Linux rc.sysinit script
In appendix A is a listing of the /etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit file. Line numbers have been added for the sake of this discussion.
- The first thing it does is run itself through the system logger
"initlog"(lines 9-11). For more information you can type "man initlog".
- Then it sets a minimal path, "/bin:/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin", (lines 13-15) on my system.
- If the file "/etc/sysconfig/network" exists, it reads it in,
but if it doesn't exist, it disables networking (lines 17-23). The
"/etc/sysconfig/network" file defines your network parameters as
follows:
NETWORKING=yes
FORWARD_IPV4=false
HOSTNAME=mymachine.mycompany.com
DOMAINNAME=mycompany.com
GATEWAY=10.1.0.25
GATEWAYDEV=eth0
These parameters, above are used on many script files later.
- Then a file "/etc/rc.d/init.d/functions" is loaded (lines
25-26) to provide the following functions to this script file. It is
also used later in many other files and is listed in appendix B. It
will be discussed in detail later.
- daemon - Start a program
- killproc - Stop a program
- pidofproc - Find the process ID of a program
- status - Gets the status of a process (running, dead, locked)
- echo_success - Echo OK to the screen in proper colors.
- echo_failure - Echo FAILED to the screen in proper colors.
- echo_passed - Echo PASSED to the screen in proper colors.
- success - Log to the system logger that something succeeded and echo_success if bootup is verbose
- failure - Log that something failed and echo_failure if verbose bootup.
- passed - Log that something passed and echo_passed if verbose bootup.
- action - Run some action, log output to the system logger.
- confirm - Confirm whether we want to run this service.
- The program "/sbin/loglevel" is used to set the initial
loglevel (lines 28-29) which is initially set to 1 in
/etc/rc.d/init.d/functions". This controls the level of the messages
printed to the console. Each message has a loglevel numeric value
dependent on its importance to the system. This program sets the
console loglevel. The kernel will print messages of a lower loglevel
value than that set. The loglevels are as follows:
- 0 - The system is unusable
- 1 - Action must be taken immediately
- 2 - Critical condition
- 3 - Error condition
- 4 - Warning condition
- 5 - Normal but significant condition
- 6 - Informational
- 6 - Debug message
For more information try typing "man syslog" or "man syslogd".
- It sets and loads the keymap for the console (lines 31-47).
Line 36 gets the KEYTABLE variable value which is normally "us" in the
United States. On lines 37 to 39, if the string KEYTABLE is not of
length 0, and the directory /usr/lib/kbd/keymaps exists, the KEYMAP
string is made equal to the string KEYTABLE which was retrieved from
the file /etc/sysconfig/keyboard. The easy way to modify the key
settings for the system is to modify the file /etc/sysconfig/keyboard
to a new default value such as
KEYTABLE="/etc/sysconfig/console/mykeymap". Type "man keymaps" or "man
loadkeys" for more information.
- The system font is loaded by running a script program
/sbin/setsysfont (lines 49-52). This program will load/run the program
"/etc/sysconfig/i18n" which can set font variables including language
and possibly a screen font map and a user defined application charset
map. It will first try to set these fonts using the program
"consolechars" and if it can't find it, will use the program "setfont".
- The swap device specified in the file "/etc/fstab" is enabled
for file swapping (lines 54-55) which is basically the same as the
operating system using hard drive space like system memory. For more
information type "man swapon" or "man swapoff".
- The host name and NIS domain name are then set (lines 57-62).
Type "man hostname", "man domainname", "man dnsdomainname", or "man
nisdomainname" for more information. The NIS domain defines a group of
computers that share configuration information. It consists of a host
being the master server of the domain and all the other servers and
clients rely on the master host for their configuration information.
Normally most computers do not participate in an NIS domain. The
program domainname can be used to set any of the domain name
parameters.
- The options for the file system check are set up as
"fsckoptions" (lines 67-75). If the file /fsckoptions exists, its
contents are placed in the variable "fsckoptions" to be used later in
this script file when the filesystem check is done.
- If the file "/fastboot" exists the system filechecking is
skipped. The system file checking uses the programs fsck and initlog
(lines 77-112). Type "man fsck", "man initlog" for more information.
Depending on the error returned by fsck (file system check), if file
system errors exist and were not corrected the system will attempt a
super user login to allow the administrator to try to fix problems and
then unmounts all file systems and performs a reboot. See "man
sulogin", "man umount", and "man reboot".
- If the file "/proc/cmdline" contains the text "nopnp", then
pnp ability is disabled. If PNP (plug and play) is enabled, and the
file "/sbin/isapnp" is executable, and the file "/etc/isapnp.conf"
exists, the executable file "/sbin/isapnp" is used with the
"/etc/isapnp.conf" file to set up ISA PNP devices (lines 118-131). For
more information, type "man isapnp", "man isapnp.conf", or "man true".
