From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Jun 30 10:49:44 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 28E6D106566B for ; Thu, 30 Jun 2011 10:49:44 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from feenberg@nber.org) Received: from mail2.nber.org (mail2.nber.org [66.251.72.79]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3F55E8FC0A for ; Thu, 30 Jun 2011 10:49:42 +0000 (UTC) Received: from nber9.nber.org (nber9.nber.org [66.251.72.81]) by mail2.nber.org (8.14.4/8.14.4) with ESMTP id p5UAnTLp033883 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NOT); Thu, 30 Jun 2011 06:49:31 -0400 (EDT) (envelope-from feenberg@nber.org) Received: from localhost (feenberg@localhost) by nber9.nber.org (8.14.4/8.14.4/Submit) with ESMTP id p5UAnPQh023450; Thu, 30 Jun 2011 06:49:26 -0400 X-Authentication-Warning: nber9.nber.org: feenberg owned process doing -bs Date: Thu, 30 Jun 2011 06:49:25 -0400 (EDT) From: Daniel Feenberg To: perryh@pluto.rain.com In-Reply-To: <4e0c0548.eW27hshSLoLhhTu1%perryh@pluto.rain.com> Message-ID: References: <4E0B540B.3090400@comcast.net> <4e0c0548.eW27hshSLoLhhTu1%perryh@pluto.rain.com> User-Agent: Alpine 2.00 (LFD 1167 2008-08-23) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed X-Anti-Virus: Kaspersky Anti-Virus for Linux Mail Server 5.6.39/RELEASE, bases: 20110630 #5690619, check: 20110630 clean Cc: freebsd-net@freebsd.org, korvus@comcast.net, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Question about NIC link state initialization X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 30 Jun 2011 10:49:44 -0000 On Wed, 29 Jun 2011, perryh@pluto.rain.com wrote: > Steve Polyack wrote: > >> ... An occaisional fat-finger in /etc/fstab may cause one to >> end up in single-user mode ... some of these systems have a LOM >> (lights-out management) controller which shares the system's >> on-board NICs ... when the system drops out of init(8) and into >> single-user mode, the links on the interfaces never come up, >> and therefore the LOM becomes inaccessible. >> >> ... all one has to do is run ifconfig to cause the NIC's links to >> come up ... why do we have to run ifconfig(8) to bring the links >> up on the attached interfaces? > > When trying to troubleshoot a problem that was known or suspected to > involve the network or its hardware, one might not _want_ the NICs Well, maybe, but if the system needs to boot into multi-user mode for the LOM to be available, what is the need for the LOM? At that point you can do everything you might need through the OS interface. Can I ask what is the brand of this so-called LOM? Is there any documentation implying something more useful? Do they describe doing a bare metal install of an OS? Daniel Feenberg