A systems administrator is rolling out 120 identical rack-mount servers that must run Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9. The hosts can PXE-boot from a provisioning VLAN that already offers DHCP and an internal HTTP repository. The build must occur without any interactive input: the installer must partition the disks, select the required package groups, create a local administrator account, and reboot automatically when complete. Which installation approach BEST meets these requirements?
Clone the disk of a preconfigured reference host to every new server with dd over SSH.
Boot a generic cloud-init-enabled image and apply the required settings from user-data after first boot.
PXE-boot the servers while supplying an inst.ks= kernel parameter that points to a Kickstart file on the HTTP server.
Mount the RHEL DVD ISO on each server and use the Anaconda text installer to walk through the setup screens.
A Kickstart file can define every aspect of a RHEL installation-storage layout, software selection, user accounts, post-install scripts, and the automatic reboot directive. When the servers PXE-boot, adding the kernel parameter inst.ks=http://<server>/path/ks.cfg tells Anaconda to parse that file and perform an unattended installation, so no console interaction is needed.
Running the text-based Anaconda wizard (second option) is entirely manual and therefore violates the zero-touch requirement. Imaging each system with dd would copy mismatched UUIDs and hardware-specific settings and is not an installerāsupported scripted method. Cloud-init applies configuration only after a bootable OS image is in place; it cannot replace the initial OS installation itself, so it also fails to satisfy the requirement for a fully automated install.