CDE Hanging at startup

[Michael Satnilli]

I have an hp ux system and it is hanging at startup time just as it is initializing the CDE environment. THe screen is gray with the X prompt and it just sits there.

Is there a way for me to get into the system? The only thing I changed on the system was to add a nsswitch.conf file to allow my DHCP to look in files and then DNS.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[A. Clay Stephenson · Accepted solution]

The fundamental problem is that your system can't resolve its own hostname. You should have an /etc/hosts entry with at least the loopback entry and the hostname in in and FILES listed first in /etc/nnsswitch.conf then DNS or NIS. That way you can always come up.

If you can telnet in to the box then that will be the easiest method to edit the nsswitch.conf file. Otherwise, depending on your platform, there is either a 'safe' login or a concole login. In the worst case, you can come up single user, mount /var and /usr and vi the file.

[Sanjay_6]

Hi Michael,

this look like a problem withj the name resolution. your system is not able to resolve its name.

Boot the system in single user mode and you can revert back to old settings or do some diags.

Hope this helps.

thanks

[Sridhar Bhaskarla]

Michael,

As you did the change, probably that could be the reason. Try telnetting to this system from somewhere and see nslooking up your system works. Also see your hostname and other settings are proper.

You can run /usr/contrib/bin/X11/dr_dt to find out the problems in detail too.

-Sri

[Michael Satnilli]

Forgive my ignorance on Hp uX. Can anyone tell me the easiest way to bring my machine up in console mode. I seem to have a problem getting it into that mode and I can't find the IP to telnet into it.
Thanks

[Sanjay_6]

Hi Michael,

I think you have to reboot the system and bring it up in single user mode to do the changes. To do that you interrupt the boot process and then type "bo pri" to boot through the primary disk, select "Y" to interact with IPL and at the ipl prompt type "hpux -is" . This will bring the system up in single user mode and you can do the necessary modification in your /etc/resolv.conf and /etc/nsswitch.conf files, update your /etc/hosts and reboot the system to boot into multiuser mode with the CDE screen.

hope this helps.

thanks

[A. Clay Stephenson]

The answer is that it depends upon the model. Generally you hit the ESC key several times during boot.

[Michael Satnilli]

Thanks for the help. I got into the system and managed to get everything up and running except for the CDE. I'm trying to resolve an issue with the host name. If i'm using DHCP to obtain my IP address, what do I need to place in the hosts file for the system to recognize itself?

[Sanjay_6]

Hi Michael,

If you are using DHCP, i don't think you need system entry in /etc/hosts. you can also delete the /etc/nsswitch.conf and /etc/resolv.conf files.

Hope this helps.

thanks