# Automatically provision dedicated servers... how?



## 45ACP (Oct 29, 2014)

How do some companies automatically deploy new dedicated servers for their customers when others make take 3-10+ days to deliver one manually? Assuming the servers are in stock and racked already (not custom) what solutions are available that will power them up and build the OS for the customer?


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## shunny (Oct 29, 2014)

NOC-PS is an example of a software, foreman is another. 

But I think it gets down to how disciplined the provider is and how committed they are in deploying servers as quickly as possible to customers.


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## Francisco (Oct 29, 2014)

NOC-PS is a really fancy frontend to PXE.

If you having some developers you could put together your own system but NOC-PS is so affordable that it comes down to 'why bother' unless you need something really fancy.

Francisco


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## Xeepi (Oct 29, 2014)

NOS-PS is really good option to consider, however it does not provide support for WHMCS module any more, sigh...

LinMin is another option, as well as FastDeploy, but never had any experience with them, anyone could share?


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## rds100 (Oct 29, 2014)

Xeepi said:


> NOS-PS is really good option to consider, however it does not provide support for WHMCS module any more, sigh...


On the other hand the WHMCS module is not encoded so you are free to use it as a base and make whatever changes and customizations.


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## Xeepi (Oct 29, 2014)

rds100 said:


> On the other hand the WHMCS module is not encoded so you are free to use it as a base and make whatever changes and customizations.


That's why many providers are still using it, maybe NOC-PS will re-consider to continue the WHMCS module development in the future, who knows.


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## trewq (Oct 30, 2014)

Xeepi said:


> That's why many providers are still using it, maybe NOC-PS will re-consider to continue the WHMCS module development in the future, who knows.


If people are still using it then why would they bother putting money towards it?


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## Xeepi (Oct 30, 2014)

trewq said:


> If people are still using it then why would they bother putting money towards it?


Last time I checked with them, their answer is simply "because WHMCS is buggy, we deserted it." LOL


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## William (Oct 30, 2014)

Consequent.


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## msp - nick (Oct 30, 2014)

45ACP said:


> How do some companies automatically deploy new dedicated servers for their customers when others make take 3-10+ days to deliver one manually? Assuming the servers are in stock and racked already (not custom) what solutions are available that will power them up and build the OS for the customer?


Doesn't urbersmith do this?


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## MartinD (Oct 30, 2014)

Unless you have quite deep pockets and want to work with infuriating software where the devs believe they are gods then it's not really an option.


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## fileMEDIA (Oct 30, 2014)

NOC-PS is fine and really cheap. You have full access to the API and can develop all required functions and can also process VMs.

Currently nothing in this prices which can beat it.


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## hostemo.com (Nov 1, 2014)

I am trying noc-ps now. Hopefully this feature could bring more attractive to client.


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## drmike (Nov 1, 2014)

I've used Noc-PS as end user.  Dacentec uses it.

Rather nice software and it just works.

From a customer perspective,  yeah,  I want to see more Noc-ps and similar rather than waiting for datacenter staff to fuss with things and manual install then hand over.   Saves heaps of times.


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## 45ACP (Nov 12, 2014)

Seems like NOC-PS is the recommended option... I'll take a gander.


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## TurnkeyInternet (Nov 12, 2014)

with the customization clients want - it's a crap shoot you can rely on auto provisioning to a large extent for more than rescue and reformat/rollbackup and restores of existing clients.    That said, if you run a ford-model-T approach (3 server model/configs only) a tool like Noc-PS or Linmin is fine - or just using your own pxe loaders automation is the way to go.


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## Steven F (Nov 13, 2014)

We're working on our own solution. It's relatively simple, actually, to do basic OS installations. I'm getting my home server test lab setup next week and will be working on more advanced features (six SuperMicro servers and two Cisco switches, nothing fancy).


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## TurnkeyInternet (Nov 13, 2014)

Remeber with cisco switches "ip helper" is your friend  (per port)    Home growing it is the best, even you end up replacing it some day with a commercial product you learn a lot of the underlying aspects to make it better overall even with another product.


