Bug 71000

Summary: mgetty won't work for serial console
Product: [Retired] Red Hat Linux Reporter: Marc MERLIN <marc_soft>
Component: mgettyAssignee: Jason Vas Dias <jvdias>
Status: CLOSED CURRENTRELEASE QA Contact:
Severity: medium Docs Contact:
Priority: medium    
Version: 7.3   
Target Milestone: ---   
Target Release: ---   
Hardware: i386   
OS: Linux   
Whiteboard:
Fixed In Version: Doc Type: Bug Fix
Doc Text:
Story Points: ---
Clone Of: Environment:
Last Closed: 2005-06-14 19:38:06 UTC Type: ---
Regression: --- Mount Type: ---
Documentation: --- CRM:
Verified Versions: Category: ---
oVirt Team: --- RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team: --- Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description Marc MERLIN 2002-08-07 18:17:24 UTC
Quite frankly, I didn't want to be using mgetty in the first place. It's 10
times too complex when all you need/want is a simple serial console setup,
but since you unfortunately have removed the old and trusty getty_ps from
the distribution...

Inittab says:
S0:S123:respawn:/sbin/mgetty ttyS0

mgetty.config says:
# Dumb serial connection
port ttyS0
 debug 3
 speed 38400
 direct yes
 data-only yes
 toggle-dtr yes
 need-dsr yes
 port-owner root
 port-group root
 port-mode 600
 login-prompt @ \P login:\040
 login-time 60
 term vt102

Output on the serial console is inconsistent:
------------------------------------------------
Red Hat Linux release 7.3 (Valhalla)
Kernel 2.4.18-5smp on an i686       
                             

Red Hat Linux release 7.3 (Valhalla)ogin: 
Kernel 2.4.18-5smp on an i686       
                             

deeptought.engr.intransa.com ttyS0 login:
------------------------------------------------

What I type doesn't get echoed, but it does go somewhere because validating
with enter eventually generates a new prompt and the following errors in the
log:
(note that a) I have tested the serial console with minicom on both sides
and it works fine  b) I am using serial console in the kernel, but with getty_ps
there was no problem having serial console in the kernel + getty running)

08/07 10:32:51 yS0  mgetty: experimental test release 1.1.28-Jan10
08/07 10:33:03 ##### failed dev=ttyS0, pid=1916, got signal 1, exiting

--
08/07 10:33:03 yS0  mgetty: experimental test release 1.1.28-Jan10
08/07 10:33:04 yS0  TIOCMBIS failed: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:04 yS0  cannot turn off soft carrier: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:04 yS0  tcgetattr failed: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:04 yS0  cannot get TIO: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:04 yS0  mg_init_device failed, trying again
08/07 10:33:05 yS0  TIOCMBIS failed: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:05 yS0  cannot turn off soft carrier: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:05 yS0  tcgetattr failed: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:05 yS0  cannot get TIO: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:05 yS0  mg_init_device failed, exiting: Input/output error
08/07 10:33:05 yS0  cannot get terminal line dev=ttyS0, exiting: Input/output error

Comment 1 Marc MERLIN 2002-08-07 21:02:30 UTC
Just to confirm that things are working otherwise, I copied over my getty
from debian (util-linux) and that worked fine.
I also got it to work with getty_ps from RHL 7.0, but you're retired this
package...

Comment 2 Jason Vas Dias 2005-06-14 19:37:50 UTC
Just clearing out old bugs here - sorry for the delay in processing
this one - it seems to have been "lost" .

I've just retested this with mgetty-1.1.31-2 and 1.1.33-1 (mgetty is
no longer "experimental"), with the mgetty.config entry:
'
  port ttyS0
      direct y
      speed 57600
      toggle-dtr n
'
and with a null modem cable to another computer and the kernel-2.6.11
arguments 'console=ttyS0,57600 console=tty0', and the /etc/inittab
line: 'S0:2345:respawn:/sbin/mgetty ttyS0' .

The console connection worked flawlessly and let me log-in (as root,
when I had added ttyS0 to /etc/securettys).

There is also now agetty(8), which along with mgetty and mingetty
should be enough to replace getty_ps .

So this bug is closed as CURRENTRELEASE, as it appears to be fixed
with all current versions of mgetty.