How do I install and run a TFTP server?

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

5. 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

6. 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/

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.

You can install tftpd-hpa and change the configurations . Steps for installing tftpd-hpa is explained in this blog post.