Ed sent me a answer to my ramblings: "It is indeed true that init(8) is a bit picky when you don't have a console. If /dev/console cannot be opened, init(8) will just break completely. This has been fixed in FreeBSD -HEAD, where I've extended init(8) to handle this gracefully, specifically for cases where you have hardware without a console or potentially want to run init(8) in a jail (though we're not there yet)."
http://svnweb.freebsd.org/base?view=revision&revision=232977 I'll try that, and will follow up here. Nick Hibma n...@van-laarhoven.org Collect, process, organize, review and do. - GTD On 18 Feb 2013, at 20:30, Nick Hibma <n...@van-laarhoven.org> wrote: > We run our NanoBSD images on Soekris and ALIX hardware. In some cases we need > all available serial ports for other hardware like GPS, and modems. The > boards have no video, so with all serial ports unavailable as a console no > other console is available. > > The problem is that FreeBSD does not handle well the case where there is no > console at all: > > 1) http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/query-pr.cgi?pr=bin/102515 > > fsck_ufs crashes (6.1-STABLE). Because of the unitialised console libc > somehow gets corrupted and crashes fsck_ufs. This problem can be circumvented > by replacing 'fsck -p' with 'fsck < /dev/null > /dev/null'. > > 2) In 8.3-RELEASE init exits prematurely because it cannot open /dev/console > for reading and writing in setctty(). Removing the calls to _exit(1) in that > function makes the boot complete. I haven't checked whether the fsck_ufs > problem still appears as our builds run with a patched rc.d script. > > > As far as I can see this is still a problem in CURRENT. > > > My attempt at resolving this was to create a null terminal in > dev/null/null.c, see the patch below, but that did not work as expected. > After booting the system with a modified init the response to 'echo > > /dev/console' was 'Device not configured'. I've added another CN_* priority > to make sure a null console does not take precedence over for example gdb > console. > > > Any pointers as to who/how to resolve this issue? Any reason why the null > console approach does not work? > > Nick Hibma > n...@van-laarhoven.org > > GTD: Time management for chaotic people. > > Index: /usr/src/sys/sys/cons.h > =================================================================== > --- /usr/src/sys/sys/cons.h (revision 242660) > +++ /usr/src/sys/sys/cons.h (working copy) > @@ -69,10 +69,11 @@ > > /* values for cn_pri - reflect our policy for console selection */ > #define CN_DEAD 0 /* device doesn't exist */ > -#define CN_LOW 1 /* device is a last restort only */ > -#define CN_NORMAL 2 /* device exists but is nothing special */ > -#define CN_INTERNAL 3 /* "internal" bit-mapped display */ > -#define CN_REMOTE 4 /* serial interface with remote bit set */ > +#define CN_NULL 1 /* no console at all */ > +#define CN_LOW 2 /* device is a last restort only */ > +#define CN_NORMAL 3 /* device exists but is nothing special */ > +#define CN_INTERNAL 4 /* "internal" bit-mapped display */ > +#define CN_REMOTE 5 /* serial interface with remote bit set */ > > /* Values for cn_flags. */ > #define CN_FLAG_NODEBUG 0x00000001 /* Not supported with debugger. > */ > Index: /usr/src/sys/dev/null/null.c > =================================================================== > --- /usr/src/sys/dev/null/null.c (revision 242660) > +++ /usr/src/sys/dev/null/null.c (working copy) > @@ -41,6 +41,9 @@ > #include <sys/bus.h> > #include <sys/filio.h> > > +#include <sys/cons.h> > +#include <sys/consio.h> > + > #include <machine/bus.h> > > /* For use with destroy_dev(9). */ > @@ -173,3 +176,45 @@ > > DEV_MODULE(null, null_modevent, NULL); > MODULE_VERSION(null, 1); > + > +static cn_probe_t null_cnprobe; > +static cn_init_t null_cninit; > +static cn_term_t null_cnterm; > +static cn_getc_t null_cngetc; > +static cn_putc_t null_cnputc; > + > +CONSOLE_DRIVER(null); > + > +static void > +null_cnprobe(struct consdev *cp) > +{ > + sprintf(cp->cn_name, "null"); > + cp->cn_pri = CN_NULL; > +} > + > +static void > +null_cninit(struct consdev *cp) > +{ > +} > + > + > +static void > +null_cnputc(struct consdev *cp, int c) > +{ > + (void) cp; > + > + (void) c; > +} > + > +static int > +null_cngetc(struct consdev * cp) > +{ > + (void) cp; > + > + return -1; > +} > + > +static void > +null_cnterm(struct consdev * cp) > +{ > +} > _______________________________________________ freebsd-current@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-current To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-current-unsubscr...@freebsd.org"