- Then the root filesystem is remounted in read-write mode(
LINES 133-134). Type "man mount" for more information. Note: remount is
an option of the program mount.
- If an error was corrected in the filesystem in step 11 above,
a quota check is run (lines 136-143). This does a filesystems scan for
usage of files and directories. Type "man quotacheck", "man quotaon",
or "man quotaoff" for more information.
- The string "IN_INITLOG" is cleared (lines 145-147).
- If the file "/etc/HOSTNAME" does not exist, the hostname from
the file "/etc/sysconfig/network" is echoed to it so programs that use
this file will work.(lines 149-151).
- The file "/etc/mtab" is cleared (lines 153-154). Then the
files sytems "/ " (root) and "/proc" are mounted into mtab (lines
156-158). Type "man mount" for more information".
- The ability to use modules is disabled, if the file "/proc/cmdline" contains the text "nomodules" (lines 160-164).
- Set up soft links for module-info and the System.map file.
Uses the version of the kernel to determine required setup, then find
module dependencies by running "depmod -a". Type "man depmod" for more
information (lines 166-188).
- The sound modules are loaded (lines 190-206). If USEMODULES
is not empty and the file "/etc/conf.modules" contains the text "alias
sound" or "alias midi" then the object modules from the subdirectories
"/etc/sound" or "/etc/midi" are loaded respectively. If the file
"/proc/sys/kernel/modprobe" exists, and USEMODULES is enabled, the
text"/sbin/modprobe" is written to the file
"/proc/sys/kernel/modprobe".
- RAID devices are added (lines 208-236). If the normal file
"proc/mdstat" and "etc/raidtab" and the executable file "/sbin/raidadd"
exist then raid devices are started using the program "/sbin/raidadd".
Reading the man page for raidadd tells us that this is an obsolete RAID
command. If raidadd returns 0 another obsolete RAID command "raidrun"
is attempted. If this returns an error, a superuser login (sulogin) is
done, filesystems are unmounted and a reboot is done.
- File systems are checked again with minor differences between this step and step 11 (lines 238-272).
- All other filesystems except for NFS and /proc are mounted
(they are already mounted). nonfs, smbfs, ncpfs, and proc are mounted
(lines 274-277).
- If the executable file "/sbin/quotaon" exists it is run (lines 279-281).
- The following files are deleted: /etc/mtab~, /fastboot
/fsckoptions /forcefsck (lines 283-307). The file /var/run/utmp is
cleared. The time of file /var/run/wtmp is updated (See "man touch").
File permissions and groups are changed for "/var/run/utmp" and
/var/run/wtmp". Other files deleted are: "/var/lock/console.lock",
"/var/lock/console/*", "/var/lock/LCK*", "/var/lock/subsys/*",
"/var/run/*.pid", "/tmp/.X*-lock", and "/tmp/.s.PGSQL.*".
- The system clock is set (lines 309-350). The file
"/etc/sysconfig/clock" is loaded. The values ARC and UTC are set
dependent on the values in "/etc/sysconfig/clock" and CLOCKMODE. In my
systems case, these are both false. The string values "$CLOCK" and
"$CLOCKFLAGS" are set up dependent on files and options as shown below.
If the file "/sbin/hwclock" exists, it will be run with the option
"hctos" to set the system time from the hardware clock. Also the option
"—adjust" is added to adjust for clock drift. If the above file
"/sbin/hwclock" doesn't exist the "/sbin/clock" program will be run. If
the "UTC" option is enabled then the "-u" option is added to
CLOCKFLAGS. This allows for the hardware clock to be set in Coordinated
Universal Time rather than local time.
- Swap space is turned on (lines 352-354). Type "man swapon" for more information.
- The serial ports are initialized (lines 356-359). If the file
"/etc/rc.d/rc.serial" it is loaded resident. It doesn't exist on my
system.
- Load modules (for backward compatibility with VARs) (lines
361-364). If the file "/etc/rc.d/rc.modules" exists, it is loaded. The
script does not indicate it is loaded resident, but I wonder if this is
a typo???
- If a SCSI tape is detected, load the st module unconditionally (lines 366-375).
- Set the preferred X display manager link (lines 377-400). If
the file "/etc/sysconfig/desktop" contains the text "GNOME" preferred
is set to "gdm". If "KDE" it is set to kde. If "AnotherLevel" it is set
to xdm. In the statement "if [-n "$preferred" ] && which
$preferred >/dev/null 2>&1;" the condition is met if the
string "$preferred" has length, and the program "which" has any error
or standard output greater than null.
- Dump the syslog ring so we can find it later (lines 402-404).
The program dmesg is used to output the kernel logging to the file
"/var/log/dmesg". Type "man dmesg" for more information.
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