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I have an embedded VxWorks target that needs to boot its kernel from my Ubuntu computer. How do I install and run a TFTP server?

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TFTP Server Install and Setup

  1. Install following packages.

    sudo apt-get install xinetd tftpd tftp

  2. Create /etc/xinetd.d/tftp and put this entry

    service tftp
{
protocol        = udp
port            = 69
socket_type     = dgram
wait            = yes
user            = nobody
server          = /usr/sbin/in.tftpd
server_args     = /tftpboot
disable         = no
}

  3. Create a folder /tftpboot this should match whatever you gave in server_args. mostly it will be tftpboot

    sudo mkdir /tftpboot
sudo chmod -R 777 /tftpboot
sudo chown -R nobody /tftpboot

  4. Restart the xinetd service.

    newer systems:

    sudo service xinetd restart

    older systems:

    sudo /etc/init.d/xinetd restart

Now our tftp server is up and running.

Testing our tftp server

  1. Create a file named test with some content in /tftpboot path of the tftp server

    Obtain the ip address of the tftp server using ifconfig command

  2. Now in some other system follow the following steps.

    tftp 192.168.1.2
tftp> get test
Sent 159 bytes in 0.0 seconds

tftp> quit

cat test

Source: http://mohammadthalif.wordpress.com/2010/03/05/installing-and-testing-tftpd-in-ubuntudebian/

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    only step 4 needs to be changed, since xinetd is spawned by upstart. you need to restart it with 'service xinetd restart' – BЈовић Sep 4 '13 at 12:14
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    I followed this instruction and faced permission denied! Destination filename [c2950-i6q4l2-mz.121-22.EA1b.bin]? TFTP: error code 2 received - Access violation %Error opening tftp://10.1.11.14/c2950-i6q4l2-mz.121-22.EA1b.bin (Permission denied) #copy flash:c2950-i6q4l2-mz.121-22.EA1b.bin tftp: Address or name of remote host []? 10.1.11.14 Destination filename [c2950-i6q4l2-mz.121-22.EA1b.bin]? TFTP: error code 2 received - Access violation – Mohammad Rafiee Apr 8 '14 at 6:30
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    @Mohammad Rafiee: the blog post linked to here added some info: run sudo chmod -R 777 /tftpboot between step 1 and 2 of "Testing our tftp server". Not that it helped me, but it looks like it helped others. – Gauthier Aug 28 '14 at 11:43
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    On 14.04, this did not work for me. The info about /tftpboot in /etc/xinetd.d/tftp did not seem to matter. Instead, the client looks in the directory /srv/tftp as specified in /etc/inetd.conf. I don't if the way things are setup changed since the article, or if I screwed up somehow. If the answer above does not work for you, try putting your test file in /srv/tftp instead. – Gauthier Aug 28 '14 at 12:28
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    Please note that with Ubuntu 16.04, you will experience error code 2 (access violation) . To fix it put tftpboot -s in server_args (no leading slash, -s at the end. Source: icesquare.com/wordpress/… – CharlesB Aug 31 '18 at 13:13
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You can install atftpd and it will create a directory called /tftpboot in which you may place your files. Put especially the pxelinux.0 file there. Any future configuration will be addressed if it is necessary.

When you install the package with 

sudo apt-get install atftpd

it will use Debconf to prompt you for some choices. You can set many choices(server timeout may be useful), especially the basepath. You can also adjust the multicast range.

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  • What is pxelinux.0 for? I'm booting a VxWorks target, so I thought that I only need the file vxworks in /tftpboot. – user1689961 Oct 15 '12 at 21:11
  • Sorry - that did not work for me. – user1689961 Oct 18 '12 at 16:59
  • Try renaming vxworks to pxelinux.0, just to see whether my answer will work for future users. – nanofarad Oct 18 '12 at 20:40
  • this doesnt work for 13.04. I just tried – BЈовић Sep 3 '13 at 8:55
  • @BЈовић This is somewhat of an old answer and I honestly do not know the procedure for 13.04. – nanofarad Sep 4 '13 at 11:02
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You can install tftpd-hpa and change the configurations . Steps for installing tftpd-hpa is explained in this blog post.

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    Whilst this may theoretically answer the question, it would be preferable to include the essential parts of the answer here, and provide the link for reference. – guntbert Sep 6 '13 at 7:02
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    upvoted you only because tftpd-hpa is a stupid simple tftp server to use and doesn't actually require any of the config needed in that post just drop your files in /var/lib/tftpboot and you are set (on ubuntu 16.04 not sure about other OS). – mschuett Jan 3 '17 at 4:25

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