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## datarealm (Nov 14, 2014)

All you need is console access and a PXE boot server.


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## layerbyte_ben (Nov 23, 2014)

I attempted to give NOC-PS a try, but had a question regarding one of the features and sent a request for information via their contact method. After a few days wait, I ended up getting a one line sentence telling me to go look on their site for the information I want. Not real helpful, as what I was looking for was not on the site..


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## MannDude (Nov 23, 2014)

Interesting to see a lot of people say it's easy to do with NocPC... but in my experience, any server I've ever ordered, was setup manually and took anywhere from 1-5 days to process the order.

Is there some limitation involved that prevents most providers from doing this? I assume in most cases when a server is ordered it may not actually be physically racked or built yet, hence the processing delays?


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## AndrewM (Nov 23, 2014)

MannDude said:


> Interesting to see a lot of people say it's easy to do with NocPC... but in my experience, any server I've ever ordered, was setup manually and took anywhere from 1-5 days to process the order.
> 
> Is there some limitation involved that prevents most providers from doing this? I assume in most cases when a server is ordered it may not actually be physically racked or built yet, hence the processing delays?


I think auto-install and auto-provision have been confused. Auto install simply makes the client's or the provider's life easier because they can start the installation, and it will do it for them (in lieu of manually doing it). 

I would caution that most provider's don't offer "instant setup" on dedicated servers because of the price point (do you really want someone dropping anywhere from $80 to $500 or more of dirty money on your door step?), and because of other tasks that need to be performed pre-release of the server.


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## MartinD (Nov 24, 2014)

AndrewM said:


> I think auto-install and auto-provision have been confused. Auto install simply makes the client's or the provider's life easier because they can start the installation, and it will do it for them (in lieu of manually doing it).
> 
> I would caution that most provider's don't offer "instant setup" on dedicated servers because of the price point (do you really want someone dropping anywhere from $80 to $500 or more of dirty money on your door step?), and because of other tasks that need to be performed pre-release of the server.


Well, this is all quite subjective. Once you've been around a while it becomes quite easy to spot the dodgy orders; those done with fake details, probably stolen money etc. It's a stage most of us will go through when building a business and becoming aware of these patters or 'guts feelings' saves you a lot of money in the long run. If people don't bother to learn that particular craft then anything else is consequential and irrelevant.

As for auto-install and provisioning, I think they go hand in hand so not so much confused. Yes, there is an element of hands-on provisioning required but that's just for initial racking. Once it's racked and you've checked the bois/IPMI settings, everything else can be done from your desk for the most part. Adding mac addresses to a DB so that it can be run from PXE etc is simple enough and is part of the auto-provision and install process.

The biggest issue, from what I can see, is getting a system in place that works the way you want it to. NocPS is 'okay' and lots of people use it but I've never really liked it. Ubersmith can work too but then you're spending a large chunk of money on a product that will be bloatware for a lot of companies. In the end I found an opensource piece of software that worked 80% of the time and had 70% of what I wanted. A bit of fiddling around later saw it operating more to how I like but there's still something missing.

Ultimately it comes down to what you can afford in time and money I guess!


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## Steven F (Nov 24, 2014)

MartinD said:


> Well, this is all quite subjective. Once you've been around a while it becomes quite easy to spot the dodgy orders; those done with fake details, probably stolen money etc. It's a stage most of us will go through when building a business and becoming aware of these patters or 'guts feelings' saves you a lot of money in the long run. If people don't bother to learn that particular craft then anything else is consequential and irrelevant.
> 
> As for auto-install and provisioning, I think they go hand in hand so not so much confused. Yes, there is an element of hands-on provisioning required but that's just for initial racking. Once it's racked and you've checked the bois/IPMI settings, everything else can be done from your desk for the most part. Adding mac addresses to a DB so that it can be run from PXE etc is simple enough and is part of the auto-provision and install process.
> 
> ...


OneClickKick is what you're referring to, correct?


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## MartinD (Nov 24, 2014)

That is indeed it!


