Hi everybody,
When I am booting up my DEC3000/300X (DEC OSF/1 1994 version), it
reaches successfully single-user mode. At this point I can manually
mount the /usr and /var partitions. The problem is that the root
partition is mounted read-only, and I am unable to make any changes
in certain important files that are located in the /etc directory.
The booting disk currently contains information assuming the machine
is networked, and attempts to obtain domain information through an NIS
server. I want to temporarily disable the network configurations, because
the machine is not currently networked, but I am unable to do any changes,
because of the read-only root partition issue I mentioned above.
Also, if I exit single-user mode, and I let the machine complete its
booting process, it finally reaches the login screen. At this point,
if I try to login it tries to locate the NIS server and communicate
with the network (I am getting messages on the console window ;; ln0:
check network connection, etc.). Then, the system hungs, and all I
can do is power-cycle.
My questions are:
1. How can I change important files (/etc/passwd, /etc/hosts, etc.) that
are located in the root partition when I am in single-user mode? For some
reason the / partition is mounted read-only and I seem powerless in making
the changes that I want.
2. What changes do I need to make, so that the machine will not complain
for not being networked (I have a pretty good idea of what to change
here, but I think a comprehensive list of things to do would be a really
useful summary) ;; Of course for the changes to take place problem #1 needs
to be solved first.
3. Finally, is there a key sequence that will place me into console mode,
when the system is hung? For example in Sun systems, users working in
multi-user mode can at any point press Stop-A, which places them
automatically to console mode; then if they type "continue" they return
to multi-user mode. I have not seen something analogous in DEC stations
In other words, when the system hungs, I can only shut the system off
(which I hate doing), while in the Sun system a user can type "Stop-A"
and then reboot the machine, by typing "boot".
Is power-cycling the machine the only way to deal with a hung system
(unable at this point to perform normal shutdown)?
Can a user toggle console mode, by an equivalent of Sun's Stop-A, without
having to perform a normal shutdown?
For example, is it possible for someone to be in multi-user mode,
then switch for a second to console mode, type something like SHOW DEV, and
then type continue to return to multi-user mode? (without doing a formal
halt or shutdown)
Thanks in advance for your responses.
PS Please let me know if you need additional info.
Received on Tue Mar 16 1999 - 00:19:27 NZDT