diff --git a/bitbake/bin/toaster b/bitbake/bin/toaster
index 7511012552..6969bf7f82 100755
--- a/bitbake/bin/toaster
+++ b/bitbake/bin/toaster
@@ -251,7 +251,11 @@ case $CMD in
             return 4
         fi
         unset BBSERVER
-        bitbake --postread conf/toaster.conf --server-only -t xmlrpc -B 0.0.0.0:0
+        PREREAD=""
+        if [ -e conf/toaster-pre.conf ]; then
+                PREREAD="--read conf/toaster-pre.conf"
+        fi
+        bitbake $PREREAD --postread conf/toaster.conf --server-only -t xmlrpc -B 0.0.0.0:0
         if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then
             start_success=0
             echo "Bitbake server start failed"
diff --git a/bitbake/lib/toaster/bldcontrol/bbcontroller.py b/bitbake/lib/toaster/bldcontrol/bbcontroller.py
index 7c27fe110e..102606e929 100644
--- a/bitbake/lib/toaster/bldcontrol/bbcontroller.py
+++ b/bitbake/lib/toaster/bldcontrol/bbcontroller.py
@@ -135,6 +135,11 @@ class BuildEnvironmentController(object):
         bblayerconffile.write("# line added by toaster build control\nBBLAYERS = \"" + " ".join(layerlist) + "\"")
         bblayerconffile.close()
 
+    def writePreConfFile(self, variable_list):
+        prefilepath = os.path.join(self.be.builddir, "conf/toaster-pre.conf")
+        with open(prefilepath, "w") as prefile:
+            for i in variable_list:
+                prefile.write("%s=\"%s\"\n" % (i.name, i.value))
 
 
     def startBBServer(self, brbe):
diff --git a/bitbake/lib/toaster/bldcontrol/management/commands/runbuilds.py b/bitbake/lib/toaster/bldcontrol/management/commands/runbuilds.py
index 56c989c9c9..bdce6ee902 100644
--- a/bitbake/lib/toaster/bldcontrol/management/commands/runbuilds.py
+++ b/bitbake/lib/toaster/bldcontrol/management/commands/runbuilds.py
@@ -53,14 +53,11 @@ class Command(NoArgsCommand):
 
             # set up the buid environment with the needed layers
             bec.setLayers(br.brbitbake_set.all(), br.brlayer_set.all())
+            bec.writePreConfFile(br.brvariable_set.all())
 
             # get the bb server running with the build req id and build env id
             bbctrl = bec.getBBController("%d:%d" % (br.pk, bec.be.pk))
 
-            # set the build configuration
-            for variable in br.brvariable_set.all():
-                bbctrl.setVariable(variable.name, variable.value)
-
             # trigger the build command
             task = reduce(lambda x, y: x if len(y)== 0 else y, map(lambda y: y.task, br.brtarget_set.all()))
             if len(task) == 0:
diff --git a/bitbake/lib/toaster/orm/models.py b/bitbake/lib/toaster/orm/models.py
index 46b704c130..6fbbeed8f3 100644
--- a/bitbake/lib/toaster/orm/models.py
+++ b/bitbake/lib/toaster/orm/models.py
@@ -529,6 +529,7 @@ class Recipe_Dependency(models.Model):
 
 
 class Machine(models.Model):
+    search_allowed_fields = ["name", "description"]
     layer_source = models.ForeignKey('LayerSource', default = None, null = True)  # from where did we get this machine
     up_id = models.IntegerField(null = True, default = None)                      # id of entry in the source
     up_date = models.DateTimeField(null = True, default = None)