Remote Single User Mode?

[Bill Campbell]

On Wed, Mar 22, 2006, Kris Kennaway wrote:
>On Wed, Mar 22, 2006 at 10:11:48AM -0800, Chris Maness wrote:
>> In the make file for /usr/src it says I need to boot into single user 
>> mode.  Is this possible from a remote connection (I don't think it is)?  
>> Do I have to be in single user mode to do the following?:
>> 
>> # 5.  `reboot'        (in single user mode: boot -s from the loader prompt).
>> # 6.  `mergemaster -p'
>> # 7.  `make installworld'
>> # 8.  `mergemaster'
>> # 9.  `reboot'
>> 
>> I administer this box by remote.
>
>You absolutely need to in certain situations.  Sometimes (even often)
>you can get away without it, but sometimes your system won't reboot to
>multiuser mode unless you do those steps.
>
>Look into setting up a serial console; this is the "remote single user
>mode" you're looking for.

I have been able to work in single user mode on some systems by getting
somebody with physical access to the box to boot in single user then start
networking and secure shell manually.  Once the sshd daemon was running I
could get to the box from another machine on the LAN.

The last time I did this was on an SCO OpenServer box which started the
networking even in single user mode.  I would have to RTFM to figure out if
and how this can be done with FreeBSD.

Bill
--
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