If you use a serial console as the only screen for your linux machine (see /usr/src/linux/Documentation/serial-console.txt) then mgetty will not work for this configuration. The machine will boot sucessfully and display all boot messages onto the terminal but will not print anything like "login..." onto the terminal. I debugged mgetty and found out, that the INPUT is transferred to mgetty but no OUTPUT is displayed on the terminal. If I use agetty (which should be in util-linux but is not -> this is in bugzilla, too) instead of mgetty, then everything works fine and I could log into the machine using my terminal. It seems, that either mgetty is not able to work with serial consoles or it is broken in RH 7.
What does your inittab like look like? Serial console should be well off with a simpler getty too. We're using the following (from getty_ps package, though) and it works fine: S0:2345:respawn:/sbin/getty ttyS0 DT38400 vt102
You are right. getty_ps works fine. BUT mgetty did not work: S0:2345:respawn:/sbin/mgetty -p "TILLBUEBCK" -r -x 9 -s 9600 ttyS0 However, also agetty and getty_ps worked fine: S0:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty ttyS0 9600 ansi -or- S0:2345:respawn:/sbin/getty ttyS0 DT9600 ansi I recompiled mgetty from scratch and did not made a success. So I assume, that mgetty itself is broken and that this is no RHAT bug. +-------+--------------------------------------------------------------+ | | dr. tilmann bubeck think@work it consulting | | | professional services | | think | cell.: +49 172 8842972 widmaierstrasse 58 | | @work | fax : +49 711 7227734 70567 stuttgart | | | email: bubeck http://www.think-at-work.de | +-------+ -------------------------------------------------------------+
could you please test the newest version from ftp://wallace.redhat.com/pub/redhat/linux/rawhide/i386/RedHat/RPMS again and report your results ? If you don't want to upgrade your system you may also just recompile the src.rpm and try that.
I would try the new package, but I could not log into the server you've given: [root@localhost ~bubeck/download]# ftp wallace.redhat.com Connected to wallace.redhat.com. 421 Service not available, remote server has closed connection ftp> bye [root@localhost ~bubeck/download]# Should I try mgetty-1.1.26-3.src.rpm from a rawhide mirror instead? Why couldn't I use rawhide directly? It's asking for a password. Where can I get one?
I tried the unchanged mgetty-1.1.25-2 of RH 7.1 and also mgetty-1.1.26-3 of rawhide, and.... both worked! There was no problem at all, everything worked fine. Thanks for any help! Till