NAME

       install_packages - install FAI configured packages

SYNOPSIS

       install_packages

DESCRIPTION

       Fully  Automatic  Installation  (FAI) is used to provide unattended installation of Debian
       GNU/Linux operating systems with a very flexible class-based system.  install_packages  is
       a  Perl  script written for FAI to selectively install, hold, remove, or purge packages or
       tasks.

       install_packages is called from the fai installation  script  and  should  not  be  called
       directly.   Its  function  is  to  parse  the  package_config  files  based  on  the class
       definitions of the client.  For example, if the client belonged to the  SMTPSERVER  class,
       install_packages   would  parse  ../package_config/SMTPSERVER  for  instructions  on  what
       packages to install, hold, remove, or purge.

OPTIONS

       -d     Only download packages instead of installing them.  Variable  $aptoptions  must  be
              set.

       -h     Show help, version and summary of options.

       -H     Show list of all available commands for the file in package_config.

       -l     Print only the list of all packages that would be installed, then exit.

       -L     Print  the  list  of all packages with version number that would be installed, then
              exit.

       -m MAX Install only MAX packages at a time. Same as setting the shell environment variable
              MAXPACKAGES.

       -n     Dry run. Do not execute installation commands, just print them.

       -N     Do not check package names whether they are valid.

       -p DIRECTORY
              Read the configuration files from DIRECTORY instead of $FAI/packages_config.

       -s     Download source of binary packages that are installed. Currently supported only for
              apt-get/aptitude based installations.

       -v     Be verbose.

NOTES

       install_packages  expects  to  find  the  FAI_ROOT  directory,  the  location   of   class
       definitions,  package  configurations,  and  custom  install  scripts,  somewhere  in  the
       filesystem.   This  location  is  configurable  in  /etc/fai/fai.conf  and   defaults   to
       /srv/fai/config.

SEE ALSO

       apt(1), aptitude(8), apt-get(8), dpkg(8), tasksel(1)

       This  program  is  part of FAI (Fully Automatic Installation). See the FAI manual for more
       information on how to use install_packages. The FAI homepage is http://fai-project.org.

FILES

       /etc/fai/fai.conf
              The FAI configuration file.

       /srv/fai/config/package_config/
              The FAI package configuration directory.

AUTHOR

       Thomas Lange <lange@informatik.uni-koeln.de>