topic Re: System won't boot multi user in Operating System - HP-UX

System won't boot multi user

Geoff Wild — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 09:23:59 GMT

I have a B2000 Workstation with HP-UX 11i - latest patches.

The other day, I made a kernel parameter change - MAX_DBC_PCT from 50 to 10.

The system hangs at:

/sbin/auto_parms: DHCP access is disabled (see /etc/auto_parms.log)

If I wait a while, then press the power button, it comes back - "command respawning to quickly"....samd

I tried booting the previous kernel - same thing - so it can't be the parameter change?

The only other change to my system - 2 weeks ago I installed BIND 9.2.0 for testing...

I can boot into single user mode...

What I have tried:

commenting start up of BIND in /etc/rc.config.d/namesrvs

commenting out samd in /etc/inittab

There's nothing strange in any log file....all file systems can be mounted....

Looking for suggestions....

Thanks...Geoff

Re: System won't boot multi user

Pete Randall — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 09:27:38 GMT

Geoff,

It sure sounds like we should be suspecting BIND! In the meantime, have you tried going to multi-user mode from single-user mode: "init 3"?

Pete

Re: System won't boot multi user

Jeroen Peereboom — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 09:34:12 GMT

Geoff,

As a workaround to get your system up and running I would add the hostname (short and FQDN) to /etc/hosts and make sure that files are used for DNS lookups first (in /etc/resolv.conf).

samd can respawn if network config is not correct.

JP.

Re: System won't boot multi user

Geoff Wild — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 09:43:05 GMT

Pete - yes I did init 3 - same thing.

Jeroen - Yes, short and FQDN in /etc/hosts

nsswitch.conf:

hosts: files [NOTFOUND=CONTINUE] dns

Rgds...Geoff

Re: System won't boot multi user

Geoff Wild — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 09:57:02 GMT

Playing around with the init levels - I can go from s to 1 to 2 with no issues....

I even put samd back - and init 2 works!

Now - just to figure out why init 3 doesn't....

Rgds...Geoff

Re: System won't boot multi user

Sridhar Bhaskarla — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 10:01:26 GMT

Hi Geoff,

As a temporary fix, try moving /sbin/auto_parms as /sbin/auto_parms.old and see if the system boots. Then you can troubleshoot from there.

-Sri

Re: System won't boot multi user

Pete Randall — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 10:02:51 GMT

Geoff,

Pursuing Jeroen's line of thought, do you have a legitimate /etc/hosts file and does it contain entries for the host in question? You might want to try taking the dns entry out of nsswitch.conf (or rename nsswitch.conf).

Pete

Re: System won't boot multi user

Geoff Wild — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 10:34:44 GMT

Here's what I can do:

ISL > hpux -is

# init 2

login as root

# init 3

Voila - Gnome login screen appears....

But trying a reboot, (default run-level is 3) - it hangs...

Stranger and stranger....

Rgds...Geoff

Re: System won't boot multi user

Alex Glennie — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 10:51:26 GMT

when you say hang ..... what exactly do you mean ? If gnome is running are you aware there was a problem with the gdm binary ...

http://ximian.com/hpux-updates.html & http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/parseCurl.do?CURL=%2Fcm%2FQuestionAnswer%2F1%2C%2C0x58458b82cc91d711abdc0090277a778c%2C00.html&admit=716493758+1077551381640+28353475

Re: System won't boot multi user

Geoff Wild — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 10:59:17 GMT

Alex - yes - I know about the gdm issue with Gnome.

hang - the system just sits there - doing nothing - last thing on console is:

"/sbin/auto_parms: DHCP access is disabled (see /etc/auto_parms.log)"

It seems to hang at the inittab - IE it never gets to the rc start up scripts....

Rgds...Geoff

Re: System won't boot multi user

Vasikaran Venkatesan — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 11:33:01 GMT

try this!.
Press ^\ (control + backslash) (when it is staying at /sbin/auto_parms.....)
It may escape from where it is stuck. R u having any CA application loaded in the system ?.

Re: System won't boot multi user

Volker Borowski — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 12:47:55 GMT

Hi Geoff,

that sounds to be a timing problem between level 2 and 3. When you do it the login-way, enough time has passed (may be a network-timeout) to make things work.
If it is done too quickly, it gets locked up.

Check the links in /sbin/rc2.d and /sbin/rc3.d !

If you find nothing obvious, try to confirm the timing issue by creating a script
/sbin/rc3.d/S0000000_sleep
that just sleeps for a while.

If you succeed, you know you have to look for a startscript in rc2.d that is not waiting long enough.

Good luck
Volker

Re: System won't boot multi user

Geoff Wild — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 13:42:50 GMT

^\ (cntrl back slash) does the trick.....that is handy - but it would be nice if I didn't have to...

What is CA?

Rgds...Geoff

Re: System won't boot multi user

Pete Randall — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 13:53:39 GMT

Geoff,

In my world, CA is Computer Associates, though I'm not sure what their software might have to do with this problem!

Pete

Re: System won't boot multi user

Geoff Wild — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 13:58:38 GMT

Yeah - that's what I thought CA was - nope - nada....

Small issue with the ^\

The GUI logon does not run....

Back to inittab...

Re: System won't boot multi user

Sridhar Bhaskarla — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 14:02:18 GMT

Hi Geoff,

Did you try renaming auto_parms?. I got into trouble quite sometime back and I remember renaming this file (I don't use DHCP and ofcourse the system was already configured) that allowed me to login. You could always move it back after finding the problem by manually running it later.

-Sri

Re: System won't boot multi user

RAC_1 — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 14:05:04 GMT

Hoe about renaming auto_parms and then botting and running it manuualy.

This may give some idea on what is going wrong.

Re: System won't boot multi user

Geoff Wild — Mon, 23 Feb 2004 14:31:48 GMT

I tried the auto_parms - boots - with a lot of complaining (like /usr not mounted....) so a lot of stuff does not run....

/usr mounts at the end of all the rc...

Running auto_parm manually - produces nothing....

The log says - auto_parm can only be run from the transition from run level S....

Rgds..Geoff

Re: System won't boot multi user

Hrvoje Dubravica — Tue, 24 Feb 2004 04:47:29 GMT

Hi Geoff,

I had same problem, it is not conected with any kernel paramters or DHCP or anything from /etc/inittab.

Boot engine in single user mode, go in /etc/rc.config.d/ and find script(s) or executable(s) that someone put there and move it somewhere else. In this directory you can only have text files with variables!!!

After that shutdown -ry now.

Hope this help.
Kind regards,

Hrvoje

Re: System won't boot multi user

Pete Randall — Tue, 24 Feb 2004 06:31:57 GMT

Geoff,

Hrvoje's idea occurred to me yesterday but I never got a chance to mention it. When you're faced with unexplainable startup behaviour like this, it's alway a good idea to look at the contents of your /etc/rc.config.d and your /etc/rc?.d directories. Anything in there gets sourced during startup. Quite often you'll find that someone has backed up a file before changing it, giving you a filename.old or a filename.save or some such thing that gets sourced along with (and most likely afterward) the real one. This can lead to some very strange symptoms.

Pete