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Debian
Hi all,
Does anyone know the best way to install debian and get it connected to my wifi network headless? I'm going to order an NUC for use as a home virtualisation server (plan is to install proxmox once I've got debian on it) and I wanted to just put the hard drive and ram in and have it running ready for me to ssh / weblogin into locally. Anyone know the easiest way to do it?
Comments
why rush man...
Proxmox, although don't know if it supports WiFi, it's pretty out of the box however.
That is a great question.
It did not occur to me that it might be possible to setup a headless server from scratch without requiring a monitor and keyboard for the very beginning of the process, until your question appeared. I have always attached a monitor and keyboard to my headless boxes for the initial OS installation and setup. As early as possible, I would get remote terminal or remote access going, and then disconnect the keyboard and monitor forever. (After that, I always test a full reboot cycle to make sure that can connect to it after a power failure.) I have one headless server that I set up in 2005. It is still running. At the very beginning, I set it up using a monitor and keyboard.
I believe that connecting a monitor and keyboard for initial setup is the easiest solution. Still, I did a web search, and found various websites that talk about automating the installation process, where you boot the installer with an included script to answer the configuration questions. Here is one:
https://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/Preseed
Another approach might be to configure a base headless server, image it, then clone the image to your new computer's hard drive. Connect to it on an isolated network so you can change the configurable items (e.g., hostname, IP address, etc.) before connecting it to your production network.
Putting the disk in another machine and running the installer from that machine would be the easiest way, but make sure you get the correct package for your WiFi card (It might require non-free adding to sources list!!).
You can then edit /etc/network/interfaces to auto connect to your WiFi network:
auto wlan0iface wlan0 inet static
wpa-ssid SuperNet
wpa-psk supersecretpassword
address 10.10.223.2
netmask 255.255.255.0
gateway 10.10.223.1
dns-nameservers 8.8.8.8
Nice one, I didn't think of that. I'll give it a go