Boot a "CD-ROM" via IPMI into a custom installer, flash image (generated from a Dockerfile!) to disk, reboot. Install takes ~15 seconds, full process (going via POST once) takes ~4 minutes. This also allows us to have a "hardware validation" image (that one doesn't get persisted to disk).
Not sure if there's any plans to make it public right now, but I'll ask around. Feel free to contact me via email (in profile)
So, I share your excitement when it works but I'm not happy with the out-of-the box experience of IPMI. I wish there was something better but unfortunately this is just one case of a split/mismatch of what HW people provide and what software people need.
Any hints about how to do this? I'd love to use something as nice to work with as a Dockerfile to build bare metal installs.
Fly.io[1] also does this (although they boot the result in a VM, the concepts are the same)
[0]: https://blog.davidv.dev/docker-based-images-on-baremetal.htm...
Please do. There's a need for it. :)