button by the X Window System. This option should
be used if you have a two button mouse.
After options, the mouse type may be specified as one of
the following:
This list can also be found in the
/usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/rhpl/mouse.py
file, which is part of the rhpl package.
If the mouse command is given without any arguments, or
it is omitted, the installation program attempts to
automatically detect the mouse. This procedure works for most
modern mice.
network (optional)
Configures network information for the system. If the kickstart
installation does not require networking (in other words, it is
not installed over NFS, HTTP, or FTP), networking is not
configured for the system. If the installation does require
networking and network information is not provided in the
kickstart file, the installation program assumes that the
installation should be done over eth0 via a dynamic IP address
(BOOTP/DHCP), and configures the final, installed system to
determine its IP address dynamically. The
network option configures networking
information for kickstart installations via a network as well as
for the installed system.
--bootproto=
One of dhcp,
bootp, or
static.
It defaults to dhcp.
bootp and dhcp
are treated the same.
The DHCP method uses a DHCP server system to obtain its
networking configuration. As you might guess, the BOOTP
method is similar, requiring a BOOTP server to supply the
networking configuration. To direct a system to use DHCP:
network --bootproto=dhcp
To direct a machine to use BOOTP to obtain its networking
configuration, use the following line in the kickstart file:
network --bootproto=bootp
The static method requires that you enter all the
required networking information in the kickstart file. As
the name implies, this information is static and are
used during and after the installation. The line for static
networking is more complex, as you must include all network
configuration information on one line. You must specify the
IP address, netmask, gateway, and nameserver. For example:
(the "\" indicates that this should be read as one
continuous line):
If you use the static method, be aware of the following
two restrictions:
All static networking configuration information must be
specified on one line; you cannot wrap
lines using a backslash, for example.
You can only specify one nameserver here. However, you can
use the kickstart file's %post section
(described in Section 1.7 Post-installation Script) to add more name
servers, if needed.
--device=
Used to select a specific Ethernet device for
installation. Note that using --device=
is not effective unless the kickstart file is a local
file (such as ks=floppy), since the
installation program configures the network to find the
kickstart file. For example:
network --bootproto=dhcp --device=eth0
--ip=
IP address for the machine to be installed.
--gateway=
Default gateway as an IP address.
--nameserver=
Primary nameserver, as an IP address.
--nodns
Do not configure any DNS server.
--netmask=
Netmask for the installed system.
--hostname=
Hostname for the installed system.
part or partition
(required for installs, ignored for upgrades)
Creates a partition on the system.
If more than one Red Hat Enterprise Linux installation exists on the system on
different partitions, the installation program prompts the user
and asks which installation to upgrade.
Warning
All partitions created are formatted as part of the
installation process unless --noformat and
--onpart are used.
The <mntpoint> is where the
partition is mounted and must be of one of the following
forms:
/<path>
For example, /,
/usr, /home
swap
The partition is used as swap space.
To determine the size of the swap partition
automatically, use the
--recommended option:
swap --recommended
The minimum size of the automatically-generated swap
partition is no smaller than the amount of RAM in the
system and no larger than twice the amount of RAM in the
system.
raid.<id>
The partition is used for software RAID (refer to
raid).
pv.<id>
The partition is used for LVM (refer to
logvol).
--size=
The minimum partition size in megabytes. Specify an
integer value here such as 500. Do not append the number
with MB.
--grow
Tells the partition to grow to fill available space (if
any), or up to the maximum size setting.
--maxsize=
The maximum partition size in megabytes when the
partition is set to grow. Specify an integer value here,
and do not append the number with MB.
--noformat
Tells the installation program not to format the
partition, for use with the --onpart
command.
--onpart= or
--usepart=
Put the partition on the already
existing device. For example:
partition /home --onpart=hda1
puts /home on
/dev/hda1, which must already exist.
--ondisk= or
--ondrive=
Forces the partition to be created on a particular disk.
For example, --ondisk=sdb puts
the partition on the second SCSI disk on the system.
--asprimary
Forces automatic allocation of the partition as a
primary partition, or the partitioning fails.
--type=
(replaced by fstype)
This option is no longer available. Use
fstype.
--fstype=
Sets the file system type for the partition. Valid
values are ext2,
ext3,
swap, and
vfat.
--start=
Specifies the starting cylinder for the partition. It
requires that a drive be specified with
--ondisk= or
ondrive=. It also requires that the
ending cylinder be specified with
--end= or the partition size be
specified with --size=.
--end=
Specifies the ending cylinder for the partition. It
requires that the starting cylinder be specified with
--start=.
Note
If partitioning fails for any reason, diagnostic messages
appear on virtual console 3.
poweroff (optional)
Shut down and power off the system after the installation has
successfully completed. Normally during a manual installation,
anaconda displays a message and waits for the user to press a key
before rebooting. During a kickstart installation, if no
completion method is specified, the reboot
option is used as default.
The poweroff option is roughly equivalent to
the shutdown -p command.
Note
The poweroff option is highly dependent on
the system hardware in use. Specifically, certain hardware
components such as the BIOS, APM (advanced power management),
and ACPI (advanced configuration and power interface) must be
able to interact with the system kernel. Contact your
manufacturer for more information on you system's APM/ACPI
abilities.
For other completion methods, refer to the halt,
reboot, and shutdown
kickstart options.
raid (optional)
Assembles a software RAID device. This command is of the form:
Location where the RAID file system is mounted. If it is
/, the RAID level must be 1 unless a
boot partition (/boot) is present. If a
boot partition is present, the /boot
partition must be level 1 and the root
(/) partition can be any of the
available types. The
<partitions*> (which
denotes that multiple partitions can be listed) lists the
RAID identifiers to add to the RAID array.
