Oliver Hansen » freebsd http://blog.oliverhansen.com A techie's not-so-technical weblog Sun, 27 Nov 2011 23:37:11 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Force FreeBSD to Run Startup Scripts Without Rebooting http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2008/02/19/force-freebsd-to-run-startup-scripts-without-rebooting/ http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2008/02/19/force-freebsd-to-run-startup-scripts-without-rebooting/#comments Tue, 19 Feb 2008 20:51:17 +0000 Oliver http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2008/02/19/force-freebsd-to-run-startup-scripts-without-rebooting/ I wondered about this for quite a while and eventually saw the answer while looking for other information. Sometimes I make a change to some startup files and I just want to rerun the startup without having to go through POST and all the other startup before the computer gets to the OS.

With root privileges [...]]]> I wondered about this for quite a while and eventually saw the answer while looking for other information. Sometimes I make a change to some startup files and I just want to rerun the startup without having to go through POST and all the other startup before the computer gets to the OS.

With root privileges execute the command:
shutdown now

This will give you a screen that looks like
Enter full pathname of shell or RETURN for /bin/sh:

Press enter to select the shell. I’m not qualified to say if this is the same as booting into single user mode or not.

Type
exit

The system will run the startup scripts and ask you to log in just as usual!

]]> http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2008/02/19/force-freebsd-to-run-startup-scripts-without-rebooting/feed/ What Device Is My Serial Port In FreeBSD? http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2007/10/01/what-device-is-my-serial-port-in-freebsd/ http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2007/10/01/what-device-is-my-serial-port-in-freebsd/#comments Tue, 02 Oct 2007 04:37:44 +0000 Oliver http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2007/10/01/what-device-is-my-serial-port-in-freebsd/ Wow. I thought it would be easy to configure my new (to me) APC SmartUPS to be connected to my FreeBSD server on the serial port. The install of apcupsd went quite well but when it came time to set the device to be used in the config file I couldn’t figure out which device [...]]]> Wow. I thought it would be easy to configure my new (to me) APC SmartUPS to be connected to my FreeBSD server on the serial port. The install of apcupsd went quite well but when it came time to set the device to be used in the config file I couldn’t figure out which device it was! I looked at the output of dmesg to see all the devices that were found on startup. I saw sio0 which mentioned a COM port so I thought maybe that would be it. I tried using /dev/sio0 but that didn’t work so I even restarted the computer to check the BIOS and made sure the serial port was enabled. It was. Another restart had me looking at sio0 again. It made sense to me as well for Serial Input/Output but still didn’t work.

Ok, to Google I went and finally found this little gem from the freebsd mailing list. The thread mentioned the same message I was getting

sio0: configured irq 4 not in bitmap of probed irqs 0
sio0: port may not be enabled
sio0: <16550A-compatible COM port> port 0x3f8-0x3ff irq 4 flags 0×10 on acpi0

about sio0 but the person asking seemed to know something I didn’t. They knew that FreeBSD normally uses cuad0 for the serial device. I have no idea why or how that came about. Can’t even figure out how that naming convention came about but I’m sure there are some out there who know. Well, now I know — I put /dev/cuad0 in the config file and now my APC UPS is talking to my FreeBSD box! I might write about the details later but apcupsd is pretty cool because it will allow my box to find the percentage of battery left on the UPS when it is running on batteries and when it gets to a certain percent the computer can shut itself off properly before losing power!

Google to the rescue again!

]]> http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2007/10/01/what-device-is-my-serial-port-in-freebsd/feed/ Updating My FreeBSD Installation — Automatically http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2007/09/27/updating-my-freebsd-installation-automatically/ http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2007/09/27/updating-my-freebsd-installation-automatically/#comments Fri, 28 Sep 2007 06:19:41 +0000 Oliver http://blog.oliverhansen.com/index.php/2007/09/27/updating-my-freebsd-installation-automatically/ My APC Smart-UPS 700XL arrived yesterday so I decided to do the first step in relocating my server from next to my TV in my bedroom to inside my closet. The server is just a desktop PC size and isn’t extremely loud but it is noticeable when sleeping. I actually think it took me a [...]]]> My APC Smart-UPS 700XL arrived yesterday so I decided to do the first step in relocating my server from next to my TV in my bedroom to inside my closet. The server is just a desktop PC size and isn’t extremely loud but it is noticeable when sleeping. I actually think it took me a while to sleep last night because I wasn’t used to the quiet! I will eventually have 2 or 3 computers running full time so I wanted them to have a place to be and a UPS for at least the NAS box. So now the NAS box is in my closet with the UPS. Soon I hope to have the UPS smart port connected to the NAS box so if power is not restored the box will shut itself off properly before losing power completely.

After relocating the NAS box, I decided I should try to keep my FreeBSD 6.2 server installation updated and do it regularly. I had done an update previously when I discovered my hard drive was bad but after reinstalling everything I hadn’t done another. The FreeBSD Handbook is a great resource and I went there to see the method for updating the ports tree. Keeping the ports tree up to date is important so whenever you decide to install a new program you have the latest information.

The main suggested way to keep the ports tree up to date is to use CVsup.

  • First install CVSup as directed on the upgrading ports page.
  • Continue following the instructions on the page by running CVSup and then I suggest taking the advice of creating your own supfile. The server closest to you will matter if you are outside the US but if inside, I have no idea which of the servers on the list are closest to me so just pick your favorite number and go from there!
  • Follow the instructions in section 4.5.4.2 and install the port portupgrade.
  • At least the first time you run portupgrade, you should use the -ai option so it will ask you to confirm before you actually upgrade each port. If you find you want every port upgraded then you can get rid of the -i part of the option.

I created a script to run the CVSup and made a crontab to run the script every Sunday night. I’ll have to wait until this Sunday to see if it works because I don’t feel like debugging it now by changing the timing of the crontab. I know the script runs when called from the command line. I didn’t include the portupgrade part in the script because I don’t want to be upgrading my ports all the time. If it’s working and there is no security fix then I really don’t need to upgrade it. But this way if I need to upgrade it, the current port is already there.

*Note* You should also keep the stable or current system tree up to date as well. I am using the stable because I just need things to work; not be the latest and greatest. This can be done by using CVSup but changing the supfile to one you will find in /usr/share/examples/cvsup/stable-supfile

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