[gPXE] problem with autoboot after dhcp

[Pascal Suter]

hi all

I have discovered gPXE only today and could already put it to great use for
me thanks to the scripting capabilities. i made a little script that i
compiled as embedded_image into gpxe that would send an http get request to
a webserver to log my mac address and then it would load the regular
pxelinux.

i originally wanted to just call autoboot after i was done with my http
getting but that caused the autoboot to run into a dhcp timeout. in order
to find the source for my problem i bootet the computer, hit CTRL+B before
my script was executed and tried these scenarios:

gPXE> autoboot

just autoboot alone works and i get the pxelinux menu immediately

gPXE> dhcp net0
gPXE> autoboot

the first line gets an ip instantateously but after that autoboot fails to
receive an ip before the timeout (mostly) or if it gets one it functions
properly but very very slow.

gPXE> ifopen net0
gPXE> autoboot

works just fine without problems

gPXE> dhcp net0
gPXE> ifclose net0
gPXE> autoboot

timeout or very slow again

gPXE> dhcp net0
gPXE> dhcp net0
gPXE> dhcp net0

gets an ip almost instantaneously every time i call dhcp net0 without any
delay

gPXE> dhcp net0
gPXE> ifclose net0
gPXE> ifopen net0
gPXE> autoboot

timeout or very slow again

this seems to me like a bug somewhere in autoboot.
my current solution is this:

gPXE> dhcp net0
gPXE> ... do all my script stuff here
gPXE> chain tftp://${next-server}/pxelinux.0

that does it for me right now but i feel this is a bit of a hack .. ;)
any help to get that autoboot working is appreciated.

i am using gPXE 1.0.1 and i boot it off a usb stick via Syslinux as
described in the etherboot wiki.

kind regards
Pascal
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