Ventoy Auto Installation Plugin

Many distros provide unattended deployment solution. You just need to give a script or template for the installation.
For example, unattend xml for Windows, kickstart script for Redhat/CentOS, autoYast xml for SUSE, preseed script for Debian and so on.
In normal case, if you want to make an unattended deployment, you need to recreate a new iso file based on the original iso file, and add the script or template into the new iso file.
Now Ventoy brings a new feature here. You don't need to recreate a new iso file, just use the original one. You just need to put a script or template in the USB drive and tell ventoy, that's all. You can specify more than one scripts for an iso file at a time, ventoy will provide a menu to choose before boot. You can also update these scripts whenever you want.

• Supported Distros (Updating)

In theory, as long as the distribution supports automatic installation through script or template, Ventoy can support it, but it takes time to test each one.

• Json Configuration

Recommend to use VentoyPlugson, a GUI ventoy.json configurator. Refer VentoyPlugson
A auto_install array is defined to describe the auto installation configuration in /ventoy/ventoy.json.

{
    "auto_install": [
        {
            "image": "/abc/centos.iso",
            "template": "/ventoy/script/centos_kickstart.cfg"
        },
        {
            "image": "/ISO/cn_windows_server_2012_r2_vl_x64_dvd_2979220.iso",
            "template": [
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended1.xml",
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended2.xml",
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended3.xml",
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended4.xml",
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended5.xml",
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended6.xml"
            ],
            "autosel": 2
        },
        {
            "image": "/ISO/cn_windows_server_2016.iso",
            "template": [
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended7.xml",
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended8.xml",
                "/ventoy/script/windows_unattended9.xml"
            ],
            "autosel": 3,
            "timeout": 10
        },
        {
            "image": "/SLE-12-SP3-Server-DVD-x86_64-GM-DVD1.iso",
            "template": "/ventoy/script/suse_autoyast.xml"
        },
        {
            "parent": "/ISO/SUSE",
            "template": "/ventoy/script/suse_autoyast.xml"
        },
        {
            "image": "/ubuntu-16.04-server-amd64.iso",
            "template": "/ventoy/script/ubuntu_server.seed",
            "autosel": 1
        }
    ]
}

• Variables Expansion (1.0.77+)

When we do auto installation, there are some configurations in the installation script that cannot be fixed and hard-coded. The most common is the disk name or disk id.
For example, we set DISK0 or /dev/sda in the auto installation script file, but in some computer, it is not the right disk we want.
So this may install the OS to the wrong disk, or even to the disk where Ventoy is located.
Besides, sometimes we want to dynamically input some variables when install, for exmaple ComputerName UserName ...

So Ventoy supports Variables Expansion in the auto installation script since 1.0.77. The variables must be in $$XXX$$ format (XXX is the variables name).

Attention:
1. The auto installation script which contains variables must be in UTF-8 encoding.
2. The variables name XXX can only contain digits, underscores and letters. The length must be less than 63. For example: $$USERNAME$$
3. Each line in the script can only contain at most 1 variables.
4. For common variables, Ventoy will pop up a prompt box to prompt the user to enter the actual value of the variables.
5. For built-in variables, Ventoy will not pop up box and will automatically expand its value depend on its meaning.
6. All built-in variables name are begin with VT_, all common variables name can NOT begin with VT_.
7. Ventoy will automatically check whether the installation script contains variables or not.
8. Variables expansion will not modify the original installation script file in the Ventoy USB drive.

Prompt box for common variables:


unattend.xml




kickstart.cfg

• Multi-Mode

Supported. You can set different configurations for different BIOS mode. Please refer Multi-Mode Option for details.

• Prompt Before Boot (1.0.12+)

When you boot an iso file with auto installation config, a prompt will be shown. You can choose whether to use the auto installation template and which template to use for this time.