How To Configure Linux Console Terminal Serial Ports UNIX Hyper-Terminal

As you may or may not know, UNIX is a command line operating system. Most administrators (like me) have to use the shell on Linux/UNIX systems because they don't have a nice and pretty GUI (Graphical User Interface) A gui is something like windown. A command line doesn't have all the images, instead it only has a prompt, letters and numbers..

How to Configure Linux Console:
Follow these steps to configure the linux machine,box, server,computer or whatever you call it.

Step 1. MAKE BACKUP - You will need to make a backup copy of your inittab, so to do this, send this command.
Code:

cp /etc/inittab /etc/inittab.org

Step 2. CHECK SERIAL PORTS ARE ENABLED: Send this comands to check you have console ports in your motherboard:

Code:

dmesg | grep tty

You will see something like this:

Code:

ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
ttyS1 at I/O 0x2f8 (irq = 3) is a 16550A

Now send this command:

Code:

setserial -g /dev/ttyS[01]

You should see somthing like this:

Code:

/dev/ttyS0, UART: 16550A, Port: 0x03f8, IRQ: 4
/dev/ttyS1, UART: 16550A, Port: 0x02f8, IRQ: 3

NOTE: Sometimes you will need to enable the serial port in your mother baord by going into the BIOS.

Step 3. EDIT INITTAB FILE - To edit the inittab file, execute this command:
Code:

nano /etc/inittab

NOTE: For my example i used the nano text editor, you can use whatever text editor you prefer, like VI Editor.

The inittab file should look something like this:

Code:

#
# inittab This file describes how the INIT process should set up
# the system in a certain run-level.
#
# Author: Miquel van Smoorenburg, <miquels@drinkel.nl.mugnet.org>
# Modified for RHS Linux by Marc Ewing and Donnie Barnes
#

# Default runlevel. The runlevels used by RHS are:
# 0 - halt (Do NOT set initdefault to this)
# 1 - Single user mode
# 2 - Multiuser, without NFS (The same as 3, if you do not have networking)
# 3 - Full multiuser mode
# 4 - unused
# 5 - X11
# 6 - reboot (Do NOT set initdefault to this)
#
id:3:initdefault:

# System initialization.
si::sysinit:/etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit

l0:0:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 0
l1:1:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 1
l2:2:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 2
l3:3:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 3
l4:4:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 4
l5:5:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 5
l6:6:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 6

# Trap CTRL-ALT-DELETE
ca::ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -t3 -r now

# When our UPS tells us power has failed, assume we have a few minutes
# of power left. Schedule a shutdown for 2 minutes from now.
# This does, of course, assume you have powerd installed and your
# UPS connected and working correctly.
pf::powerfail:/sbin/shutdown -f -h +2 "Power Failure; System Shutting Down"

# If power was restored before the shutdown kicked in, cancel it.
pr:12345:powerokwait:/sbin/shutdown -c "Power Restored; Shutdown Cancelled"

# Run gettys in standard runlevels
1:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty1
2:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty2
3:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty3
4:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty4
5:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty5
6:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty6

# Run xdm in runlevel 5
x:5:once:/etc/X11/prefdm -nodaemon

Search for the line where it says: 6:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty6 and add these line:

Code:

# Run agetty on COM1/ttyS0 and COM2/ttyS1
s0:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -L -f /etc/issueserial 9600 ttyS0 vt100
s1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -L -f /etc/issueserial 38400 ttyS1 vt100
#s1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -L -i 38400 ttyS1 vt100

so now your inittab file should look like this:

Code:

#
# inittab This file describes how the INIT process should set up
# the system in a certain run-level.
#
# Author: Miquel van Smoorenburg, <miquels@drinkel.nl.mugnet.org>
# Modified for RHS Linux by Marc Ewing and Donnie Barnes
#

# Default runlevel. The runlevels used by RHS are:
# 0 - halt (Do NOT set initdefault to this)
# 1 - Single user mode
# 2 - Multiuser, without NFS (The same as 3, if you do not have networking)
# 3 - Full multiuser mode
# 4 - unused
# 5 - X11
# 6 - reboot (Do NOT set initdefault to this)
#
id:3:initdefault:

# System initialization.
si::sysinit:/etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit

l0:0:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 0
l1:1:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 1
l2:2:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 2
l3:3:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 3
l4:4:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 4
l5:5:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 5
l6:6:wait:/etc/rc.d/rc 6

# Trap CTRL-ALT-DELETE
ca::ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -t3 -r now

# When our UPS tells us power has failed, assume we have a few minutes
# of power left. Schedule a shutdown for 2 minutes from now.
# This does, of course, assume you have powerd installed and your
# UPS connected and working correctly.
pf::powerfail:/sbin/shutdown -f -h +2 "Power Failure; System Shutting Down"

# If power was restored before the shutdown kicked in, cancel it.
pr:12345:powerokwait:/sbin/shutdown -c "Power Restored; Shutdown Cancelled"

# Run gettys in standard runlevels
1:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty1
2:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty2
3:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty3
4:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty4
5:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty5
6:2345:respawn:/sbin/mingetty tty6

# Run agetty on COM1/ttyS0 and COM2/ttyS1
s0:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -L -f /etc/issueserial 9600 ttyS0 vt100
s1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -L -f /etc/issueserial 38400 ttyS1 vt100
#s1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -L -i 38400 ttyS1 vt100

# Run xdm in runlevel 5
x:5:once:/etc/X11/prefdm -nodaemon

Step 4. ACTIVATE NEW CHANGES - to active the new changes, send this command:
Code:

init q

Step 5. CONFIRM agetty IS LISTENING TO PORTS: send this command to confirm:
Code:

ps -ef | grep agetty

The output should look like this:

Code:

[root@ns3 ~]# ps -ef | grep agetty
root 3526 1 0 09:27 ttyS1 00:00:00 /sbin/agetty -L -f /etc/issueserial 38400 ttyS1 vt100
root 5337 3762 0 10:23 pts/0 00:00:00 grep agetty

Step 6. HOW TO CONNECT FROM PC TO SERVER CONSOLE: Now comes the good part, connecting to your console ports. Now that they have been enabled, you can connect to them. These are the parts (items) things you are going to need to connect:

1 roll-over cable
2 db-9 connectors
post picture

Step 7 - EMULATOR - for this tutorial guide, i will be using windows Hyper-Terminal. These are the step to take to start they hyper-terminal:

Give your connection a name, you can name it whatever you want:
post picture

Select the COM connection, in my exaple i am using COM1
post picture

Make sure to use these setting: 9600 8-N-1
post picture

Now you should be connected to the Shell
post picture

DONE

credit To Van Emery : http://www.vanemery.com/Linux/Serial/serial-console.html

Quote:

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