[SOLVED]Gentoo Installation Through Serial Console?

[NiceGuy]

Hi everyone,

Does anyone know if it is possible to install Gentoo through a serial console? I mean does the current LiveCD support this, I have attempted but never get anything displayed on my serial console terminal (minicom) on my laptop.

Thanks for your help
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success is the ability to go from one failure to the next without any loss of enthusiasm

[ewaller]

I would think so. If not with a stock CD, with a slightly modified one. All one should have to do is ensure is to enable a serial port login in /etc/inittab.

I have an HP51 calculator with a USB interface that appears as /dev/ttyUSB0 when I attach it. I have a terminal emulator that runs on that calculator which can talk to my laptop as if it is a serial terminal through the above dev node. The cool part, is when X hangs on my laptop, I can plug in the calculator, fire up it's terminal app, and login to my laptop. From there I can command an orderly shutdown. All I had to do was at /dev/ttyUSB0 to /etc/inittab.

My point is, I am certain a serial terminal could be used for an install with an appropriate inittab file.
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Nothing is too wonderful to be true, if it be consistent with the laws of nature -- Michael Faraday

[John R. Graham]

HP-51? What's that? (Closet calculator enthusiast here.)

- John
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I can confirm that I have received between 0 and 499 National Security Letters.

[NiceGuy]

Hi again,

I have been able to (thus far) get the liveCD/liveUSB to transmit to the serial console which will in the end allow me to do the installation through the serial console.
This is what I did:
1. Mounted (then copied) the gentoo livecd iso.
2. Mounted (then copied) the image.squashfs from the within the livecd
3. Edited the image.squashfs/etc/inittab to allow serial console ttyS0
4. Edited image.squashfs/etc/securetty to allow root access for ttyS0 and ttys/0
5. Added "console=ttyS0, 115200n8" to isolinux.cfg kernel line
6. Remastered the iso
7. Rebooted using serial console
8 Done

The only thing left now is I need to find a way to get grub on the liveCD/liveUSB then get the grub menu[/b]to display to the serial console ... again the liveCD uses isolinux as it boot loader not grub.
Thanks
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success is the ability to go from one failure to the next without any loss of enthusiasm

[John R. Graham]

See "Serial terminal: Using GRUB via a serial line" in the grub Texinfo manual. Type

[NiceGuy]

Hi,

[DONAHUE]

putting grub on a usb stick is as simple as:
plug the stick into a linux computer that has grub installed;
if needed, format the stick;
if needed, mount the stick (probably auto mounted already if system is current style {assume /media/disk substitute your value below})

[NiceGuy]

Hi again,

I installed grub onto my USB stick. It appears to boot up my USB grub properly as I can now see the grub menu, however it keeps getting stuck when it is trying to load the kernel on the USB

[NiceGuy]

Here is more information for my particular problem:
grub.conf

[DONAHUE]

usb sticks or drives need the rootdelay=12 (or some other number of seconds) in the kernel line to allow them to "settle" before the root can be read.

does

[NiceGuy]

[NiceGuy]

Hi everyone,

I believe I am very close (but still a ways off). I can get grub to load my kernel ... but as it is booting it complains that

[NiceGuy]

HI again,

Just wanted to close this post ... I posted a complete solution .. here
https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-763379-highlight-.html

That encapsulates this problem
Thanks
_________________
success is the ability to go from one failure to the next without any loss of enthusiasm