Panic on boot. How do I get a kernel dump.

[Kris Kennaway]

On Fri, Apr 27, 2007 at 04:22:48PM -0700, Tom Cumming wrote:
> On 4/27/07, Peter Jeremy <peterjeremy at optushome.com.au> wrote:
> 
> >1) It is a production server that can't be left down for extended periods.
> 
> 
>   Yup.  I.e., the dump provides a snapshot of the full state of the system
> at the moment of the panic. This snapshot can be examined at leisure, a
> customer could ftp the dump to a qualified engineer, etc.
> 
> 2) It is a remote system without remote console access.
> 
> 
>   .. or number 3) I can use my existing dump analysis tools and scripts to
> examine the dump, and I cannot run the scripts from the console prompt.
> 
> Lets put the original question slightly differently:  How can the
> >kernel state be saved if the kernel crashes before it's possible to
> >invoke dumpon(8)?
> 
> 
> I don't follow the geom code... is there a place in geom where I could put
> something like, geom->dumpdev = "mydevice"?
> 
> Or ...
> >Since dumpdev is now intertwined with geom and the geom tasting is
> >quite late in the boot process, I agree that the current crashdump
> >code does not seem amenable to use early in the boot process.
> 
> does  this mean even hard coding the dumpdev won't work? If so, then maybe
> the, "your sol" statement is correct.

Hmm, guess I needed a bigger font :(

Kris