problems with UUCP and SETGETTY

[Lenny Tropiano]

In article <417 at cpsolv.UUCP> rhg at cpsolv.uucp (Richard H. Gumpertz) writes:
|>I have recently been having problems with UUCICO getting wedged after a 
|>session: 
|>a program named setgetty is running and eating cycles and getty is not getting
|>started.
|>
|>1) Has anyone else had this problem?
..
Yes, those problems are pretty old.  I can't remember the specifics, although
I believe they were fixed.  If they weren't fixed there were public domain
version of setgetty (John Milton wrote) that did the same thing.
|>
|>2) What does setgetty do?
|>
Basically it puts a :, and removes a : from the /etc/inittab file for
a specific port.  It will call init q, to tell init that it changed that
file.  Putting a : in front of a line will basically disable that port
(turn off the getty) and removing the : (assuming respawn is there) will
turn that port back on.

|>3) What are its arguments?
|>
Usage:  setgetty devname state
		 ^^ device (ph0 = ph0, tty000 = 000, tty001 = 001, etc.. )
			 ^^^ state = 0 off, 1 on

|>4) After I kill the hung setgetty, do I have to edit /etc/inittab and then run
|>   telinit q or is that what setgetty was supposed to do?  If so, how do I
|>   retry?
|>
Probably because "setgetty devname 1" hung...


|>5) Any ideas that might lead me to eliminating the setgetty problem?  Any 
|>   ideas what causes it?

A malformed /etc/inittab file may hang setgetty.  Basically if there is no
space in front of a [uu]getty line it *might* lock up uugetty.

|>6) I am using 3.51 standard AT&T uucp.  Is there anything in the 3.51a update
|>   that will help?  Will HDB uucp do better?
|>
I don't think the 3.51a fixdisk did anything for this?!  Don't remember, it
was *ages* ago...  I've been running HDB without any problems, and it does
use the scripts /usr/bin/geton.sh, /usr/bin/getoff.sh which indirectly call
setgetty, without any problems.

-Lenny
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