Feature: _pxe

Description

Features

This feature creates PXE boot artifacts:

• root.squashfs — Compressed root filesystem
• vmlinuz — Linux kernel
• initrd — Initial ramdisk
• cmdline — Kernel command line parameters

When combined with _trustedboot or _unsigned (USI builds):

• boot.efi — Unified Kernel Image (UKI) for UEFI boot

Boot Modes

Traditional PXE Boot:

• Uses separate kernel (vmlinuz) and initrd
• Fetches root.squashfs over HTTP at boot time
• Works with both BIOS and UEFI systems via iPXE

UKI PXE Boot (with _trustedboot):

• Uses single boot.efi (UKI) containing kernel, initrd, and cmdline
• Fetches root.squashfs over HTTP at boot time
• UEFI-only, supports Secure Boot when signed

WARNING

Please be aware of the fact that systemd-networkd-wait-online is configured to mark the system as online when at least one interface becomes online. This makes the boot process faster, but, on systems with multiple NICs on different network segments, that would mean that depending on the order in which the NICs get configured, the system will get marked as online but the squashfs fetching might still fail and the system will fail to boot.

Installation Support

The _pxe feature provides ephemeral live boot by default. For disk installation capability, combine with:

• _install — For interactive installation (prompts for disk and password)
• _autoinstall — For automatic unattended installation (includes _install)

Live Boot Only (no installation):

./build.sh metal_pxe

Live Boot + Interactive Installation:

# Add _install feature for interactive disk installation
./build.sh metal_pxe_install

Live Boot + Automatic Installation:

# Add _autoinstall for unattended disk installation
./build.sh metal_pxe_autoinstall

Includes:

• _ignite for Ignition-based first-boot configuration

Unit testing

This feature does not support unit tests.

Meta

type	flag
artifact	.pxe.tar.gz (contains vmlinuz, initrd, cmdline, root.squashfs, and optionally boot.efi for USI builds)
included_features	_ignite
excluded_features	None