I've got a SPARCclassic running Debian Linux which is having an odd issue,
and the fact that it's happening with two different flavors of Linux
suggests a quirk with the Sun rather than an issue with Linux. Anyway the
wtmp log file is growing at an astonishing rate, 10-15MB a day which is a
whole lot of text! I looked in it and it's filling up with a bunch of the
stuff below. I'm running this box headless so perhaps that has something to
do with it?


[6] [30245] [1 ] [LOGIN ] [tty1 ] [ ] [Sep 19
17:24:16] [0]
[6] [30592] [3 ] [LOGIN ] [tty3 ] [ ] [Sep 19
17:44:34] [0]
[6] [30786] [2 ] [LOGIN ] [tty2 ] [ ] [Sep 19
17:52:33] [0]
[6] [30838] [6 ] [LOGIN ] [tty6 ] [ ] [Sep 19
17:58:22] [0]
[6] [30953] [3 ] [LOGIN ] [tty3 ] [ ] [Sep 19
18:05:06] [0]
[6] [31212] [5 ] [LOGIN ] [tty5 ] [ ] [Sep 19
18:18:56] [0]
[6] [31246] [3 ] [LOGIN ] [tty3 ] [ ] [Sep 19
18:19:29] [0]
[6] [31363] [2 ] [LOGIN ] [tty2 ] [ ] [Sep 19
18:26:12] [0]
[6] [31395] [4 ] [LOGIN ] [tty4 ] [ ] [Sep 19
18:26:43] [0]
[6] [31492] [2 ] [LOGIN ] [tty2 ] [ ] [Sep 19
18:33:06] [0]
[6] [32024] [1 ] [LOGIN ] [tty1 ] [ ] [Sep 19
19:00:26] [0]
[6] [32270] [2 ] [LOGIN ] [tty2 ] [ ] [Sep 19
19:14:06] [0]
[6] [32570] [1 ] [LOGIN ] [tty1 ] [ ] [Sep 19
19:28:45] [0]
[6] [00547] [4 ] [LOGIN ] [tty4 ] [ ] [Sep 19
19:54:58] [0]
[6] [00642] [2 ] [LOGIN ] [tty2 ] [ ] [Sep 19
19:56:25] [0]
[6] [00932] [3 ] [LOGIN ] [tty3 ] [ ] [Sep 19
20:15:44] [0]
[6] [00992] [2 ] [LOGIN ] [tty2 ] [ ] [Sep 19
20:16:39] [0]
[6] [01028] [1 ] [LOGIN ] [tty1 ] [ ] [Sep 19
20:17:12] [0]
[6] [01164] [3 ] [LOGIN ] [tty3 ] [ ] [Sep 19
20:29:16] [0]
[6] [01303] [6 ] [LOGIN ] [tty6 ] [ ] [Sep 19
20:36:19] [0]

James Sweet wrote:
> I've got a SPARCclassic running Debian Linux which is having an odd issue,
> and the fact that it's happening with two different flavors of Linux
> suggests a quirk with the Sun rather than an issue with Linux. Anyway the
> wtmp log file is growing at an astonishing rate, 10-15MB a day which is a
> whole lot of text! I looked in it and it's filling up with a bunch of the
> stuff below. I'm running this box headless so perhaps that has something to
> do with it?
>
>
> [6] [30245] [1 ] [LOGIN ] [tty1 ] [ ] [Sep 19

Comment out the offending ttys in /etc/inittab.

"Chris Newport" <crn.news@nospam.netunix.com> wrote in message
news:dh7gk2$d6t$1$8302bc10@news.demon.co.uk...
> James Sweet wrote:
> > I've got a SPARCclassic running Debian Linux which is having an odd
issue,
> > and the fact that it's happening with two different flavors of Linux
> > suggests a quirk with the Sun rather than an issue with Linux. Anyway
the
> > wtmp log file is growing at an astonishing rate, 10-15MB a day which is
a
> > whole lot of text! I looked in it and it's filling up with a bunch of
the
> > stuff below. I'm running this box headless so perhaps that has something
to
> > do with it?
> >
> >
> > [6] [30245] [1 ] [LOGIN ] [tty1 ] [ ] [Sep 19
>
> Comment out the offending ttys in /etc/inittab.

But it's *all* the ttys! I need to have at least one of them active so I can
log into it locally if I ever need to do that, of course that involves
plugging in a keyboard and rebooting. Hmm maybe if I boot it with the kb
plugged in then pull it?

James Sweet wrote:
> "Chris Newport" <crn.news@nospam.netunix.com> wrote in message
> news:dh7gk2$d6t$1$8302bc10@news.demon.co.uk...
>
>>James Sweet wrote:
>>
>>>I've got a SPARCclassic running Debian Linux which is having an odd
>
> issue,
>
>>>and the fact that it's happening with two different flavors of Linux
>>>suggests a quirk with the Sun rather than an issue with Linux. Anyway
>
> the
>
>>>wtmp log file is growing at an astonishing rate, 10-15MB a day which is
>
> a
>
>>>whole lot of text! I looked in it and it's filling up with a bunch of
>
> the
>
>>>stuff below. I'm running this box headless so perhaps that has something
>
> to
>
>>>do with it?
>>>
>>>
>>>[6] [30245] [1 ] [LOGIN ] [tty1 ] [ ] [Sep 19
>>
>>Comment out the offending ttys in /etc/inittab.
>
>
> But it's *all* the ttys! I need to have at least one of them active so I can
> log into it locally if I ever need to do that, of course that involves
> plugging in a keyboard and rebooting. Hmm maybe if I boot it with the kb
> plugged in then pull it?

Your serial console is /dev/ttyS0, or something similar.
the tty command will tell you which tty you are on.
So now you can add a few lines to /etc/rc.d/rc.S (or whatever your linux
flavour uses to initialise single user before going multi)

If `tty` returns ttyS0 then cp /etc/inintab.serial /etc/inittab
else cp /etc/inittab.kbd /etc/inittab

Exact implementation is left as an exercise for the reader
IOW it is 0dark30 and I am tired.

>
> Your serial console is /dev/ttyS0, or something similar.
> the tty command will tell you which tty you are on.
> So now you can add a few lines to /etc/rc.d/rc.S (or whatever your linux
> flavour uses to initialise single user before going multi)
>
> If `tty` returns ttyS0 then cp /etc/inintab.serial /etc/inittab
> else cp /etc/inittab.kbd /etc/inittab
>
> Exact implementation is left as an exercise for the reader
> IOW it is 0dark30 and I am tired.
>

I'm not sure I follow, I log in normally using SSH, but on occasion the
machine does get plugged into a monitor and keyboard which is the local TTY,
the serial port TTYA and TTYB are never used.

James Sweet wrote:

> I'm not sure I follow, I log in normally using SSH, but on occasion the
> machine does get plugged into a monitor and keyboard which is the local TTY,
> the serial port TTYA and TTYB are never used.

If the keyboard is not plugged in you are using the serial console
AUTOMATICALY.

"Chris Newport" <crn.news@nospam.netunix.com> wrote in message
news:dhcqnd$5g0$1$8300dec7@news.demon.co.uk...
> James Sweet wrote:
>
> > I'm not sure I follow, I log in normally using SSH, but on occasion the
> > machine does get plugged into a monitor and keyboard which is the local
TTY,
> > the serial port TTYA and TTYB are never used.
>
> If the keyboard is not plugged in you are using the serial console
> AUTOMATICALY.

Ah, still there's only two of those right? I believe what I'm seeing in the
log file are the virtual terminals, there's 8 of them and you can switch
between them by pressing Alt-Fx