--level=
RAID level to use (0, 1, or 5).
--device=
Name of the RAID device to use (such as md0 or md1).
RAID devices range from md0 to md7, and each may only be
used once.
--spares=
Specifies the number of spare drives allocated for the
RAID array. Spare drives are used to rebuild the array in
case of drive failure.
--fstype=
Sets the file system type for the RAID array. Valid values
are ext2, ext3, swap, and vfat.
--noformat
Use an existing RAID device and do not format the
RAID array.
--useexisting
Use an existing RAID device and reformat it.
The following example shows how to create a RAID level 1
partition for /, and a RAID level 5 for
/usr, assuming there are three SCSI disks
on the system. It also creates three swap partitions, one on
each drive.
part raid.01 --size=60 --ondisk=sda
part raid.02 --size=60 --ondisk=sdb
part raid.03 --size=60 --ondisk=sdc
part swap --size=128 --ondisk=sda
part swap --size=128 --ondisk=sdb
part swap --size=128 --ondisk=sdc
part raid.11 --size=1 --grow --ondisk=sda
part raid.12 --size=1 --grow --ondisk=sdb
part raid.13 --size=1 --grow --ondisk=sdc
Reboot after the installation is successfully completed (no
arguments). Normally during a manual installation, anaconda
displays a message and waits for the user to press a key before
rebooting.
The reboot option is roughly equivalent to
the shutdown -r command.
Note
Use of the reboot option
may result in an endless installation loop,
depending on the installation media and method.
The reboot option is the default completion
method if no other methods are explicitly specified in the
kickstart file.
For other completion methods, refer to the halt,
poweroff, and shutdown
kickstart options.
rootpw (required)
Sets the system's root password to the
<password> argument.
rootpw [--iscrypted] <password>
--iscrypted
If this is present, the password argument is assumed to
already be encrypted.
selinux (optional)
Sets the system's SELinux mode to one of the following arguments:
--enforcing
Enables SELinux with the default targeted policy being
enforced.
Note
If the selinux option is not present in
the kickstart file, SELinux is enabled and set to
--enforcing by default.
--permissive
Outputs warnings only based on the SELinux policy, but
does not actually enforce the policy.
--disabled
Disables SELinux completely on the system.
For complete information regarding SELinux for Red Hat Enterprise Linux, refer to
the Red Hat SELinux Guide.
shutdown (optional)
Shut down the system after the installation has successfully
completed. During a kickstart installation, if no completion
method is specified, the reboot option is used
as default.
The shutdown option is roughly equivalent to
the shutdown command.
For other completion methods, refer to the halt,
poweroff, and reboot
kickstart options.
skipx (optional)
If present, X is not configured on the installed system.
text (optional)
Perform the kickstart installation in text mode. Kickstart
installations are performed in graphical mode by default.
timezone (required)
Sets the system time zone to
<timezone> which may be any of
the time zones listed by timeconfig.
timezone [--utc] <timezone>
--utc
If present, the system assumes the hardware clock is set
to UTC (Greenwich Mean) time.
upgrade (optional)
Tells the system to upgrade an existing system rather than
install a fresh system. You must specify one of
cdrom, harddrive,
nfs, or url (for FTP and
HTTP) as the location of the installation tree. Refer to
install for details.
xconfig (optional)
Configures the X Window System. If this option is not given, the
user must configure X manually during the installation,
if X was installed; this option should not be used if X is not
installed on the final system.
--noprobe
Do not probe the monitor.
--card=
Use specified card; this card name should be from the
list of cards in
/usr/share/hwdata/Cards from the
hwdata package. The list of cards can
also be found on the X Configuration
screen of the Kickstart Configurator. If this
argument is not provided, the installation program
probes the PCI bus for the card. Since AGP is part of the PCI
bus, AGP cards are detected if supported. The probe
order is determined by the PCI scan order of the
motherboard.
--videoram=
Specifies the amount of video RAM the video card has.
--monitor=
Use specified monitor;
monitor name should be from the list of monitors in
/usr/share/hwdata/MonitorsDB from the
hwdata package. The list of monitors can
also be found on the X Configuration
screen of the Kickstart Configurator. This is
ignored if --hsync or
--vsync is provided. If no
monitor information is provided, the installation
program tries to probe for it automatically.
--hsync=
Specifies the horizontal sync frequency of the monitor.
--vsync=
Specifies the vertical sync frequency of the monitor.
--defaultdesktop=
Specify either GNOME or KDE to set the default desktop
(assumes that GNOME Desktop Environment and/or KDE Desktop
Environment has been installed through
%packages).
--startxonboot
Use a graphical login on the installed system.
--resolution=
Specify the default resolution for the X Window System
on the installed system. Valid values are 640x480,
800x600, 1024x768, 1152x864, 1280x1024, 1400x1050,
1600x1200. Be sure to specify a resolution that is
compatible with the video card and monitor.
--depth=
Specify the default color depth for the X Window System
on the installed system. Valid values are 8, 16, 24, and
32. Be sure to specify a color depth that is
compatible with the video card and monitor.
volgroup (optional)
Use to create a Logical Volume Management (LVM) group with
the syntax:
volgroup <name><partition><options>
The options are as follows:
--noformat
Use an existing volume group and do not format it.
--useexisting
Use an existing volume group and reformat it.
Create the partition first, create the logical volume group,
and then create the logical volume. For example:
If zerombr is specified, and
yes is its sole argument, any
invalid partition tables found on disks are initialized. This
destroys all of the contents of disks with invalid partition
tables. This command should be in the following format:
zerombr yes
No other format is effective.
%include
Use the %include
/path/to/file command to include
the contents of another file in the kickstart file as though the
contents were at the location of the %include
command in the kickstart file.
