From owner-freebsd-questions  Thu Aug 31 13:45:49 2000
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Date: Thu, 31 Aug 2000 13:44:14 -0700
From: John Zwiebel <jzwiebel@cisco.com>
Organization: cisco Systems
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Subject: /etc/ttys and "headless" systems
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HI:

Can I ask you guys to consider doing something to help
out folks who have headless systems?

By default you don't enable the serial console in 
/etc/ttys.  I realize that its important to have
the extra security.

However, I can't tell you the number of times this
has frustrated me when loading a new version of
FreeBSD.  Although I make sure that I have a 
username that I can use to telnet in with and then
SU to, and then the first thing I do is to manually
change /etc/ttys so I can get getty running
on the serial console and can log in as root.  
For some "god only knows" reason, this doesn't
always work for me.  When I reboot, I end up with
no way to get into my PC.  (Yes, I "should" be able
to use the fixit floppy, but that's never worked for
me and I've never figured out enough systems 
information to determine what it is I need to do.)

So, I'd appreciate it if you'd consider making
the serial console on by default.

I recognize that there are conflicting goals to
be achieved here and that there are probably very
few installations like the one I have (no VGA card
no keyboard, no mouse, just a serial console).

Thanks for considering it. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
	John Zwiebel                       Phone: 408-526-5303
	Cisco Systems Inc.                 
	IP Multicast Group


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