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To: questions@FreeBSD.org
Cc: medina@lirmm.lirmm.fr, charnier@lirmm.lirmm.fr, fiorio@lirmm.lirmm.fr
Subject: Using FreeBSD on a network of diskless PCs
Date: Thu, 16 Mar 1995 18:31:11 +0100
From: "Raoul Medina" <medina@lirmm.fr>
Sender: questions-owner@FreeBSD.org
Precedence: bulk


Hi,

Actually we use several PCs connected on an ethernet network. They are 
diskless and boot on a main DOS server via Novell.
We are considering the ability of using these PCs as X terminals. We want
them to boot on FreeBSD via the network (the boot program will be on the
main DOS server). We are wondering if such installation was already made
in the past and if there are particular problems.
Particularly, each PCs may have a different monitor/video card.
The questions are:

1) Is FreeBSD free of charge for any institution as it is for any particular ?
   (particularly for public universities...)

2) Is it possible to do a remote boot via ethernet ? Are there any security 
   problems using this method ? (Could someone boot using a floppy disk and
   then become root, allowing him to connect to the entire network with these
   privileges ? )

3) Can we configure the X86Config file in order to take into account the 
   heterogeneity of monitors and video cards ? Particularly, may we change
   the X11 manager sources to tell him to search for the right configuration
   of a PC in a file called (for instance) X86Config.<ip number> ?
   We should also consider that some of the video cards require different
   XServer (S3, SVGA, etc...). May we change the "startx" sources in order 
   to select the X.<ip number> as the XServer ?

Thanx for your help,

regards,

Raoul Medina

LIRMM, 161 Rue Ada, 34392 Montpellier Cedex 5 (France)
email: medina@lirmm.fr
Phone: (33) 67 41 85 78
Fax  : (33) 67 41 85 00