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## Geekion (Jan 6, 2015)

i wish to know the method too


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## farhanideas (Jan 9, 2015)

TurnkeyInternet said:


> with the customization clients want - it's a crap shoot you can rely on auto provisioning to a large extent for more than rescue and reformat/rollbackup and restores of existing clients.    That said, if you run a ford-model-T approach (3 server model/configs only) a tool like Noc-PS or Linmin is fine - or just using your own pxe loaders automation is the way to go.


I am agree with you


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## LeaseVPS (Nov 2, 2015)

shunny said:


> NOC-PS is an example of a software, foreman is another.



Agreed , both NOC-PS and Foreman are the way to go, We have used both of them.


We currently use NOC-PS but I really liked the foreman, especially how easy it was to pass info from the order form into the pxe script or first boot script


I think there is a much larger community behind Foreman as it's also used to handoff to puppet or chef, from memory RHEL use to for their RDO (Openstack) deployments


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## rds100 (Nov 2, 2015)

Unfortunately the noc-ps guy doesn't like WHMCS (i could understand why). So he doesn't offer a working noc-ps module for WHMCS 6. Fortunately the older versions for WHMCS 5 are not that hard to modify to work with WHMCS 6.


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## farhanideas (Jun 23, 2017)

Best way to to keep that dedicated server details which we have there in stock which help to deliver them as soon as possible


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## web-project (Jul 9, 2017)

I do remember in the past the hostbillapp software can provision automatically the dedicated servers.


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## HaBangNet (Jul 9, 2017)

*Ubersmith *got this feature, but cost will rather expensive


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## web-project (Jul 9, 2017)

HaBangNet said:


> *Ubersmith *got this feature, but cost will rather expensive



I think the *Ubersmith* is most professional solutions compare to others.


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## norival1992 (Jul 15, 2017)

DCImanager is capable of managing infrastructure of any scale, from a few servers to all physical assets of the data center. You can administrate server equipment, keep track of inventory & parts, and check power consumption.


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## Tyler (Jul 27, 2017)

rds100 said:


> Unfortunately the noc-ps guy doesn't like WHMCS (i could understand why). So he doesn't offer a working noc-ps module for WHMCS 6. Fortunately the older versions for WHMCS 5 are not that hard to modify to work with WHMCS 6.



Talk about the opportunity cost there. Almost every small to medium sized host is using WHMCS, and the dev put his own choices about disliking WHMCS over adding a module for it. His loss, I guess.


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## UltratechHost (Aug 6, 2017)

DCIManager will be an another option but when comes to different payment gateway and other feature WHMCS is best.


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## GS-Dylan (Aug 21, 2017)

I've been working with Easy-DCIM lately and have to say it's a pretty solid product, it can completely auto provision from ordering to os installation if you have it configured correctly, it has modules for NOC-ps and WHMCS making it easy. It's also great for using it as your Datacenter Inventory Mangement (DCIM). The one area I find lacking, but is improving, is the IPAM module. The lead developer Konrad is an awesome guy, I talk to him on skype regularly to provide feedback on how to make workflows easier, issues I've found, etc. He's very receptive to it and I've seen multiple features I've suggested get added in the next release. I would consider it still a "young" product but with that said I have very little issues with it's stability and performance and it's truly an all in one solution unlike any the dedicated server provisioning and management system the market has seen. It's also developed by the ModulesGarden so that will attest to the team behind it.


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## TierNet (Aug 23, 2017)

Hmm automation.. not sure but most hosting companies have scripts created to speed up the installation process. The script will basically install everything required on the server and take care of configuration too.


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## scv (Sep 4, 2017)

Centralized management is a must - machines should all be on their own VLAN, and you can forward DHCP off to your management server to choose the prefix from the database. DB driven DHCP makes the PXE boot option a lot easier for handling automated installs. 

Another option is to interface with platform IPMI and keep a local SMB server around for image redirection, but that'd require different implementation for different vendors, or at least an abstraction layer to translate into vendor-specific function calls. Might be a bit easier than maintaining PXE-based kickstart/debootstrap installers though.


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## MVPSNET (May 29, 2018)

PXE + kickstart all the way


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