Bug 18991

I don't *think* it's compiled wrong.

If you rebuild it with -mcpu=ev5, does it work?

Yes, it works if I recompile it.  All I did to recompile it was "rpm -i
chkconfig-1.2.16-1.src.rpm" and "rpm -bc chkconfig.spec" and run the resulting
binary.

It looks like it was compiled for EV5:

$  rpm -qvp --qf '%{optflags}\n' chkconfig-1.2.16-1.alpha.rpm 
-O2 -mieee -mcpu=ev5
$ 

I have several programs that don't work (I can't even boot into the normal
multi-user runlevel).  I guess it is possible that something is screwy on my
system; this is an older Alpha that I've cobbled together from parts from
several.  I do have a hard drive with a bad spot (but I'm using RAID5 so it
_shouldn't_ be a problem except that of course the partition with the bad spot
is not used and that partition of the RAID is running degraded).  I think my RAM
is okay; is there any kind of memory tester (like "memtest86" on x86)?

I've got Digital Unix 5.1 CDs sitting on my desk; I guess I could try installing
it and see what it sees.

I'm willing to try anything you can suggest.

I just did a fresh install after removing the questionable disk.  I
didn't do anything special; I did a text install on a serial console,
did a "server" install, letting the installer partition the disks.  I
booted once with "init=/bin/sh" so I could turn off console gettys,
install getty_ps (I think this should be installed by default) and set
up a getty on ttyS0.  I also fixed the aboot.conf (I had to add
"console=ttyS0" and fix the kernel path: the installer put
"0:1/vmlinux...." in there, but the "1/" should just be "/"; I'll
bugzilla that).

Here is the tail of the boot and a login attempt:

INIT: Entering runlevel: 3
egrep: /proc/stat: No such file or directory
/etc/rc3.d/S99local: [: : integer expression expected
/etc/rc3.d/S99local: /etc/issue: Read-only file system
/etc/rc3.d/S99local: /etc/issue: Read-only file system
/etc/rc3.d/S99local: /etc/issue: Read-only file system
cp: cannot stat `/etc/issue': No such file or directory
/etc/rc3.d/S99local: /etc/issue: Read-only file system
(none) login: root
Login incorrect

login:

It has the same problems as before: chkconfig didn't work so /etc/rc3.d
is empty except for S99local. Then there are other programs not working
either so the whole thing is screwed up.

I wouldn't expect to get the exact same problem from flakey RAM or bad disk.

I thought perhaps I had a corrupted CD, but I just booted up with
"init=/bin/sh", brought up the network with "ifup eth0" (which worked okay), and
FTPed the chkconfig package from ftp.beta.redhat.com.  No difference, except I
noticed that passive FTP (which apparently is the default now in "ftp") did not
work either.  I don't know if I should bugzilla that or not, since I don't know
if the problem is just me or what.

Are both the rebuilt and original source RPMs built with the
same optflags if you query them?

Now that I look at it, my recompiled chkconfig does NOT have "-mcpu=ev5", while
the distributed version does.  However, I just forced it to use "-mcpu=ev5" and
recompiled (so the flags match the distributed version) and my recompiled
version still works fine.

I just found that the other main package I'm having this trouble with is
initscripts.  I just recompiled and reinstalled it and chkconfig (and then
re-ran chkconfig to add all the init scripts), and now the system boots okay
into multiuser mode (I'm able to log in remotely via ssh now).

If you try the chkconfig-1.2.17-1 RPM from 

people.redhat.com/notting/chkconfig/

does that work?

Oh, never mind. This is the RPM problem. Everything that linked in popt
statically (chkconfig and initlog) would die horribly.
RPM got fixed, so this should be fixed with the new chkconfig build.

verified fix in internal testing ...