Questions on using serial console

[Gregory Nowak]

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Hi.

On Wed, Aug 17, 2005 at 01:58:54PM +1200, Arthur Pirika wrote:
> Hi there, I have some questions about using a serial console with a separate pc or laptop to access linux.
> 
> First, how early in the boot process would it be possible to connect to the system?
> 

That depends on if you activate the serial console by passing a
parameter to the kernel via a boot loader, or if you edit /etc/inittab
and restart init once you've logged in. The first option is the faster
of the two. To start the serial console on the first serial port,
/dev/ttyS0 at 9600 baud, by simply passing a parameter to the kernel
at boot, put the following in lilo's append line, or use whatever
mechanism your boot loader of choice uses to pass boot parameters to
the kernel:

console=ttyS0,9600

. To use the second, and harder method, boot your distribution, and
login. Open /etc/inittab with your editor of choice, and put in the
following line, at the end should be good:

s1:12345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -L ttyS1 9600 vt100

I remember once reading about a way of doing this with the cat command in an
old emacspeak howto, but don't remember enough of the procedure to
feel comfortable that I'm giving you correct information.
Once you've edited /etc/inittab, you need to tell init to reread the
file by typing:

telinit q
.

> second, if I connected to linux with say, hyperterminal on windows, would i be able to control linux from the laptop's keyboard?
> 

The short answer is yes, though I personally feel more comfortable
doing this from minicom, rather then from hyperterminal.

> btw, how do you tell linux to use a serial console?

See my answer to question 1.

Greg



> 
> tia,
> Arthur.
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> 
> 

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